Christian Values Unwelcome!
By
Paul M. Weyrich
Toogood Reports [Wednesday, December 17, 2003; 12:01 a.m. ET]
URL:
http://ToogoodReports.com/
Georgetown University prides itself upon being one of America's finest universities. Not only does it boast a living former president, William Clinton, as one of its alumni, its reputation for academic excellence has grown over the years.
Georgetown University President John J. DeGoia welcomes visitors to the university's webpage by noting that the school retains the Catholic and Jesuit identity that was central to its founding in 1789. Crucifixes are displayed in many classrooms and daily masses are held on campus for those students who are Catholic.
However, not all Christian principles are welcome on this Catholic campus.
Catholics represented just 55% of the student body in 2000. The university's "diversity" is perhaps better reflected in the adherence to Politically Correct norms -- not Catholic doctrine -- by many members of the administration and faculty.
Recently, two members of the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property's student group were distributing fliers in the university's so-called Red Square -- a "designated free speech zone." The fliers were registering dissent to the Supreme Court's decision on Lawrence vs. Texas that declared Texas' anti-sodomy laws to be unconstitutional. The fliers made clear TFP's intention to work "untiringly to create a moral atmosphere whereby homosexuality is rejected" and to do so "loudly and firmly, legally and peacefully, in defense of Christian morals."
The flier left no doubt that the active practice of homosexuality was a sinful activity, but it made clear that to display "true charity" toward homosexuals is to demonstrate to them the sinfulness of their lives and to encourage them to abandon "their deplorable state." It quoted Pope John Paul II: What is not morally acceptable, however, is the legalization of homosexual acts. To show understanding towards the person who sins, towards the person who is not in the process of freeing himself from this tendency, does not at all mean to diminish the demands of the moral norm….
For that Georgetown University's Interim Vice President for Student Affairs, Todd Olson, had decided to eject the TFP student members who had been distributing the pamphlet despite the fact that it had been passed out in the so-called "free speech zone."
Catholic World News quoted Olson: "The individuals removed from campus were spreading a message that was grossly offensive, and I view the removal as entirely appropriate."
Olson also sent a campus-wide e-mail to reassure the university that there was no place on campus for Politically Incorrect speech, even when it came to reasoned criticisms of the homosexual lifestyle. "Intolerance and invective have no place at Georgetown," the e-mail said in a section addressed to the campus' homosexual community.
No doubt many members of Georgetown University's student body and faculty view this incident as a decisive rebuke to those whom they consider purveyors of intolerance.
Yet, when Francis Cardinal Arinze delivered the commencement address at Georgetown last spring many of the students and faculty demonstrated their own intolerance by walking out when he spoke in defense of the traditional family and against those forces and lifestyles that undermine it.
One professor of theology walked off the stage as Cardinal Arinze was speaking. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution quoted a member of the history department's faculty calling the Cardinal's remarks "wildly inappropriate" for a commencement ceremony. Another faculty member, a Catholic priest no less, maintained the good Cardinal draws a paycheck to say such statements, but he claimed that they were inappropriate to say at a graduation ceremony. Students also walked out during the speech.
Jane McAuliffe, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, expressed regret that members of the students and faculty would be upset by Cardinal Arinze's remarks even though he was expressing a viewpoint fully in consonance with Catholic doctrine on the campus of an ostensibly Catholic university.
Many institutions in this country have lost touch with their original intentions, including Georgetown University.
Five decades ago, it would have been unthinkable for the incidents described above to have occurred on the campus of a Catholic educational institution such as Georgetown University.
What should Christians do? Some have chosen to take brave stands and attempt to reclaim fallen institutions. They have taken upon themselves a difficult task and deserve our support as lone voices of truth reaching out to those who most need to hear it. However, they have chosen a task against which the diversity bunch has stacked the odds, against Christians and the truths they represent.
Others have formed their own institutions. Home schooling is one example. Many Christian families have found the public and even religious schools to be wanting, and provide instruction to their own children at home. What was once considered to be outside the mainstream is gaining more acceptance. Another new institution is Patrick Henry College, which deliberately reaches out to homeschooled students.
Nor is that the only institution formed to speak the truth. Christendom College was formed just over a quarter century ago, and its mission is to provide a quality education that respects the teachings of the Catholic Church.
My own daughter, Diana, is an alumna so I speak with firsthand knowledge. A third of Christendom's incoming students this year were homeschooled. The college received the highest classification among baccalaureate colleges in America from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Many Christians and Jews of faith, when presented with something that runs smack up against the truth, as happens so frequently on the campus of Georgetown University and other fallen institutions of higher learning, believe they must grin and bear it. Not so. The experiences of homeschoolers, Patrick Henry College and Christendom College demonstrate that we have the power to find our own solutions and make them work. We need more such efforts.