According to the article this man is a friend to the current pope. This is from Naples news which offers a wealth inside dirt on Ave Maria, if you google the site specifically. Anyway, here is a portion of the article.

Top Ave Maria official dismissed By Daily News staff Originally published 2:55 p.m., March 21, 2007 Updated 4:41 p.m., March 21, 2007 The provost at Ave Maria University, once a student of the current pope, has been asked to resign his position immediately. Provost Joseph Fessio sent an e-mail shortly after 2 p.m. today to members of the Ave Maria community, saying he been asked to resign and leave the campus immediately. His brief e-mail reads: "To the Ave Maria University community: I have been asked to resign my position as provost and leave the campus immediately. I will miss Ave Maria and the many of you whom I hold dear. Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J."

If you scroll down, there is some interesting statements in the comments sections about what those differences might be. I found this comment to be particularly interesting.

Posted by bicoastal (anonymous) at 4:01 p.m. on March 21, 2007 (Suggest removal) AMU needs more money. ------------------------------------ School's slow growth prompts funding plea Costly tuition prices, lofty academic and maturity requirements and an inching accreditation process could stall the growth of Collier County's most ambitious project. In a recent letter to Ave Maria University supporters, Provost Joseph Fessio wrote that enrollment and retention numbers at the stringent, private Catholic college are low. The problems are contributing to "a probable added deficit," which he referred to as a "crisis." "It isn't that we did not plan for it," Fessio wrote in a letter, dated Oct. 18. "But as a situation unfolds, the problem (or sometimes even a crisis) becomes crystal clear." AMU needs more students. The ideal growth of the school and 5,000-acre town, to be located between Immokalee and Naples in eastern Collier County, depends on it. After disclosing a laundry list of problems the school has with recruitment and retention, Fessio made a serious plea to potential donors to fund merit and need-based scholarships so more students could have the opportunity to attend. "To that end, I'm starting a task force of Regents to raise money precisely for scholarships that will help us increase our enrollment and retention," Fessio wrote. "Without such a scholarship fund, we are going to incur deficits over the next few years which will be unsustainable." www.naplesnews.com

I think this is interesting because it indicates that wealthy opus dei members are just too narrow a customer base to sustain a university or a town. Not that this will phase the church hierarchy. Santorum seems to still believe his message has appeal dispite massive defeat. Anyway, if McCloskey and Monohan seriously want the church to dwindle down to just people who want to go to ave maria, they might end up with no church at all.