The Infrastructure of Political Correctness at Marquette

From the Louis Joliet Society, a blog post that takes off from the fact that Marquette is going to impose a five percent tuition increase, in spite of the fact that inflation has been running at 2.5 percent.

And what is the reason? Not to provide more scholarship money for students. Not to pay for more faculty lines, so that students can have smaller classes, more attention from faculty and more class choices.

No, a large part is to support a massive infrastructure in political correctness.

For starters, Marquette’s Office of the Provost carries a staff of at least 65 individuals, many of whom are presumably well-compensated, holding titles like vice-provost, vice-president, executive director and dean. Clearly, a number of the functions performed by these individuals are entirely legitimate for the successful administration of the university. But, in some cases, we have our doubts. 

For example, one entity under the Provost’s watch is the Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion. Myers created this office in 2015 “to elevate the importance of equity, diversity and inclusion at Marquette.” But, alas, despite a lengthy and lofty strategic plan and numerous initiatives and programs, Marquette is still pretty much all white and evidently, still racist (also here and here). The office’s Hispanic Initiatives include resources for undocumented students, not the least of which are university-funded grants and scholarships for non-citizens. The Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion also houses Marquette’s Title IX coordinator who is presumably responsible for selecting the LGBTQ-agenda advancing Title IX vendor employed by the university.

Another entity under the Provost’s office is the Division of Student Affairs. While the division has been around for quite some time, Myers expanded it in 2015 to include a new LGBTQ Resource Center (host of the infamous Pride Prom). Also added to the division in 2015 was the Office of Intercultural Engagement, which, as far as we can tell, is a source of institutional reinforcement and reiteration of the race and LGBTQ agendas on campus, and is not to be confused with the CENTER for Intercultural Engagement which provides still more reinforcement and reiteration of the race and LGBTQ agendas on campus. Lastly, under the Division of Student Affairs is the Office of Residence Life, which championed the introduction of “transgendered bathrooms” at Marquette in 2015 and was recently exposed for forcing Resident Assistants to participate in Leftist “social justice” indoctrination in the student dorms. 

Other entities under the Provosts Office include the Office of Community Engagement and Social Responsibility, created in 2016 as “a central clearinghouse for community engagement activities and promotion of the scholarship of engagement.” Got it? As an interesting aside, the Executive Director of the Office of Community Engagement, Dan Bergen, serves on the board of directors of the Cream City Foundation, an organization whose mission is to “mobilize philanthropic resources by harnessing the pride, passion, and commitment of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people and their allies to advance the human rights and respond to the human needs of LGBTQ+ people in Southeastern Wisconsin.” As for what the Office of Community Engagement has actually accomplished in its two years of existence is anybody’s guess; all activities listed on its webpage appear to have already been in motion by 2016. 

Marquette’s Center for Teaching and Learning is also under the auspices of the Office of the Provost. This center is charged with teaching Marquette teachers how to teach. It is also charged with teaching non-Catholic and under-catechized faculty and staff about the history and importance of Catholic higher education. The director of the Center for Teaching and Learning, however, is openly homosexual. So much for Catholic teaching.

Also inaugurated by Provost Myers in 2015, but not as part of his office, is the new and improved Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies (to replace the ignominious and disastrous Gender and Sexualities Resource Center). Like the Provost’s LGBTQ Center, Office of Intercultural Engagement and Center for Intercultural Engagement, this center also provides institutional reinforcement and reiteration of race and LGBTQ agendas on campus. (Are we seeing a pattern here?) 

We move now to the Office of Mission and Ministry. This office is, presumably, most directly charged with preserving and advancing Marquette’s Catholic identity. And yet, despite some good efforts, through the Office of Mission and Ministry we get: anti-Catholic Marquette Mission Weeks, LGBTQ Glitter Ashes on Ash Wednesday, LGBTQ Masses, LGBTQ+ prayer services, LGBTQ indoctrination from the university’s Center for Ignatian Spirituality, and a Center for Peacemaking which for nearly ten years has been little more than a training center for progressive political activism.

The post summarizes by asking:

• How much do all these positions, offices and activities cost and where does the money to pay for them come from?
• What demonstrable value do they bring to the education of students or the betterment of Marquette’s culture as a Catholic, Jesuit university?
• Why does a Catholic university invest so heavily in things that have little to do with/are often contrary to its Catholic identity?
• Why should students not transfer to public colleges and universities which offer the same secularized higher education at half or less the cost?

In the meantime, however, you and your families better get busy finding those extra tuition dollars.

Conclusion

It’s typical of higher education today that university bureaucrats build a huge bureaucracy dedicated to political correctness. It’s slightly less expected that a large part of that bureaucracy at a “Catholic university” should be engaged in trashing Catholic teaching. But only slightly.

Two things are behind this trend. First, there is the felt need by campus bureaucrats to pander to every politically correct victim group on campus. Such groups will be supported by leftist faculty capable of making noise if the demands are not acceded to.

Secondly, all bureaucrats want to build their little empires. But the faculty are never the “empire” of any bureaucrat — faculty control their own affairs.

So to build an empire, you need lots of “initiatives” and staff to “implement” those “initiatives.”

This quickly leads to whole university offices where most of the staff are involved, not in some useful work, but in pushing political correctness.

Marian Grotto at Marquette University?

From the Louis Joliet Society, which is committed to holding Marquette to its claimed Catholic mission, an appeal for a Marian Grotto:

St. Ignatius of Loyola was intensely devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary. She was the impetus of his conversion, his lifelong devotion to Christ and his founding of the Society of Jesus. He was often referred to as a “Soldier of Mary” and “The Holy Knight of Mary.”

Ignatius knew intimately the incomparable power of the Blessed Mother for captivating souls, protecting them from evil and leading them to Jesus Christ, her Divine Son. For this reason, he consecrated himself and his religious order to “Mary, Queen of the Society of Jesus.”

Marquette University is a Jesuit university entrusted with the formation of the minds and hearts of young men and women. Imparting this most fundamental component of Ignatian Catholic spirituality – Marian devotion – is critical to its mission. The Louis Joliet Society proposes that Marquette do so through the creation of a Marian Grotto on campus as do other Catholic universities (above photo - the Beaudry Shrine at John Carroll University), honoring Our Lady with beautiful spaces dedicated to her likeness where students can pray for her motherly protection, comfort and intercession.

This, of course, is pure symbolism, and nothing about having a Marian Grotto would prevent Marquette from continuing to be a university where opposition to gay marriage is frowned upon, if not outright forbidden. Nothing would prevent leftist centers of activism like the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center that decorated an entire wall with a fawning mural of Assata Shakur, terrorist and cop killer.

But at least, it would be the right kind of symbolism.

It would very much contrast with the mere symbolism of Marquette designating “gender neutral restrooms.” It turns out that only single use bathrooms on the ground floors of several dorms were designated “gender neutral,” but this was in flat contradiction to Catholic teaching on gender theory. The Church (including the very fashionable Pope Francis) has roundly condemned the notion that you can be any sex you want to be. But Marquette didn’t care.

So we wish the Louis Joliet Society well on this initiative. Moving things in the right direction, even in a minor way, is better than what has been happening.