In a culture that is often hostile or indifferent to the Catholic faith, Catholic religious educators need to be aware of the challenges and obstacles they must face as they hand on the faith to others.

That is why William Donohue has been invited to open the Diocese of Peoria’s annual Diocesan Summer Institute next month.

Donohue, president and CEO of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and author of three books on civil liberty, will deliver a keynote address at 8:30 a.m. on Friday, June 11, to open the two-day event hosted at St. Vincent de Paul Parish, Peoria.

He will also be one of the speakers at a pre-Institute Clergy Day at noon on Thursday, June 10.

In his talk, Donohue will sketch a picture of the great harm that secularism has been doing to religion and culture in America, touching on themes addressed in his forthcoming book, “Secular Sabotage,” due out this September.

“I’m going to be talking about where we’re really at in the culture war,” he said. “We’ve been in a culture war for several decades. Who’s going to win, I don’t know.”

“We have challenges coming at us from all over,” Donohue said, including multiculturalist philosophy, Hollywood and entertainment, public schools and academia, the artistic community, “sexual engineers,” legal activists, and dissident elements within Catholicism and Protestantism. “No institution is unaffected,” he said.

“The challenges are real. They’re palpable. In my lifetime I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” said Donohue.

An effective response demands devout Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Muslims or Mormons to set aside their theological differences and cooperate to defend religious faith and family life, he said. “We’re the only ones who can do anything about it. The problems won’t go away just through good will,” said Donohue.

For more information on workshops and speakers, or to download a registration form, visit the Web site of the Diocese of Peoria at www.cdop.org and click on the link for the 2009 Summer Institute. Information is also available from the Office of Catechetics at (309) 671-1550, ext. 283.