Virtue Laundering

Last updated on: September 19, 2019 at 4:00 pm by D. G. Hart

Virtue Laundering 2019-09-19T16:00:52-04:00 D. G. Hart

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

As an alum of Harvard Divinity School, I regularly receive mass email messages from the University’s president. A recent communication from Laurence S. Bacow addressed the challenge of how Harvard should address the gifts it received from Jeffrey Epstein. This is a genuine moral dilemma, one that lots of charitable and non-profit institutions face when revelations about the lives of wealthy people come to light. For instance, Villanova University had to figure out what to do with the arena in which the national champion men’s basketball team played when its chief donor, John du Pont, was convicted of murder. Over several years, the university gave the facility a face lift and changed the name from the Du Pont Pavilion to the Finneran Pavilion.

In Harvard’s case, the scandals surrounding Epstein’s life and death make Villanova’s dilemma look less dramatic even if the sums of money were smaller than what Villanova received from du Pont. (For those who don’t receive email messages from Harvard’s president, go here.) According to Bacow:

between 1998 and 2007, Epstein made a number of gifts to support various faculty and institutional research activities across the University. The largest of these was a $6.5 million gift in 2003 to support the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics. The University received other gifts, which totaled approximately $2.4 million, based on current information. Each of these gifts from Epstein and his affiliated foundations to Harvard University predates his guilty plea in June 2008. To date, we have uncovered no gifts received from Epstein or his foundation following his guilty plea. Moreover, we specifically rejected a gift from Epstein following his conviction in 2008.

Even if Harvard disassociated itself from Epstein after his 2008 conviction, that still leaves the problem of what to do about the funds the university did receive. Part of the problem is that Harvard has already spent the money.

The majority of Epstein’s gifts were designated for current use, not as endowed funds, and nearly all were spent years ago for their intended purposes in support of research and education. Our ongoing review of these gifts has identified one current use fund and one small endowment designated to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences with a total unspent balance of $186,000. After consultation with the Dean of the FAS, we have decided that the University will redirect the unspent resources to organizations that support victims of human trafficking and sexual assault. This is an unusual step for the University, but we have decided it is the proper course of action under the circumstances of Epstein’s egregiously repugnant crimes.

I do not doubt that this is a wise course of action. But it raises a further question — which kicks the proverbial can down the road — of whether the money is still tainted even after it has passed through Harvard’s budgetary mechanics.

From one perspective, Harvard’s decision to bestow the leftover Epstein funds to, say, The Polaris Project, is commendable but the money still comes from a “repugnant” source (Epstein). Even if the check is written on a Harvard University check, the university itself is tainted by having received Epstein’s money in the first place. Guilt by association is the standard of cancel culture. The money Harvard gives away is therefore guilty. Even in ancient times, when Judas brought the silver he had received for betraying Christ to the chief priests, that did not clear his conscience. Like Epstein, Judas took his life.

And what should an organization do with Harvard’s check? How can it receive and spend the money knowing that it came from the morally repugnant Epstein and the guilt-by-association Harvard?

It might be idealistic to burn the money, but that’s what Nathaniel Hawthorne saw coming in his short story, Earth’s Holocaust, where social reformers of all kinds throw on to the earth’s bond fire all the evils (slavery and monarchy) and undesirable activities (smoking and drinking) of humanity.

Image

Previous Post

September 17, 2019

Raiders Nation Reading Hour

Next Post

September 24, 2019 If Baptist or Episcopalian, Why be Evangelical?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category 2016 Presidential Election 2020 Presidential Election Apocalypse Bible in American Life Biblical authority Books and culture Calvinism Church Life Civil Religion Culture Wars Doctrine evangelicalism Gullibility Heaven and Hell Intellectual life Jesus Ministry modernity moralism Nationalism New Testament Old Testament Otherworldiness Otherworldliness Paul Peter Piety Popular culture Protestantism Psalms Puritans Race Roman Catholicism sacred/secular distinction Sex Shameless Self Promotion Sports Ten Commandments U.S. politics Uncategorized vulgarity worship

Select a Month January 2022 October 2021 August 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz