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Stonehill College administrators don't want students distributing free condoms to each other... because they'd rather have students distribute free herpes and babies to each other by having unprotected sex! We all know how well vows of "chastity" work for priests, so who can expect college students to refrain, even at a Catholic school? Stonehill's backwards position on birth control is almost as absurd as some of the Globe comments in response to the situation, which include gems like "This girl should be more concerned about the spread of herpes by sharing cups playing beer-pong rather than the students not being coherent enough to use condoms." The dangers of beer pong aside, it's not about students being coherent enough to use condoms. It's about students having good access to condoms—which they don't, because the school took them away. Stonehill certainly has the right to enforce its policies on campus, but it does so at the risk of deterring students from attending the school. The fact that the school's already been driven to accept non-Catholic students (as in the case of the condom distributor) suggests that the market for a school with such strict policies may be about as small as the likelihood that college students will abstain from sex. Perhaps Stonehill will need to rethink its position on these issues if it wants to survive.
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I think you missed the point with this story. Catholic universities banning contraception is old news--it's a doctrine of the faith. What's more interesting is the efforts of students--like those at Boston College who passed a resolution calling for contraceptive distribution on campus--to organize against the school's Catholic faith. Is it reasonable to demand that an organization with an explicitly moral purpose to put aside its moral principles because of other concerns, like student health, etc.?
Interesting how you could have tied this in to the ongoing efforts of Caritas to get approved by Commonwealth Care by partnering with abortion providers.
It's also not unusual, as you seem to imply in this article, for non-Catholics to attend Catholic universities. It's been happening for decades because many, like Boston College, are among the best institutions in the country.
But what does Catholic doctrine say about beer pong?
well, i think the point of the story is that stonehill is preemptively clamping down on students' efforts to organize against its policies. and my point is not that it's unusual for non-catholics to attend catholic universities--my point is that non-catholics should avoid attending schools that ask them to compromise their own principles. only then will such schools shut down.
Catholic schools can't die! Where would we get all of our atheists?