Purposeful Exclusion of Sexual Minority Youth in Christian Higher Education: The Implications of Discrimination

Wolff, Joshua R.; Himes, Heather L.

doi:10.1080/15363759.2010.513630

Cited by 37 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Wolff (2011) and Wolff and Himes (2010) argue that current policies at many religious colleges and universities contribute to a hostile climate toward sexual minority students and reinforce negative attitudes. Furthermore, recent epidemiological research has suggested that gay and lesbian youth are significantly more likely to attempt suicide in environments that are perceived as more hostile toward gay persons, representing an important public health issue (Hatzenbuehler, 2011).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Evangelical Christian College Students and Attitudes Toward Gay Rights: A California University Sample

Wolff

Himes

Kwon

et al. 2012

Journal of LGBT Youth

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Research demonstrates that Evangelical Christians generally hold more negative attitudes toward gays and lesbians, and are less supportive of gay rights than the general U.S. population. To assess these attitudes, undergraduate students at an Evangelical Christian university in California (N = 319) completed the Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men (ATLG) scale (Herek, 1984(Herek, , 1998 and other demographic and religiosity items. Results indicated that Evangelical Christian college students who are not homeschooled and know a gay or lesbian friend, relative, or acquaintance held significantly less negative attitudes toward gay rights than those who do not know a gay or lesbian person. Issues related to increasing respectful dialogue between groups are addressed.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Evangelical Christian College Students and Attitudes Toward Gay Rights: A California University Sample

Wolff

Himes

Kwon

et al. 2012

Journal of LGBT Youth

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“…SM students from forming same-sex relationships or attending their schools, unlike many Evangelical, Nondenominational, and Mormon schools (Biaggio, 2014;Lyon, 2007;Wolff & Himes, 2010). Furthermore, without such a ban in place, more Catholic schools may allow GSAs and other SM-themed activities on campus than more restrictive NARAUs.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sexual minority students in non-affirming religious higher education: Mental health, outness, and identity.

Wolff

Himes²,

Soares

et al. 2016

Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity

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Sexual minority (SM) students are vulnerable to increased rates of psychological distress and harassment as a result of stigma and other forms of marginalization in the college environment. However, little research has been conducted on the experiences and psychological functioning among SMs who attend nonaffirming religiously affiliated universities (NARAUs) that enforce restrictive admission and conduct policies toward SM students, and/or view same-sex romantic expressions and identities as sinful. SM students (N ϭ 213) attending NARAUs completed the Counseling Center Assessment of Psychological Symptoms (CCAPS), the Outness Inventory (OI), and the Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Identity Scale (LGBIS). Results indicate that SM students who attend Mormon, Evangelical, and Nondenominational Christian NARAUs had more difficultly coming to terms with their sexual orientation than those in Catholic or Mainline Protestant schools. Furthermore, Mormon students reported significantly more incongruence between their sexual orientation and religious beliefs than other religious groups. Students who were involved with a Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) had significantly less difficultly with their sexual orientation, less negative identities, and less religious incongruence than those students not involved with a GSA. More than 1 third (37%) reported being bullied or harassed at school because of their sexual orientation. Almost 1 in 5 (17%) reported a mental health professional had attempted to change their sexual orientation. Implications and recommendations for NARAU campus communities and counseling centers are discussed.

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“…LGBT advocates at Catholic and other religiously affiliated universities will likely face resistance given the perception that LGBT rights conflict with religious teachings (Maher, 2003;Wolff & Himes, 2010). Previous studies have shown that external constituents, especially alumni and benefactors, can be a barrier to LGBT organizing on Catholic campuses due to these stakeholders' investment in the university's Catholic identity (Love, 1998).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience of Grassroots Leaders Involved in LGBT Issues at a Catholic University

Hughes

2017

Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice

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This case study examined the sources of resilience utilized by staff and faculty grassroots leaders at a Jesuit, Catholic university addressing the LGBT campus climate. Interviews with 31 grassroots leaders uncovered how self-authorship helped participants reconcile tensions between Church teachings and LGBT concerns, self-efficacy to make a difference contributed to increased confidence, reliance on support networks countered feelings of isolation, and maintaining balance preserved psychological resources. Homophobia and heterosexism permeate college campuses (Rankin, Weber, Blumenfeld, & Frazer, 2010), so many faculty and student affairs professionals are involved in advocacy to address the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) climate (Messinger, 2011). On religiously affiliated campuses, like Catholic universities, however, administrators often perceive LGBT advocacy to be in conflict with religious teachings regarding homosexuality and gender identity (Maher, 2003; Wolff & Himes, 2010) and act to suppress such efforts (Love, 1998; McEntarfer, 2011). When faced with protracted resistance, faculty and staff can find LGBT advocacy on these campuses to be incredibly frustrating, which may escalate into psychological burnout (Howard-Hamilton, Palmer, Johnson, & Kicklighter, 1998). To counter these feelings of frustration, staff and faculty LGBT advocates rely on their sense of resilience (Kezar & Lester, 2011) or their ability to cope with and adapt to adversity (Robertson & Cooper, 2013; Seery, 2011). People develop resilience through extrinsic and intrinsic protective factors or sources of resilience that provide them the psychological resources needed to cope with adversity (Kezar & Lester, 2011; Yonezawa, Jones, & Singer, 2011). Identifying sources of resilience may seem somewhat intuitive, but resilience is a process that is both an innate psychological characteristic and an ability that can be developed (Robertson & Cooper, 2013). Very little research has explored the role of resilience in LGBT advocacy at religiously affiliated colleges and universities, let alone broader campus activism and grassroots leadership in general. The purpose of this study then is to examine the various sources of resilience on which faculty and staff at a Jesuit, Catholic university rely to sustain their commitment to LGBT advocacy. I generally use "LGBT" throughout this article to refer to gender and sexual minority communities, as this version of the abbreviation was most commonly used at my study site, although I do acknowledge this abbreviation is not fully inclusive of the range of identities along gender and sexuality spectra. I make exceptions when referring to study participants, where I use lesbian, gay, bisexual, questioning (LGBQ) as the sample included no transgender participants, and in references to prior literature, I use the abbreviation employed by the authors of those studies. Literature Review The LGBT campus climate is a multidimensional construct that encompasses individual behavior toward and perc...

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Purposeful Exclusion of Sexual Minority Youth in Christian Higher Education: The Implications of Discrimination

Cited by 37 publications

References 17 publications

Evangelical Christian College Students and Attitudes Toward Gay Rights: A California University Sample

Evangelical Christian College Students and Attitudes Toward Gay Rights: A California University Sample

Sexual minority students in non-affirming religious higher education: Mental health, outness, and identity.

Resilience of Grassroots Leaders Involved in LGBT Issues at a Catholic University

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