Posted on 05/12/2014 1:48:25 PM PDT by NYer
.- The president of Harvard said that a student group’s plans to hold a re-enactment of a satanic black mass are offensive, disrespectful and inflammatory, but will be allowed to proceed for the sake of free expression.
“The 'black mass' had its historical origins as a means of denigrating the Catholic Church; it mocks a deeply sacred event in Catholicism, and is highly offensive to many in the Church and beyond,” university president Drew Faust said in a May 12 statement.
“The decision by a student club to sponsor an enactment of this ritual is abhorrent; it represents a fundamental affront to the values of inclusion, belonging and mutual respect that must define our community,” she continued.
“It is deeply regrettable that the organizers of this event, well aware of the offense they are causing so many others, have chosen to proceed with a form of expression that is so flagrantly disrespectful and inflammatory.”
However, the president continued, due to the university’s “commitment to free expression,” the student group will be permitted to continue with its ceremony.
Faust said that she plans to attend a Eucharistic Holy Hour and Benediction to be held by the Catholic community at St. Paul's Church on the edge of campus, to coincide with the black mass.
In doing so, Faust said that she hopes to “join others in reaffirming our respect for the Catholic faith at Harvard and to demonstrate that the most powerful response to offensive speech is not censorship, but reasoned discourse and robust dissent.”
The announcement that the Harvard Extension Cultural Studies Club is planning a May 12 re-enactment of a satanic black mass on campus has prompted a wave of complaint from the Harvard community and beyond.
A black mass is a sacrilegious ceremony structured as a parody of the Catholic Mass. Connected to witchcraft and demonic worship, it invokes Satan and demons, often in Latin.
The ceremony is centered around the desecration of the Eucharist, which is generally done by stealing a consecrated host from a Catholic Church and using it in a profane sexual ritual, or defecating and urinating on it.
A spokesperson for The Satanic Temple, which is staging the event, initially told media outlets that a consecrated host would be used, although the temple and the Cultural Studies Club both later denied this, insisting that only a plain piece of bread would be used.
The Archdiocese of Boston has voiced strong opposition to the event, and many individuals in the Harvard community and broader Catholic community have called for it to be canceled. Critics argue that the university would not allow a re-enactment of a Koran burning or lynchings of African Americans for the sake of free expression, and neither should it allow a sacrilegious ceremony mocking the Catholic faith.
The Cultural Studies Club has defended the black mass re-enactment as educational and dismissed critics as demonstrating a close-minded “paranoia.” The group told CNA that those offended by the event hold outdated views “based on intolerance and ignorance,” which are “arrogant and egocentric.”
I find it ironic that the president’s last name is “Faust”.
Will Harvard, in his commitment for freedom of expression, allow a ceremony centered around the desecration of the Koran, using it in a profane sexual ritual, or defecating and urinating on it?
Faust? Really. LMAO Someone tell this bunch of kooks that Jesus already won the battle and they picked the losing side.
I thought the same thing.
However, the president continued, due to the university’s “commitment to free expression,” the student group will be permitted to continue with its ceremony.
Really. Suppose some college club decided to invite somebody, say, Condoleeza Rice or Anne Coulter or Michelle Malkin to talk, or decided to have a presentation on the evils of abortion and promiscuous sexuality, or to hold a presentation on the benfits of the Second Amendment, would their definition of “freedom of expression” prevail?
Those students who oppose this should picket it as well as the office of this sophomoric loon.
Harvard and satanism: I don’t see the disconnect.
“However, the president continued, due to the university’s “commitment to free expression,” (unless you are Christian) the student group will be permitted to continue with its ceremony.”
Another gutless administrator. Do it with Islam then and see how long it takes for mass riots and bloodshed to get started.
It’s abhorrent, but it’s Ok since it trashes Christianity.
I’ll see if I can get 72 virgins played by some queer guy sodomites and some washed up hookers to perform a parody of the islamic heaven and a midget in a tuxedo and turban to play Mohammed while “Allah” (whose part in the performance will be played a donkey in rubber waders) cavorts on stage. See if they stop that one from being done.
I presume then that we could burn a cross in the Yard and lynch a dummy (for historical purposes, if course)?
Really? And what about a Mass for the Christian conversion of the eternally lost and unbelieving:
Muslim?
Jew?
Jehova’s Witness?
Mormon?
Harvard president: “Symbolic Michael Sam lynching abhorrent, but may go forward.” /s
Harvard has active, university-supported conservative student groups that receive free space and use of university resources (things denied to this night school student "cultural studies" group), and that hold activities on campus, invite speakers, etc. These include Harvard Pro-Life, the Anscombe Society (traditional marriage and sexual morality), and the college Republicans.
They don't usually do things that are flamboyant, but that's not always the case. A few years back, Harvard Pro-Life had a poster campaign featuring cartoon drawings and photos of a developing fetus representing an unborn girl, “Elena,” with pro-life quotes, which disturbed the tender sensibilities of many liberal students on campus, who consider the pro-life cause to be a “hate crime.”
I don't think that Harvard would permit the desecration of a Koran, but they'd probably hold their noses and permit the desecration of an effigy thereof. Just as they drew the line at the desecration of a consecrated host, in this case.
Harvard is far from perfect and has many flaws. It is a place swimming in its own liberalism (among its flaws). Nonetheless, my conservative son and his conservative friends have usually found welcome in Harvard's embrace, and failing that, at least tolerance.
sitetest
“I don’t think that Harvard would permit the desecration of a Koran, but they’d probably hold their noses and permit the desecration of an effigy thereof.”
Caveat - if it were under similar circumstances, i.e., held as a private event where the sponsoring group was paying its own way, as in the current situation, where the “student group” is actually privately renting the campus bar.
There is nothing more dangerous to anti-theists than the admission that Satan is real.
Wonder if the good president would sanction mocking that middle eastern religion that is so often in the news.
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