Todd Starnes of Townhall.com reports that the folks in the drama department at Cape
Fear Community College are just fine with staging productions about rape and
incest; but when it comes to staging a show with Christian themes – well, that’s
a problem. So says Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)
– a religious advocacy group – claiming the school’s drama advisor ordered a
student to “dumb down” the religious nature of an upcoming production because
it might offend and anger people.
Justin Graves is a 17-year-old
homeschooler who has dual enrollment at the college. A Christian and an up-and-coming magician, he
proposed a faith-based magic show featuring skits and illusions that
“illustrate a life changed by Christ.” His
fellow drama club students loved the idea and unanimously approved the project.
But drama club advisor, Jack Landry, overruled
the students.
ADF attorney Travis Barham wrote a letter to the college
alleging that Jack told Justin he “could not support the overtly Christian
show” because the Wilmington, NC, college is a publicly-funded institution. “So you ordered him to minimize or ‘dumb
down’ the religious content until it was not ‘obvious,’” Barham wrote in the
complaint. “You explained that the
content could anger taxpayers, prompting lawsuits; that you did not want anyone
to feel ‘offended,’ (although you apparently had no such concerns when the
drama club sponsored productions that included rape and incest this year); and
that this production would violate the 1st Amendment if it included religious content.”
A college spokesman confirmed that
the school received a copy of the complaint.
He declined to comment.
“It’s not the adviser’s job to
dictate what a student can and can’t say in his own production,” said Barham. “Universities seem to think they have to go on
this quest to purge their campuses of all things religious.”
Graves was surprised and
disappointed by what happened. “I’ve
been homeschooled for most of my academic career,” he said. “But I love to get different viewpoints and
ideas and discuss them with people. I
thought college would be that sort of place.”
“My faith is my life,” Justin said. “I can’t dumb down knowing what my God did for
me.”
The other stage productions are
“House of Yes,” which includes a theme about incest, and “Tape,” a show which has
a theme about rape. “It’s absurd to say
that a Christian message is some-how offensive if you are allowing all this
other content to be portrayed,” Barham said.
Somehow the college can justify
sponsoring plays with themes about rape and incest while banning the Christian
production. Clearly, the censorship of
Justin’s production is a violation of the 1st Amendment. “The Supreme Court has clearly indicated that
public universities cannot single out religious speech for special, detrimental
treatment,” Barham wrote in the complaint letter. “Indeed, when the government targets not
subject matter, but particular views taken by speakers on a subject, the
violation of the 1st Amendment is all the more blatant.”
Sadly, many colleges and
universities around the nation are cracking down on religious liberty. Just ask the folks at InterVarsity Christian
Fellowship. The prominent college
ministry was de-recognized by the California State University system because
they refused to sign a non-discrimination document that would have put them in
conflict with their religious beliefs.
Rev.
Dr. Kenneth L. Beale, Jr.
Chaplain
(Colonel-Ret), U.S. Army
Pastor, Ft. Snelling Memorial Chapel
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