At Harvard College, the Office of Student Life has placed the student religious group Harvard College Faith and Action on “administrative probation” for a year after the organization pressured a female member of its student leadership to resign in September following her decision to date a woman.
College spokesperson Aaron M. Goldman announced the move to put HCFA in a statement that read,
“After a thorough review and finding that HCFA had conducted itself in a manner grossly inconsistent with the expectations clearly outlined in [the Office of Student Life’s] Student Organization Resource and Policy Guide, OSL has placed HCFA on a one year administrative probation.”
HCFA co-presidents, students Scott Ely and Molly L. Richmond, elaborated:
“Earlier today, we met with an administrator who informed us that the College would place HCFA on probation, citing our relationship with Christian Union as well as our standards for leaders. The decision to suspend HCFA, though, is almost certainly tied to the Sept. 2017 resignation of a female bisexual former assistant Bible course leader. HCFA leadership asked the woman to step down from her position after they learned she was dating another female student—violating guidelines laid out in the Harvard College Student Handbook, which stipulates recognized campus student groups cannot discriminate on the basis of “sexual orientation.”…We reject any notion that we discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation in our fellowship. Broadly speaking, the student in this case was removed because of an irreconcilable theological disagreement pertaining to our character standards.”
In other words, the group did not eject the female student because of her sexual orientation, but because the religious group’s principles dictated that same-sex sexual relations were wrong, thus disqualifying her as a leader. The ejected student herself confirmed to the Harvard Crimson that this was her understanding.
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day:
“The forces of intolerance just won another victory in Wisconsin,” is how The Progressive headlines a story about a “rightwing evangelical” whose complaints prompted the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources to cancel a planned production of “The Bible: Complete Word of God, Abridged” in a state park. From the article:
“Vic Eliason raised a stink. Eliason is an evangelical clergyman in Milwaukee who runs the VCY (Voices of Christian Youth) America Radio Network. He has a show, “Cross Currents,” in Milwaukee, and on August 9, he dedicated his hour-long program to condemning the play as “blasphemous” and “diabolical.” He urged his listeners to contact the board members of SummerStage, and he gave out their numbers. He also urged listeners to call the businesses where some of the board members worked and ask them, “How can you have someone on the board who will literally spit in the face of the Bible?” Eliason also gave out the phone numbers of the DNR’s top two officials and told listeners to ask them why the state was allowing this play to go on, and why it was profiting from it. (The agreement with SummerStage and the Lapham Peak State Park is that 5 percent of ticket sales go to the park, Eliason said.)”
The article ridicules the state and Ellison on several grounds. The play, it notes, is “very light-hearted,” a spoof of the Bible. Ellison admits he never read the script, but that the theme of the comedy is enough. The statement of the Department in cancelling the play smacks of dishonesty: “SummerStage will not be performing ‘The Bible – the Complete Word of God, Abridged’ at Lapham Peak as the event did not meet the provision of the Department agreement requiring all productions to be family oriented,” said a spokesperson. Translation: “This was turning into a hassle with the possibility of a lawsuit, and it just isn’t worth it.”
I agree that Eliason is an officious trouble-maker, a bully who sees nothing wrong with stopping people from entertaining and being entertained if he doesn’t approve of their taste. But I have some questions: Continue reading
The Iowa Caucuses produced a bumper crop of ethics lessons.
Ah, it may look like corn, but but there are kernals of ethics knowledge in those Iowa fields!
1. People may do the right thing for the wrong reasons, but what counts is that they do the right thing. Jaw-dropping statements from some Evangelicals in Iowa that they just couldn’t see voting for a woman to be President had many pundits writing that Iowa was too backward to have such a prominent role in electoral politics. The result of this particular bias, however, was to knock Rep. Michele Bachmann out of the race, a result she had earned with her serial irresponsible statements and half-truths. And it was a bias that she courted, both by her repeated nod to subservience in her own marriage and her self-identification with the Evangelical bloc. The bigotry that helped end her candidacy was a bigotry that she supported, and that equals rough justice, but justice nonetheless.
2. The news media’s lack of diligence and professionalism warps the process. Continue reading
How dare he?
I have avoided weighing into the controversy over Tim Tebow, the Denver Bronco quarterback whose very public Christianity, combined with his penchant for leading miracle comeback victories for his team, has made him the most polarizing figure in sports today, and one of the most polarizing people in the culture as a whole. I have avoided commenting because I think the ethics of the controversy are obvious. Tebow is a decent, law-abiding, well-bred young man in a sector of our culture that produces profane, semi-literate, violent, or arrogant jerks, fools, cheats and felons, not to mention arrested adolescents, by the hundreds, who are cheered, worshipped and enriched based solely on their talent to excel in stadiums and arenas. Anyone who chooses Tim Tebow, out of all these travesties of sports celebrity, to deride solely because he is vocal about his religious beliefs isn’t worth arguing about, because the verdict’s in: that critic’s priorities are backwards, inside out and warped. Tebow, unlike the NFL’s assorted felons, the NBA’s many dead-beat dads, and baseball’s steroid cheats, is a worthy role model for kids. He is humble, respectful, does his job and plays by the rules. What’s not to like?
Well, we know the answer to that question. He prays on the field, thanks God after every touchdown pass, and is prone to saying things like, “First and foremost I gotta thank my lord and savior Jesus Christ” to reporters. Is it annoying? Oh, sure it is. This stuff is annoying from any athlete. To begin with, it is silly—the very idea that a Supreme Being gives a hoot which wins a football game is infantile—and it comes off as a commercial, like an athlete who makes sure that he says, “Well, first and foremost I have to thank the General Mills people, because Wheaties, “The Breakfast of Champions,” has made me who I am today!” in every interview. But Tebow’s statements aren’t commercials, though, and anyone inclined to be fair knows it. This is a man with a deep religious faith who really believes that God guides his every move, and that it is right and responsible to thank Him when the quarterback is being celebrated for athletic exploits that in Tebow’s belief system are the product of his relationship with his deity. The sentiment is sincere and the motivation is virtuous. For Tebow’s displays of faith to incur hatred is an indictment of the haters. If he annoys you, don’t listen to him. If you do, the annoyance is your fault, not Tebow’s. Continue reading
Bachmann doesn't kid about this.
“When you take the 9-9-9 plan and you turn it upside-down, the Devil’s in the details.”
—-Rep. Michele Bachmann, concluding her critique of rival Herman Cain’s “9-9-9” tax plan during the Bloomberg GOP presidential candidates’ debate.
Throughout her campaign, as she has throughout her political career, Rep. Michele Bachmann has been sending coded messages to her Evangelical Christian base, usually through Bible references that most Americans don’t recognize. But most of us have seen “The Omen.” When an Evangelical like Bachmann suggests, with a big smile of course, that a black Presidential rival named Cain is pushing a plan that becomes the Mark of the Beast when turned upside-down, she’s not joking….indeed, I have never seen any evidence that Michele Bachmann is capable of joking. Continue reading
Ethics Alarms 
Here is yet another Comment of the Day, this one by Alexei, on the post, Ethics Quiz: Harvard And Evangelicals: