Beware the brainwashing at Secular U

“Oh, it’s okay, he’s grounded in his faith. And besides, he signed up for a religion course!” 

I heard that reassurance from parents at my parish regarding their son, a solid Catholic kid being shipped off to Secular U. one autumn. I warned them about our universities, pleading that they send him to a serious Catholic college. 

When I asked around Thanksgiving how his college experience was going, they groaned. After listening to their litany about his thorough indoctrination on sexuality and gender, I asked how the “religion” course was going

“It’s awful!” they shouted. “It’s taught by an atheist!”

 Of course, it is. Who did they expect, Thomas Aquinas? 

I could go on and on.

A tearful Catholic mom told me about her six children: all products of Catholic schools, youth groups, and even one “Catholic” college (she put “Catholic” in quotes). All now vigorously support everything from Planned Parenthood to same-sex “marriage” to Facebook’s 71 gender options. “Much worse,” she added, “is that they’re all six clearly anti-Christian.” She notes the conventional wisdom that “things will change” as they get older and have kids. Hasn’t happened. 

She explained in a word where this permanent rebellion occurred: college.

 I could list those six colleges here, but there’s no point. They’re representative of any 600 or 6,000 colleges taking down the culture. If you’re not sending your children to a real Catholic/ Christian college, then you’re risking their souls. And paying for it. 

History’s worst radicals long looked to the universities to sow discord and implant destructive ideas.

“Give me four years to teach the children,” asserted Vladimir Lenin, “and the seed I have sown shall never be uprooted.”

The atheist philosopher/educator Richard Rorty candidly stated that the job of professors like him is “to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homophobic religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own” and “escape the grip of their frightening, vicious, dangerous parents.” Rorty’s message to parents: “We are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable.” 

What a testimony to our universities, where impressionable freshmen are putty in the hands of fundamental transformers who teach them to redefine everything from unborn life to marriage to family to sexual orientation to gender. Those who resist are “bigots” who—in the name of “tolerance”—must not be tolerated.

Tragically, if these professors fail to get hold of these young minds in the K-12 years, they eventually get them in the universities, where the parents pay huge fees for a re-education completely contrary to what they inculcated at home for 18 years. Modern universities are hotbeds for courses like “Queer Citizenship” and “Exploring Homophobia” within programs like (to name just one) the University of Maryland’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Program.

And it isn’t merely cultural extremism that students learn. I’m often asked where the sudden support of socialism among youth comes from. The answer is obvious: education, especially at the university level.

What’s the antidote to this? There’s no easy fix. The vast majority of Americans (Catholics included) will funnel their children into these universities, seduced by prestigious names or scholarships that, nonetheless, can do serious soul damage. But you can at least address your own family.

For recommended real Catholic colleges, see the crucial lists published by the National Catholic Register and Cardinal Newman Society. Think carefully. Ask hard questions. Do research. Don’t be duped by admissions people who insist their college isn’t hostile to your values.

This is serious business. The souls of your children are at stake. 

PAUL KENGOR is professor of political science at Grove City College in Grove City, PA. He is author of over a dozen books, including A Pope and a President: John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and the Extraordinary Untold Story of the 20th Century