In mid-July, after it received numerous public and private complaints, the University of San Diego withdrew its invitation to a feminist theologian to hold an endowed chair during the fall 2009 semester. Now, some faculty members and Roman Catholic groups are protesting the Catholic university’s decision, which they say prioritized Catholic doctrine over academic freedom.

The university said it had decided Rosemary Radford Ruether was the wrong person for the prestigious post because of her service on the Board of Directors of the abortion-rights organization Catholics for Choice. “Her public position and the symbol of this chair are in direct conflict,” a university spokeswoman, Pamela Gray Payton, told The San Diego Union-Tribune.

Two thousand people, including 50 faculty members at San Diego, have signed a petition supporting Ms. Ruether. The petition, sponsored by two women’s religious groups, asks the university either to appoint Ms. Ruether to the position or to host her on the campus for a lecture on academic freedom.

The university had invited Ms. Ruether to hold the Monsignor John R. Portman Chair in Roman Catholic Theology, a post that would have entailed teaching a course, giving a public lecture, and serving as a mentor for junior faculty members. The invitation drew cries of protest from Catholics who argued that Ms. Ruether’s support of abortion rights is incompatible with Roman Catholic beliefs. —Allie Grasgreen