Leftists went into a tizzy after the press uncovered that the Christian school where second lady Karen Pence teaches holds to historic and orthodox Christian beliefs on sexuality and gender. Accusations of bigotry, fascism, and worse were thrown at Mrs. Pence and Immanuel Christian School. Most likely setting a precedent for other progressives to follow, D.C.’s Sheridan School is now refusing to allow their sports teams to play at Immanuel Christian School. The reason? The LGBTQ students felt “unsafe.”
Rod Dreher got his hands on the email Sheridan School sent to their students’ parents. Here’s the pertinent section:
Since the majority of students wanted to play, we were initially planning to go to ICS with the student-athletes wearing a statement of support (such as rainbow socks or warm-up jerseys). As we talked more, we understood that some students did not feel safe entering a school that bans LGBTQ parents, students or even families that support LGBTQ rights. Forcing our children to choose between an environment in which they feel unsafe or staying home was not an option. So we decided that we would invite ICS to play all of the games at Sheridan. Since ICS declined our offer to host, we will only play our home games and will not go to ICS to play. [Emphasis added]
Think about it: “some students did not feel safe entering a school that bans LGBTQ parents, students or even families that support LGBTQ rights.”
As best I can tell, ICS has never been accused of assaulting anyone, let alone LGBTQ individuals and their supporters. Sheridan School knows this; they know that their students are not in any physical danger when on the campus of ICS. In fact, knowing the ministry of ICS as I do, if any of their students taunted, ridiculed, or treated Sheridan students unkindly to any degree, ICS would take disciplinary action against their offending students. Once again, I’m fairly confident that the administration of Sheridan knows this about the administration of ICS. And this is where it becomes scary for Christians.
Sheridan School’s actions are flat-out bigotry against Christians — Christianphobia, if you will. They are saying that they will limit their exposure and interaction with Christians over beliefs. Instead of shouting down the discrimination, their bigotry is being applauded.
Thanks for highlighting a school that listens to its' pupils and takes their concerns seriously! Good on Sheridan School for not exposing them to a bigoted and unsafe environment.
— Hannu Jaakkola (@Nahuman) January 31, 2019
It doesn’t escape my attention that the actions of Sheridan School come on the heels of the infanticide kerfuffle roiling the nation. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re aware that Virginia Delegate Kathy Tran introduced a bill that would legalize abortion up until the moment of birth. Taking it a step further, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam publicly advocated for infanticide.
Delegate Tran’s bill (which has been defeated, thankfully) would have allowed doctors to abort the baby based solely on the mental well-being of the mother. When Northam said that the doctor and mother would decide what to do with the already born and resuscitated baby, he knew that according to the proposed bill “viable” could be defined under the umbrella of the mother’s mental well-being. Northam’s support for infanticide on the birthing table will inevitably lead to Peter Singer’s utilitarian belief that parents have the right to terminally dispose of children before they reach the age of self-actualization (good luck determining what age that happens at). My question is, what’s to stop progressives from terminally disposing of anyone who is detrimental to the mental well-being of the approved members of society?
Think of it this way (and there’s precedent in history for this): If conservative Christians are a threat to the mental well-being of approved members of society, how quickly will we move from schools boycotting playing sports at Christian schools to criminalizing Christian beliefs and then calling for the imprisonment of conservative Christians? After all, the very presence of the unapproved beliefs amount to a threat to the mental well-being of society, right?
From that point, as history tells us, it’s an even shorter leap to finding a permanent solution.
This may sound absurd and, no doubt, I will be accused of fear-mongering, but is it really that absurd? How many would have guessed just five years ago that society would applaud the actions of Sheridan School? Likewise, who would have thought just five years ago that the governor of Virginia would publicly advocate for infanticide? All bets are off, and it’s not outside the realm of possibility that Christianity will be outlawed in the coming years. If that happens, and, again, it’s not outside the realm of possibility for it to happen, we could very well find ourselves living in a country that deems it appropriate to find a permanent solution for the sake of the mental well-being of the approved members of society.
Refusing to play sports at a Christian school because your students “feel unsafe” is farther down the slippery slope of intolerance than many people are willing to recognize.
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