Notre Dame students protest the university's silence on LGBT issues in 2010. (Photo Credit: Tribune/Marcus Marter)

The University of Notre Dame has refused to allow an organization for LGBT students to form at least 15 times, and for 15 years has refused to add sexual orientation to its nondiscrimination statement. Now, the university has announced a new comprehensive plan called, “Beloved Friends and Allies: A Pastoral Plan for the Support and Holistic Development of GLBTQ and Heterosexual Students at the University of Notre Dame.” The plan, to be implemented by next summer, includes hiring a full-time student affairs professional who will serve as advisor to a new LGBT student organization that will be a permanent part of the university (as opposed to a club that would only be temporary). Unfortunately, the news is not all good.

According to university President Fr. John Jenkins, the organization’s roots will be based in Catholic teaching, and in an interview with The Observer, glossed over the implications of what that really means:

JENKINS: It’s a rich teaching about the role of sexuality, about intimacy, about human relations, about responsibilities to the community, about relationships to the Church and I’m not evading the question but to put this in a ‘well you can do this, you can’t do that,’ is to distort the issue. I would just invite those who are wondering about it to look at this plan to reflect upon catholic teachings about these issues because I think this can be an opportunity for all of us to think about this more deeply, and at least that, that’s a wanted result.

But the “Beloved Friends and Allies” plan does specify what students can or cannot do. In accordance with the Catechism of the Catholic Church, it is based on a foundation that God demands chastity of people who are LGBT:

Thus the call to chastity represents a divine invitation to develop relationships characterized by equality, mutuality, and respect, qualities of a deeply spiritual nature, beckoning us “to follow and imitate the one who has chosen us as his friends, who has given himself totally to us and allows us to participate in his divine estate” (CCC, 2347). In beautiful terms, the Catechism proclaims that the virtue of chastity, “blossoms in friendship” and “leads to spiritual communion.” Indeed, “chastity is expressed notably in friendship with one’s neighbor. Whether it develops between persons of the same or opposite sex, friendship represents a great good for all” (CCC, 2347). [...]

At the same time, the University also adheres to the Church’s teaching concerning homosexual actions. As a result, “Homosexual persons are called to chastity” and to “friendship,” and should cultivate “the virtues of self‐mastery that teach them inner freedom” (CCC, 2359). Indeed, each and every student at Notre Dame is called to nothing less. All Notre Dame students are urged to understand and live the teachings of the Church relative to their lives and expressions of sexual intimacy.

This is particularly troubling for a university to endorse. Rather than progress for LGBT students, the new plan is more as a lateral move from ignoring them to condemning them. Catholic teaching is nothing short of a life sentence of sexual repression, denying those with same-sex orientations from ever having the opportunity to love or be loved. The Church’s Courage ministry, which promotes this chastity teaching, utilizes the same shaming tactics as ex-gay therapy to produce the same harmful and ineffective results.

Notre Dame students and their allies made national news this year with a campaign demanding that “It Needs To Get Better” on their campus. Perhaps they shouldn’t change their messaging anytime soon.

Under the guise of “enhancing support,” administrators at the University of Notre Dame made it clear last week that they are not making any serious changes to support gay, lesbian, bisexual, and questioning members of its campus community. Students, faculty, and staff have spent the spring demanding that “It needs to get better,” but according to a news release, the university is not adding sexual orientation to its non-discrimination policy, nor is it taking steps to allow a student gay-straight alliance to form on campus — which it has previously rejected 15 times.

Instead, administrators merely committed to more “ongoing dialogue,” falling back on the university’s 15-year-old “Statement of Inclusion,” which recognizes gays and lesbians as members of the community but offers them no legal protections. Vice President for Student Affairs Rev. Thomas P. Doyle tried to make it sound like the campus environment had dramatically changed in the interim:

DOYLE: The University has made significant progress over the past 15 years in its support for gay, lesbian, bisexual and questioning students, but we’ve always emphasized the desire to continuously improve and to be responsive to student concerns. The conversations between students and the administration both recently and over the past several years have been very important.

This is unhelpful pandering. Conversations only lead to change if the invested parties listen to each other, and Doyle’s remarks demonstrate that administrators are clearly not listening to the community’s concerns. Notre Dame trustees last voted against adding sexual orientation protections fifteen years ago, and in those fifteen years, nothing has changed. In fact, the status quo dates back to 1977, when trustees expressed concern that non-discrimination protections could inhibit the university’s ability to “make decisions that are necessary to support Catholic Church teaching.”

Administrators claim they are committed to “improving awareness.” Perhaps they had best begin with their own.

Students and staff at the University of Notre Dame have created a video called, “It Needs To Get Better.” They highlight that the administration has rejected proposals to create a gay-straight student alliance fifteen times and urge administrators to adopt non-discrimination policies that protect LGBT members of the community from discrimination. Watch it:

Fifteen years ago, the university adopted a “spirit of inclusion” statement that reads in part:

We welcome all people, regardless of color, gender, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, social or economic class, and nationality, for example, precisely because of Christ’s calling to treat others as we desire to be treated. We value gay and lesbian members of this community as we value all members of this community. We condemn harassment of any kind, and University policies proscribe it. We consciously create an environment of mutual respect, hospitality and warmth in which none are strangers and all may flourish.

But that sentiment clearly does not reflect the current campus climate for LGBT students. The Princeton Review has ranked Notre Dame as one of the top six most LGBT-unfriendly campuses in the country, and the university does not even participate in the Campus Climate Index. A 2010 cartoon published in the student newspaper, The Observer, featured the anti-gay joke “What’s the easiest way to turn a fruit into a vegetable? A baseball bat.” The newspaper apologized, but the incident inspired students to protest campus policies. Apparently those concerns persist to this day.