The other day I had a request from an organization ask to link my web age, Teach War No More to their guide on “Funding Your Education with ROTC.” I did not respond right away thinking it was a mistake since my web page seeks to end ROTC military training on Catholic campuses.

But the person was persistent and sent me a reminder today. Obviously the person had not read the material on my page and so I pointed out to him how my web page is dedicated to eliminating ROTC on Catholic Universities. In my Catholic, Jesuit educated value system teaching war and killing, killing without conscience. I may be a hypocrite but not that much of one.

That Marquette University is the host school for the Department of Defense for military training for Army, Navy/Marines and Air Force for all colleges and universities in Southeast Wisconsin deeply disturbs me. I do not know what to do with my disturbed conscience except to research, write, protest and act on my conscience to disturb the conscience of others.

Perhaps the person thought I was one of the persons who say that is “your opinion and I have my opinion” when it comes to matters of life and death. Since the Vietnam War in the 60’s I have believed that putting a person in a position to “kill or be killed” be it though the draft or offering education opportunities.

I can understand how the very high cost of education drives persons to sites like this way to fund education by joining the military but that does not make it right for a college or university to teach war and killing. Marquette’s strategy of “marginalize and ignore” seems to be working but only till the next time we take a nonviolent action to expose the hypocrisy of the university.

I wrote an article called Dorothy Day’s Worst Nightmare about ROTC on Catholic Campuses. Maybe someone will publish it. The archives of Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker Movement are in the Marquette University archives. I know Dorothy Day would not be a part of this hypocrisy.

Calling Marquette University a “hypocrite” for teaching war and reflexive killing at a University that claims to practice Gospel values and to respect and cherish life might not do any good. However, calling something for what it is is not a bad practice. There are many good hypocrites, including myself who pays war taxes. So, with all due apologies to Conservatives and Liberals, Democrats and Republicans, I will say: Marquette University is a Hypocrite.

Comments

Please send any comments on this post to . Let us know which day’s post your comments pertain to. If the comments are appropriate we will post them here for you.