(The Lion) — A Christian women’s college is under fire after administrators allegedly told students Christian crosses worn by students “is not a good look for the school.”
Commentators in Australia say it’s part of a war on Christianity raging worldwide whose current spirit leader is Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
Methodist Ladies College (MLC) in Kew, a suburb of Melbourne, Australia, set off a firestorm of protest with the cross ban, which led some year-12 girls at the school to contact the local newspaper, the Herald Sun.
“Methodist Ladies College students say they have been told to remove their religious crosses for fear of offending others while their classmates get away with wearing furry ears, tails and rainbow-themed items,” wrote the Herald Sun.
The furry ears, tails and rainbow-themed items refer to girls who identify as cats, other animals or as LGBTQ.
The trouble started when a student at the Christian college told teachers she found another student’s cross “offensive,” reported the U.K.’s Daily Mail.
“My friend was wearing a cross and there was another girl in our class who said she found the cross really offensive, and so the teacher told her to take it off,” a student told the Herald Sun. “My friend’s parents, who are very religious, tried to get answers from the school and were told ‘it’s not a good look for the school.’”
A spokesperson for the school told the Herald Sun it is “deeply committed to fostering a culture of inclusion, respect and diversity.”
Indeed, the school’s website contains some fairly strident diversity, equity and inclusion statements, including:
We learn and work in solidarity with and from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s First Peoples and as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of the land, sky and water.
We foster a safe community that celebrates diversity, uniqueness, and respect for differences of people of every faith, ethnicity, age, ability, neurodiversity, culture, language, gender identity, sex and sexual orientation.
Commentators at Australia’s Sky News, an over-the-air broadcaster owned by Comcast, blasted the well-to-do Christian boarding school, saying “they’re going to diversify themselves out of business.”
“We know now that the word inclusivity means ‘exclusivity’ and diversity means ‘uniformity,’” Dr. Stephen Chavura, who teaches European and Australian history at Campion College, told Sky News host James Macpherson.
Chavura went on to praise the girls who blew the whistle “for standing up to woke bullying” when asked to hide their crosses.
“What I want to say to all the girls at this school is, wear your crosses if you have a cross, turn up to school and wear that cross and send a message to other students and to teachers and to the school in general, that this is a Christian school,” said Chavura. “It is not a Marxist woke school.”
Mcpherson tied the incident to a general “war on Christianity,” noting how Harris last week reacted with mocking hostility “instinctively” when Christianity came up during the pro-abortion portion of her rally.
When an attendee called out “Jesus is Lord,” Harris said dismissively, “Oh, you guys are at the wrong rally.
“I think you meant to go to the smaller one down the street,” Harris added, in an obvious swipe at rival Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s campaign.
“We’ve replaced Christianity in the West, or in modern Western culture, with this woke ideology, cult religion nonsense, and it’s just leading us into all sorts of rubbish that we’ve seen at that school in Melbourne,” Damian Corry, an Australian podcast host and political commentator told Sky’s Mcpherson.
Later, another Sky News show, The Outsiders, denounced the college’s actions, while also tagging Harris as part of a war on Christianity.
“Apparently, the young girls there wearing crosses are being told it’s inappropriate. But then they’ve got these furries who are coming in with ears and tails, and they’ve got people wearing all sorts of LGBTQIA+++ material. But if you want to wear a cross … that could be problematic for some people,” said host Rita Panahi.
Panahi also spoke with co-hosts James Morrow and Rowan Dean about Harris’ decision to skip the premier Catholic political event, the Al Smith Dinner.
“Kamala Harris didn’t show up, but she sent a video that was wildly offensive to Catholics,” added Morrow. “So, too, again, it’s like this whole sort of thing where the left and religion, they don’t get it.”