Another student-led group is suing a university because the school kicked the group off campus for requiring student leaders to agree with their faith tenets. The University of Iowa told InterVarsity Christian Fellowship they weren’t allowed to hold their meetings on campus because they require their members to hold to specific faith standards and kicked them out — in response, InterVarsity sued.
The University of Iowa did the same thing last year with Business Leaders in Christ, or BLinC. This kind of blatant discrimination — one that infringes on religious freedom via the pretense of protecting other kids’ feelings — is happening regularly among secular universities and it needs to stop.
College administrators need to realize that collegiate groups who form and require their members to meet specific standards is hardly discrimination. The University of Iowa appears to be so bent on political correctness they are punishing all kinds of organizations that do this, including the Sikh Awareness Club, the Chinese Student Christian Fellowship, the Imam Mahdi Organization, and the Latter-day Saint Student Association, and banned those groups too. Fraternities and sororities have similar specific standards (unrelated to faith of course), yet they are allowed to continue to meet per usual.
InterVarsity has been a part of campus life for more than two decades. All students are welcome, but just like the 500-plus other student groups on campus, it has a distinct mission and asks its leaders to embrace their specific faith tenets. Despite this history, in June, the university abruptly ordered the group to drop its religious leadership standards within two weeks. They said the leaders of the groups could not even be “strongly encouraged” to share its faith. In July, after InterVarsity explained why it couldn’t ask its members to quiet their conscience, the university officially deregistered the group, along with several other groups with specific ideological faith requirements.
Kristina Schrock, student president of InterVarsity Graduate Christian Fellowship, is disappointed at the university’s blatant attempt to squelch religious freedom in the name of feigned concern over discrimination to others. “We’re grateful to have been part of the University community for 25 years, and we think that the University has been a richer place for having Sikh, Muslim, Mormon, Catholic, Jewish, atheist, and Christian groups. Because we love our school, we hope it reconsiders and lets religious groups continue to authentically reflect their religious roots,” she said in a statement provided by Becket, the legal organization representing InterVarsity.
Political correctness in society at large is taking root and propagating at the collegiate level, and this kind of religious discrimination is an example. It’s not only unconstitutional, but it’s an attempt to bend to the whims of social justice warriors and it needs to stop.
Nicole Russell (@russell_nm) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota.
