University of Notre Dame students who plan to protest the school’s awarding of an honorary degree to President Barack Obama on campus during commencement Sunday are calling for a peaceful, prayerful approach.
“We believe a lot more can be accomplished through prayerful, respectful witness than can be accomplished in angry protest,” said Michele Sagala, a graduating senior and member of ND Response, a coalition of student groups who oppose the school’s decision to award an honorary degree to Obama because of his support of abortion rights and embryonic stem-cell research.
Not all those who plan to be on campus Sunday, though, intend to honor the request by ND Response that they refrain from using graphic images and signs. Anti-abortion activist Randall Terry, who already faces a trespassing charge after being arrested on campus May 1 while pushing a stroller containing a doll covered in fake blood, said members of his group, The Society for Truth and Justice, plan to be arrested and to carry graphic signs.
“If Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks had played by the rules that these kids are proposing, Barack Obama would still be on the back of the bus,” he said.
ND Response has received permission from the university to hold a protest on the west end of the South Quad, starting with an all-night prayer vigil starting Saturday night, a rally Sunday afternoon and another prayer vigil for students choosing not to attend the commencement.
Notre Dame’s rules for protests and demonstrations require organizers to be registered with the school and that the protests be led by members of the university community, university spokesman Dennis Brown said. The demonstrations also must be orderly and peaceful.
Eric Scheidler, communications director for the Pro-Life Action League, said members of his group plan to follow the wishes of ND Response members while on campus, but will have members holding graphic signs on public sidewalks along the outskirts of campus.
John Daly, an ND Response spokesman, said he expects 20 to 30 graduating seniors skip commencement and attend the prayer vigil. Sagala will be among them.
“I feel like taking a stand for my faith is something that Notre Dame trained me to do,” she said.
Greer Hannan, another ND Response member who also is graduating, said she and others plan to attend the commencement but to protest Obama’s presence by putting a yellow cross with yellow baby’s feet on either side atop her mortarboard.
“To express our extreme disappointment with the university for inviting Obama to be the commencement speaker but also to call on President Obama to reconsider his positions on life issues,” she said.
Notre Dame is the second of three schools to feature Obama as commencement speaker. He spoke at Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz. on Wednesday and is slated to speak at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., on May 22.
Arizona State University officials opted not to give Obama an honorary degree typically awarded to commencement speakers, claiming the president needs to accomplish more to earn the degree. But the president shrugged off the decision, telling graduates he embraces the notion that he has more to learn and challenging them to find new sources of energy and never to rely on past achievement.
