Catholic School Scraps Killea Conference : Education: Senator’s appearance was canceled to avoid embarrassing bishop who denied her Communion because of her abortion stand.

Administrators at the University of San Diego canceled an on-campus political conference last month because of their concern that state Sen. Lucy Killea’s involvement would be an affront to Catholic Bishop Leo T. Maher, whose clash with Killea over the abortion issue generated a national controversy last fall.

Revelation of the cancellation has brought criticism from Catholic theologians and others who called the action an infringement of academic freedom.

The conference, which was to have been co-sponsored by USD’s political science department and a La Jolla consulting firm, was scrapped because of university leaders’ concern that Killea’s planned appearance would be “inappropriate,” a university spokesman said.

During last fall’s state Senate campaign, Maher told Killea that he would deny her Communion because of the San Diego Democrat’s advocacy of abortion rights--igniting a political and religious firestorm that figured in her upset victory in a special election for the Senate.

USD President Author Hughes, who prohibited the conference from being held on the Catholic campus, said Friday that he “did not regard this an an academic freedom issue.”

“The problem was not what Mrs. Killea has said, what her personal convictions are, what her relationship is to the church,” Hughes said. “The issue was whether or not it was appropriate for this institution to make her a guest . . . in view of the recent conflict. My judgment was that’s inappropriate, because it would be viewed by the Catholic community as an affront to the bishop.”

When he discussed the matter with Maher, the bishop shared his concern, saying, as Hughes recalled, “Yes, there could be some difficulties.”

Killea, who received a master’s degree at USD, said: “I didn’t really look upon the conference as an olive branch, but I thought, well, maybe this will help us get back to normal business and put this other stuff behind us. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way.”

USD began as a college owned and operated by the San Diego diocese, but became an independent Catholic university in 1972. Maher is head of USD’s Board of Trustees.

On Friday, revelation of the conference cancellation triggered a debate about academic freedom.

“Academia is supposed to be the place where various views are discussed and debated in a reasonable fashion,” said Father Thomas Reese, a fellow at Georgetown University’s Woodstock Theological Center. “It’s difficult to do that when you start barring people because of their views.”

Similarly, Jonathan Knight, the associate secretary for the Washington-based American Assn. of University Professors, called USD’s action “clearly inconsistent” with the principles of academic freedom.

But Sister Alice Gallin, executive director of the Assn. of Catholic Colleges and Universities, also in Washington, disagreed. “I don’t see any academic freedom involved,” Gallin said, defining academic freedom as the unfettered rights of professors to teach and carry out research.

“What is involved here is institutional autonomy, the judgment that something or someone is not appropriate for their institution at this particular time.”