Dolan confesses to being “not athletic at all,” but she’s always been a fan of the game and is a self-described stats and sabermetrics geek. She grew up in Chicago going to White Sox games and watching her brothers play. Baseball is also all over her Twitter feed, where she reveals herself to be a droll and thoughtful observer of sports, politics, and culture.

A Multireligious Upbringing

Dolan was also powerfully influenced by religion. Her family alternated between attending Catholic Mass and a Unitarian church, where her mother was the religious education director. And one of her grandmothers is an ordained Episcopal minister.

“I remember my mom giving sermons at Unity Temple as a kid, and then, when we went to St. Pat’s, it was difficult to see that only men could do that,” Dolan said recently over coffee at a café near Nationals Park and the Washington, D.C., home she shares with her husband and two dogs. “You almost get vertigo watching it.”

Fueled by a desire to understand why women don’t have an equal role in the church, Dolan pursued theology and religious studies in college, spending three years at L’Institut Catholique de Paris (her father was working in Amsterdam at the time, and she already spoke French) before graduating from the University of San Diego.

A Shared Sense of Humor

In 2015, Dolan took a job covering the Oakland A’s for Comcast SportsNet. A multitasker, she also worked as a speech writer (which she does full time now) and tried her hand at comedy writing.

A friendship with pitcher Brandon McCarthy, then a starter for the A’s and a fledgling comedy writer himself, led to an introduction that changed Dolan’s life. McCarthy thought she and his teammate Doolittle might hit it off. Five years and one Star Wars-themed marriage proposal later, the pair made it official on October 2.

We had the afternoon off so we eloped and we’ve never been happier pic.twitter.com/NrVB7Klf3R

— Eireann Dolan (@EireannDolan) October 3, 2017

That capped a busy stretch for the couple. Doolittle was traded from the A’s to the Nats in mid-July, reporting to the team about 12 hours later.

“It was an adventure, and you learn what you’re capable of,” Dolan said, laughing. She admitted guiltily to asking for one academic extension, directing her professor to her Twitter feed if he didn’t believe the reason.

A Passion for Social Causes

About that Twitter account. Dolan and Doolittle have a teasing, playful relationship online, with Dolan recording a video tossing out all of Doolittle’s stuff (including his Love Actually DVD) after he lost the “Face of MLB” contest to Buster Posey, or posting his awkward high school photos.

But they also use the platform to promote causes they believe in, including LGBTQ rights, aid to Syrian refugees, support for military veterans, and mental health issues. Those values drew the pair together, according to Doolittle.

“I would say that our general mission in life is firmly rooted in the Beatitudes and the imperative of Matthew 25:40,” he said of his and his wife’s commitment to social justice. “We are called to have an option for the marginalized, the oppressed, the ‘least among us.’”

In that vein, Dolan hopes ultimately to engage in one-on-one prison ministry with inmates and parolees.

She applied to Fordham’s online master’s degree program in pastoral studies late last year and started taking courses last spring, calling the program “very portable with my life.” She’s planning to increase her course load from one to two courses per session next year, and she’ll take an intensive on-campus session next summer.

In the meantime, she’s also planning a wedding.

“My big, Irish-Catholic family felt left out,” Dolan said of their elopement. So there will be a January ceremony in Chicago. She added, with a wink, that she’s counting on the cold weather to keep the guest list down. “It’s Darwinism as a wedding!”

—Julie Bourbon

That was the question posed by J. Patrick Hornbeck, chair of the Department of Theology, to kick off “Dear Mr. President: Catholic Social Teaching, Civil Discourse, and the Trump Presidency,” a discussion presented by Fordham University’s Department of Theology and Office of Alumni Relations, featuring a distinguished panel of theologians, scholars, and journalists.

The question did not elicit a simple answer.

The panelists, Christine Emba, a Washington Post columnist; David Gibson, a national reporter of Religion News Service; Natalia Imperatori-Lee, Ph.D., FCRH ’98, associate professor of religious studies at Manhattan College; and Bryan Massingale, S.T.D., professor of theology at Fordham, brought complexities to the discussion— which was held at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus on Jan. 26.

Father Massingale said that truth is essential in discussing the incoming policies of President Trump, who won 52 percent of the Catholic vote, according to a Pew national exit poll. Whether Catholics identify as liberals, conservatives, Democrats, or Republicans, civil discourse cannot exist without “a respect for the truth,” he said.

Imperatori-Lee noted that Catholic social teaching also requires a place in our national discourse to speak the truth; she said this has been a challenge in recent days.

“The relationship between the way in which our nation is being governed right now and Catholic social teaching seem to be two realities that almost cannot come into dialogue at this point,” she said.

Part of seeking and finding truth is accepting the realities of the election, said Emba, who believes that one of the most important questions facing Catholics today is “what do we do next?”

“I think that the pursuit of the human good was set aside during the election in favor of partisan discussions and anger, and [pursuing]that will be the work of the administration both in the first six days and going forward,” she said.

Speaking “truth to power” 

Father Massingale highlighted the dichotomy between law and morality, and how that has contributed to polarization both within and outside of the Catholic community. But Catholics still have a moral obligation to stand up for the poor, what is sacred, and their convictions, he said.

“Trump may have won the presidency, but that election did not un-elect my conscience,” he said.

Imperatori-Lee said that in the weeks ahead, Catholics may find themselves on the “periphery” but must protect vulnerable populations. “This is our deepest Catholic calling,” she said.

Embracing Catholic social teaching in its totality

Some discussion focused on the visceral connection that many Catholics have to certain contentious issues. During the election, issues such as gay marriage and a woman’s right to choose took precedence over the totality of Catholic social teaching, which encompasses everything from the death penalty to economic and racial injustices, panelists said.

“I think that we as a church need to find a way to make all of those issues part of our identity, and also think about why we’re focusing on some and not particularly interested in talking about others,” said Emba.

Bringing all aspects of Catholic social teaching to the forefront requires a firm commitment to the Catholic tradition of civil disobedience, particularly against unjust laws, Father Massingale said.

“Civil disobedience is something that’s not only deeply American, it is also something that’s deeply Christian,” he said. “It’s founded on the basic conviction that human law is not absolute. Human law has legitimacy only when it is moral, and there’s a difference between legal legitimacy and moral legitimacy.”

As the discussion came to an end, the panelists were asked to share their vision for the future as the country prepares for the next four years under Trump’s administration.

“What I just keep saying to people is that the reason that Trump is president is because people voted for him,” said Gibson, who encouraged the audience to become proactive during a Trump presidency. He later continued, “Our problem is we’re partisan. We need to be political, and that means we work with people who disagree with us.”