Discrimination In Religious Colleges

I remember sitting in that office, with all the little crosses and religious knick-knacks and shelves lined with endless religious texts. Today was the day I would figure out how well I could survive college life. Today was the day I would figure out how well a religious college could practice tolerance. My hands turned white as I gripped the chair, my heart beating ever faster as the moment slowly approached. Father Hart proceeded to clear his throat and an eerie, long silence hung in the air. “The College’s President says it can’t happen.”, Father Hart managed to start, “He’s concerned that it will affect the Monastery.” There it was. After the endless talks of compromise, toiling work of religious research, and tapping all the right people

Unsurprisingly, the issue has made it way to our classrooms - specifically in higher education institutions providing two and four year study programs. Although discrimination and harassment traverses gender, age, religion, and socio-economic class at universities nationally, there is a markedly higher number of cases centering around private institutions with strong religious affiliations. This can generally be observed by the fact that public universities accepting federal funds are required to Title VI of the Civil Rights act which bars discrimination based upon sex, race, and religious beliefs and Title XI of the Educational Amendments which bars discrimination and sexual harassment based on gender and sexual orientation. However, private universities, as has been proven in decisions such as Burwell v. Hobby Lobby and passage of the Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, many of these private institutions with religious affiliations are exempt from these anti-discrimination laws based upon their religious beliefs. This becomes increasingly concerning as LGBT targeted hate crimes are on the rise after the Supreme Court’s marriage equality decision. Further, and even more alarming, is the fate of college students, who often make easy targets at colleges which may

There exists a legal precedent in the U.S to give autonomy to employers, schools, and institutions which affiliate and practice religious beliefs. This often means anti-discrimination laws often don’t apply as the freedom and expression of religious guaranteed in the first amendment provides exemption. Supreme Court decisions, such as Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, a case in which a chain of craft stores with Catholic affiliation was able to ignore federally mandated access to contraceptive options under Obama Care due to Catholicism rejecting the use of contraceptives based upon biblical teaching, has upheld this standard. Further, colleges and universities have, in general, been recently able to shift responsibility of student safety from themselves to local law enforcement in terms of protecting their students from violent crimes, sexual assault, and forms of harassment. Most recently, a California court ruled in October 2015, in the case of Rosen v. UCLA, ruled the university was not responsible for a student undergoing psychiatric treatment at the university who stabbed a fellow