Two male students at George Washington University have entered into a homosexual relationship with each other. This kind of behavior is tolerated these days, and the two students are under no real pressure to alter their lifestyle. Nor do they have any reason to fear that the school will impose disciplinary action on them.
Nonetheless, they perceive mere disapproval of their relationship as a form of unacceptable intolerance. In addition, according to the GW Hatchet, the school’s independent student newspaper, “they aren’t going to take it anymore.”
The target of their outrage is the Newman Center’s chaplain, Father Greg Shaffer, who has worked at the Center for five years. Father Shaffer is simply doing what he is supposed to be doing, which includes upholding the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church. The Church has consistently taught for more than 2,000 years that homosexual acts are intrinsically wrong.
But if it is the doctrine that is at fault, then the target at which Damian Legacy and Blake Bergen have set their sights goes far beyond a single priest, but to the entire Catholic Church of which Fr. Shaffer is just a small part. Conquering the Church will prove a most daunting task, one that Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, and others who had far more ammunition at their disposal could not achieve. The Church has an inveterate propensity of not altering her doctrine in the face of mere disapproval. At the same time, the Church has won many converts who have come to approve her teaching.
Although Fr. Shaffer is not preventing Damian and Blake from doing what they want to do, they are campaigning vigorously to prevent him from doing what he is obliged to do, namely to be faithful to his priestly obligations. Apparently tolerance is a one-way street—tolerance for me but not for thee—and diversity is a variety of one. The two protestors have submitted their report to the school’s Office for Diversity. Presumably, they would not object if Fr. Shaffer is replaced by a heretic who obsequiously cow-tows to a particular interest group. If that eventuated, other interest groups—Catholic ones, for example—might have real reasons to object.
In his defense, Fr. Shaffer told the Hatchet (an appropriate name at George Washington, and now used for attempting to cut down something other than a cherry tree) that religion and unrestricted speech “play a vital role at a diverse university like GW.” His preference seems to be a reasonable alternative to a one-sided “monoversity.”
In upholding the Gospel, a priest assumes the obligation of opposing what opposes the Gospel. This is a matter of logic. If one values his computer, he opposes someone stealing it. Thus, a good priest opposes adultery, bigamy, and domestic violence. Yet, while he opposes such activities, adulterers, bigamists, and spouse abusers are not campaigning to get him removed because they feel that they are victims of his intolerance. Nor are they ever heard complaining, as Legacy claimed, that they are suffering from “the destruction” of their “human dignity.” Dignity, being a permanent and spiritual reality, is not subject to being destroyed. But is anyone concerned about the assault on Fr. Shaffer’s dignity?
Who is really intolerant in this melodrama, the priest or the homosexual pair? The view that homosexual congress is immoral is one that has been shared down through the ages by the vast majority of people who have populated this planet. Would members of the Flat Earth Society find unacceptably intolerant those who hold to the shape of the earth that is generally accepted? Would they seek to force them to see the world their way? One can disagree without being disagreeable. One should be able to make a point without making an enemy.
Fr. Shaffer is being very selfless in the matter. As he told the Hatchet, “as Vatican II states, God is the author of marriage. He defined marriage as between a man and a woman.” Apparently, Vatican II as well as the Bible must be dismantled in order to appease the disgruntled duo.
People hold in disapproval the activities of pyromaniacs and kleptomaniacs, but they do not turn the world upside down in order to accommodate them. The first moral obligation is to determine whether a particular action is good or bad, moral or immoral. It is not to assume that a particular action should be immune from criticism and anyone who disapproves of it should be vilified and ridiculed. We begin with understanding and proceed with kindness.
One hopes that school authorities at George Washington University will have the good sense and moral courage to invoke principles of fairness (along with concern for tolerance and diversity) and allow Fr. Shaffer to remain as the Newman Center’s chaplain. The school should not capitulate to the intimidation tactics and the discriminatory attitudes of two students. Rather, it should uphold the importance of religion on campus and the witness of a Catholic priest who dares to be a man of integrity.
Homosexual acts should not rule the world. This issue, however, can be properly adjudicated independently of the homosexual issue and solely on grounds of tolerance, freedom of speech, and respect for a diversity of opinion. Nonetheless, the actions of these two students brings to the surface, once again, serious concerns about a growing hostility toward anyone who defends marriage between a man and a woman, an institution long regarded as the bedrock of society.
Dr. Donald DeMarco is a Senior Fellow of Human Life International. He is professor emeritus at St. Jerome’s University in Waterloo, Ontario, an adjunct professor at Holy Apostles College in Cromwell, CT, and a regular columnist for St. Austin Review. His latest works, How to Remain Sane in a World That is Going Mad and Poetry That Enters the Mind and Warms the Heart are available through Amazon.com.
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