Equality Riders get mixed reactions at Wheaton College
Equality Riders get mixed reactions at Wheaton College
By Louis Weisberg
Staff writer. Copyright by The Chicago Free Press
During his sophomore year at Wheaton College, the Rev. Jay Johnson was outed by his roommate. In the weeks that followed, he found himself increasingly ostracized by other students. Some even threatened to boycott a college-sponsored European trip because they didn’t want to travel with him.
But on the strength of “the stellar liberal arts education” Johnson said he received at the conservative Christian college from 1979-1983, he went on to obtain a Ph.D. in divinity. Today he’s an ordained priest in the Episcopal Church and a faculty member of Pacific College of Religion in Berkeley, Calif.
Johnson returned to the Wheaton College campus April 20 to welcome Equality Ride 2006, a seven-week nationwide bus tour taking 33 young GLBT people to 19 colleges that “equate homosexuality with sickness and sin,” according to Jacob Reitan, 24, who organized the event for the organization Soulforce. The ride’s goal is to promote tolerance by fostering a dialogue about homosexuality and spirituality among fundamentalist Christian institutions of higher learning.
Wheaton was a special stop for Equality Ride: The idea for the tour came from a conversation Reitan had on April 20, 2003, with a student there who was struggling with his sexuality. The student, now a senior, remains closeted.
Reitan said he promised the student that he would show up some day at Wheaton with GLBT young people carrying the message that “Christ loves and affirms GLBT people exactly as they are, without reservation.”
Equality riders have met with mixed reactions from the colleges along their route. Five of them, including the Rev. Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University, have had them arrested for trespassing. In Minneapolis, the stop before Wheaton, they were roughed up by security guards and locked out of school buildings at North Central University, which is owned and operated by the Assemblies of God.
After sitting in front of North Central’s doors for most of the afternoon, the Soulforce riders and 300 supporters rallied at a park across the street. Among those who showed up for the event was George Takei, the “Star Trek” actor who came out last year. He said the “equality trek” shares themes with those of the starship Enterprise.
“(The riders) have shown courage and character in showing that most people of faith are not extreme reactionaries who oppose equal rights,” Takei told the media.
Most of the colleges have been more polite than North Central or Liberty. Some, including Wheaton, organized special events and programming in conjunction with the visit, including dinners and speeches. (None of the events, however, were listed at Wheaton’s website.)
“(Wheaton) is categorically different from some of the institutions we’ve visited,” Reitan said.
Equality Ride spokesman Richard Lindsay said Wheaton “students were very open and curious to hear what we had to say.”
“It’s never the students who have a problem with talking about LGBT issues, it’s always the faculty and administration that struggle with them,” Lindsay added.
A conversation Reitan had with Wheaton’s provost underscored that perception. The provost told Reitan that any student who “stood with Soulforce and expressed the belief that God affirms GLBT sexuality” would jeopardize his or her enrollment at the college, Reitan said.
Still, Johnson said the group’s visit was vital for GLBT students.
“It would have been enormously helpful to me just to have the conversation—you know, it’s not necessarily so that you have to be Christian or gay,” Johsnson said. “My hope is this is not going to be a one-time event. I hope the school will come to see it’s operating with a blind spot. I’m confident that over time there will be significant movement on this issue. Whether it happens during my lifetime is another question.”
By Louis Weisberg
Staff writer. Copyright by The Chicago Free Press
During his sophomore year at Wheaton College, the Rev. Jay Johnson was outed by his roommate. In the weeks that followed, he found himself increasingly ostracized by other students. Some even threatened to boycott a college-sponsored European trip because they didn’t want to travel with him.
But on the strength of “the stellar liberal arts education” Johnson said he received at the conservative Christian college from 1979-1983, he went on to obtain a Ph.D. in divinity. Today he’s an ordained priest in the Episcopal Church and a faculty member of Pacific College of Religion in Berkeley, Calif.
Johnson returned to the Wheaton College campus April 20 to welcome Equality Ride 2006, a seven-week nationwide bus tour taking 33 young GLBT people to 19 colleges that “equate homosexuality with sickness and sin,” according to Jacob Reitan, 24, who organized the event for the organization Soulforce. The ride’s goal is to promote tolerance by fostering a dialogue about homosexuality and spirituality among fundamentalist Christian institutions of higher learning.
Wheaton was a special stop for Equality Ride: The idea for the tour came from a conversation Reitan had on April 20, 2003, with a student there who was struggling with his sexuality. The student, now a senior, remains closeted.
Reitan said he promised the student that he would show up some day at Wheaton with GLBT young people carrying the message that “Christ loves and affirms GLBT people exactly as they are, without reservation.”
Equality riders have met with mixed reactions from the colleges along their route. Five of them, including the Rev. Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University, have had them arrested for trespassing. In Minneapolis, the stop before Wheaton, they were roughed up by security guards and locked out of school buildings at North Central University, which is owned and operated by the Assemblies of God.
After sitting in front of North Central’s doors for most of the afternoon, the Soulforce riders and 300 supporters rallied at a park across the street. Among those who showed up for the event was George Takei, the “Star Trek” actor who came out last year. He said the “equality trek” shares themes with those of the starship Enterprise.
“(The riders) have shown courage and character in showing that most people of faith are not extreme reactionaries who oppose equal rights,” Takei told the media.
Most of the colleges have been more polite than North Central or Liberty. Some, including Wheaton, organized special events and programming in conjunction with the visit, including dinners and speeches. (None of the events, however, were listed at Wheaton’s website.)
“(Wheaton) is categorically different from some of the institutions we’ve visited,” Reitan said.
Equality Ride spokesman Richard Lindsay said Wheaton “students were very open and curious to hear what we had to say.”
“It’s never the students who have a problem with talking about LGBT issues, it’s always the faculty and administration that struggle with them,” Lindsay added.
A conversation Reitan had with Wheaton’s provost underscored that perception. The provost told Reitan that any student who “stood with Soulforce and expressed the belief that God affirms GLBT sexuality” would jeopardize his or her enrollment at the college, Reitan said.
Still, Johnson said the group’s visit was vital for GLBT students.
“It would have been enormously helpful to me just to have the conversation—you know, it’s not necessarily so that you have to be Christian or gay,” Johsnson said. “My hope is this is not going to be a one-time event. I hope the school will come to see it’s operating with a blind spot. I’m confident that over time there will be significant movement on this issue. Whether it happens during my lifetime is another question.”
posted by Carlos T Mock at 4:29 PM
1 Comments:
I was present at North Central University during the Equality Ride demonstrations. At no time were any demonstrators "roughed up." As far as the locked doors, the doors are always locked and accessible only through security ID cards. This is a security issue, as the school is located in downtown Minneapolis.
In future, please check your facts before posting.
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