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Guest Post: Covenant College Censored My Alumni Update

Guest Post: Covenant College Censored My Alumni Update

Last updated on: June 25, 2015 at 7:36 am by Libby Anne

Guest Post: Covenant College Censored My Alumni Update 2015-06-25T07:36:28-04:00 Libby Anne

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A Guest Post by Kathryn

Originally posted on The Life and Opinions of Kathryn Elizabeth, Person

He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?

-Micah 6:8, KJV

When I was asked at the start of last spring semester whether I would be interested in assisting on research for an amicus brief in the Prop 8 and DOMA cases set to be argued before the Supreme Court later that spring, I jumped at the chance. Not only is it something that I’m personally and professionally proud of, as having the opportunity to play even a miniscule role in a major case is something that most people don’t get, it was something that I believe as a Christian was the right thing to do.

Do justice. Love mercy.

The brief I worked on dealt with the way that the laws negatively affect children raised by LGBT parents, and how those laws negatively affect LGBT youth, their sense of self and their ability to imagine a future for themselves. More specifically, I worked on a team with several other law students to coauthor a survey to capture the voices of LGBT youth and young adults, and our paper is cited in the amicus brief.

The responses that poured in were heartbreaking. Kids sharing their stories of growing up and realizing they were different, and the fear and worry about whether their future relationships would be treated as legitimate by the government, feeling that they were lesser because of the law. Yet, in all that, hope that someday things might change. Kids daring to dream that there might be a future where they could build a life for themselves as equal citizens. I worked to provide justice for those kids.

As you can see, my work on that brief is something that I’m very proud of. I got to play a tiny role in one of the most important civil rights cases of a generation, and I got to give a voice to those who don’t have one. Like many people do when they have a significant professional accomplishment that they want to announce, I decided to submit an alumni update for my alma mater, Covenant College’s alumni magazine, the View.

And so, I filled out the alumni update form to say that I’m a student at UF Law and was asked to work on the Family Equality Council, et al. brief in Perry and Windsor, and that as part of that I coauthored the LGBTQ Youth and Young Adult Survey as a joint project between the University of Florida Center on Children and Families and the Emory Child Rights Project. All very professional and academic. There was no intent to make a political statement. It wasn’t a protest against Covenant or the PCA’s position on homosexuality in general or marriage equality in particular. It was just a nice, generic alumni update about what I’ve been up to recently.

The only part of my update that Covenant published was my name and the fact that I’m a student at UF. The rest of the update, the professional accomplishments that prompted the decision to send an update in the first place? Gone. Erased. Unacknowledged.

Covenant tells me that they won’t run it because they won’t print anything that’s counter to the position of the college. Apparently doing so would “celebrate” something they disagree with. The disclaimer in the masthead that the contents of the View may not necessarily reflect the views of the college isn’t enough. Neither was my suggestion that they print a disclaimer before the updates specifically stating that updates were for informational purposes only and did not imply endorsement by the school.

I’m not asking Covenant to endorse or celebrate anything. Just to give me the courtesy that they give every other alumnus and run my alumni update.

Covenant keeps reassuring me that the campus is loving and safe for LGBT students, but apparently when we graduate we’re persona non grata. Everything is erased except for our names. Our lives are sanitized to remove any hint that LGBT alumni even exist.

Play a role in the biggest civil rights case of a generation? Sorry, merely printing an alumni update that acknowledges that it happened is too much. I feel like I’m about a half a step ahead of Mark David Chapman in the list of people who brought shame to the Covenant College name. Actually, scratch that, people at Covenant would talk about Mark David Chapman in connection with what he did, Covenant refuses to acknowledge that I even did anything. It appears that murdering a Beatle would get me more acknowledgment from my alma mater than helping fight for justice and equality gets me.

This is a post that I did not want to have to write. I’ve exhausted all channels of discussion and dialogue, and after much thought and prayer, I feel the need to speak out. While Covenant is entirely within their rights to publish whatever they want, what they are doing is not right. LGBT alumni exist, and to try and erase any evidence of us is wrong.

Not only that, but those LGBT students that they assure me that they’re loving towards are going to graduate and become LGBT alumni. Those kids, who have been encouraged that it’s safe to be honest, are going to graduate and discover that all their honesty gets them on the other side is an alma mater that refuses to acknowledge them.

Covenant wants to have it both ways, to be seen as a safe space for their current students while hiding the existence of LGBT alumni. The message comes through loud and clear, “We’ll be nice to you while you’re here, but the second you graduate, unless you remain committed to celibacy and opposed to equality, we’ll shove you back into the closet and the only thing we’ll acknowledge is your name.” They can’t have it both ways, that’s not how it works. It’s not a safe place as long as they’re hiding LGBT alumni away in a closet that they built for us.

LGBT alumni exist and we are not going to disappear simply because the Covenant College administration refuses to acknowledge our existence. Hopefully Covenant realizes this going forward and stops trying to hide us.

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