Despite Pushback, Marquette University And Students Stand By ‘Pride Prom’

Marquette University is scheduled to host its first “Pride Prom” on Saturday. The dance is meant to celebrate the LGBTQ community and diversity but has prompted backlash.

The Catholic, Jesuit university’s Pride Prom has the support of more than two dozen university organizations and aims to foster inclusiveness on campus.

To Charla Replogle, a sophomore at Marquette who identifies as queer, the prom means a lot.

“Sometimes I feel like it’s hard to be religious and queer at the same time,” Replogle said. “There are some people who like to make it difficult when it’s not really that difficult.”

Replogle said Pride Prom is a great opportunity for queer students to be themselves.

“I feel like sometimes the university, there’s a bit of a disconnect between the mission statement to be inclusive and the way things are on campus sometimes,” Replogle said.

Maria Bunczak is president of Empowerment, a feminist campus club and co-sponsor of the prom.

“We are more than Catholic and Jesuit, the students here are not just Catholic and Jesuit, and we need to not only acknowledge that, but celebrate that through these events like Pride Prom,” Bunczak explained.

Bunczak said the event sends the message that Marquette is welcoming of all students.

“Even if people who are outside of the school and people, like even probably some students, are not accepting of those more marginalized folks, the school will give a safe space to those people,” she said.

Bunczak said most of the backlash seems to be coming from people with no connection to the university.

A petition started by TFP Student Action, a national group saying it promotes traditional Christian values, has gotten more than 18,500 signatures since September asking to stop the event.

In an email, the organization said the university shouldn’t “legitimize lifestyles that deeply offend God,” calling the event “morally unacceptable.”

The university released its own statement saying it supports its LGBTQ community.

“Groups that rashly judge and disrespect any community of people go contrary to our commitment to the search for truth and to being an inclusive community,” the statement reads.

Marquette University has an LGBTQ+ Resource Center which opened in 2015. Other Jesuit universities like Boston College and Fordham University have similar campus organizations that host LGBTQ pride events.