St Norbert College faculty & students protest Cdl. George commencement with rainbow ribbons

Many St. Norbert College faculty members and graduates wore rainbow ribbons on their gowns on Sunday, the only visible acknowledgement of lingering controversy in the school's selection of Chicago archdiocese Cardinal Francis George as its commencement speaker.

George drew national criticism in December by referencing the Ku Klux Klan in an interview with a Chicago TV station about the schedule and route of Chicago’s annual gay Pride Parade.

“You know, you don’t want the gay liberation movement to morph into something like the Ku Klux Klan, demonstrating in the streets against Catholicism,” George said in the interview. [Which is precisely what it is becoming]

The comment prompted a couple thousand St. Norbert students, alumni and supporters to sign an online petition recently to ask the college to drop George as the commencement speaker.

College president Thomas Kunkel declined the request, saying the college welcomes a variety of opinions to its campus.  [Academic freedom is funny when it works in reverse]

[Get this!] About three-quarters of the college’s 123 faculty members and [only] a quarter of its 469 graduates wore rainbow-striped ribbons pinned to their gowns as a sign of solidarity with gays.

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