Don't discriminate in church
Letter to the Editor
There are very few times in my life when I have felt so out of place as I did Saturday at the 5 p.m. mass at the Basilica. I felt more ostracized than when I went to mass in the crypt church covered in paint from Christmas in April last year. This time I was not covered in paint, but when I walked into the Basilica there were several people in tuxedos and fur coats. This was the weekend to recognize scholarship and fellowship donors.
Now, I don't have anything against this group of people. In fact if it wasn't for them, I wouldn't be at Notre Dame today. What I am against is the ushers asking everyone who was not in formal attire, "Could you please sit in the side aisle today, the center section is reserved."
I cringed in disgust every time one of the ushers had to say this, so did the ushers. This was not planned by the ushers, or by the donors. In fact, all the donors who were sitting next to me were extremely nice.
I kept thinking about the Dark Ages when the peasants had to stand way at the back of the church and were not allowed to partake of communion, especially of the blood of Christ.
The Basilica is a small church. How important is it that someone sits in the center aisle, or five feet away in the side aisle? Generally, I am proud to be a Domer. I like telling people how great Notre Dame is and what wonderful people live, work and study here. As I spend more and more time here, there are many instances that make me ashamed to be a Domer. These include tossing an octopus, a fish and a frog (who almost caused a little girl to lose an eye) at football games, insults towards our athlete classmates, derogatory comments aimed at players from other schools in basketball and hockey games and tossing water bottles on the court at basketball games. I realize that this is the minority of the student body, but they are still representatives of our University. They are the rotten apples that give everyone here, and the University of Our Lady a bad image.
Saturday I had to watch as people who wanted to get to mass early and get a good seat were asked to leave their seats to make room for the donors. Is there something wrong with this? While I realize that the generosity of the scholarship and fellowship donors should be recognized, and that these wonderful people deserve respect and admiration, this should not be done by making members of the Notre Dame and South Bend community who do not have the resources to be so generous feel inferior.
Salvadora Hernandez
Junior
Lewis Hall
March 5, 2000
All Viewpoint Stories for Monday, March 6, 2000
