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Commencement, May 1972: Maybe the camera knew? Author Kevin Althouse (right front) and Michael Ward (left rear), accepting congratulations from his father at the side of SMC's Joyce Hall moments after commencement exercises for the Class of 1972.

     Unfortunately, I’m one of those easily distracted guys who can sometimes sit through a three-hour movie and be absolutely clueless about the main plot — usually because I try to discern a “deeper meaning” to sub-plots that only my fertile-yet-unfocused imagination concocts.
      So, it wasn’t exactly unusual for me not to have immediately extrapolated something profoundly and personally compelling from an obituary that I read nearly five years ago in SMC’s alumni publication Founder’s Hall about a 1972 classmate of mine who had died on December 1, 1997 in Boston.
      My classmate’s obit was a typically worded article about a typical alum’s death, or so I thought.
      Initially, my concern over Michael Ward’s death was the sort of self-serving there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I anguish that most of us experience when we first learn about the death of someone familiar. But, as my eyes met the obituary’s last sentence, my gut felt as if it’d been pounded sharply by a punch from Muhammed Ali in his prime.
      “[Michael] is survived by his partner, his mother and three siblings,” read the last sentence of the obituary.
      “Partner”?
      Sure, “partner” can mean many things. In legal parlance, it could be used to identify a participant in a business or corporate venture. But, by contemporary popular culture standards, “partner” relates to something altogether different than garden-variety legal partnerships or businesses, and that’s what floored me. After I did a little research, I was pretty certain that my hunch was correct, and that there was a “deeper meaning” about my deceased classmate. And from that deeper meaning, I was fairly certain that there were at least two of us in my class: Mike and me.
      Until I read his obit, I didn’t really know too much about Michael, especially personal aspects of his life. Given the era, the social and political environment while we were students, probably neither of us had a clue about any “deeper meanings” about each other. At least I didn’t.
      In retrospect, that’s really unsettling because the epiphany I had about the Michael Ward I knew from a generation past made me re-evaluate the statistics I’d heard so much about. After all, two students out of a class of some 340 in my class is roughly one-half of one percent—hardly the ten per cent figure that professor Alfred Kinsey hypothesized more than half a century ago. Simple logic told me that there were more than two of us. There just had to be.
      Strangely, it was that rather unique sense of there’s-only-two-of-us identity through which I began to develop a belated kinship with my deceased classmate. I must admit that it feels a bit eerie to have bonded with someone after his death. Establishing a relationship is infinitely easier when both parties to that relationship are alive.
      Mike and I weren’t close friends at Saint Michael’s. We were at most friendly strangers, just classmate-acquaintances who lived across the quad from each other, and who occasionally passed and recognized each other with a muted “hey” as we trekked to and from classes, the library, the chapel or Alliot Hall.
      Perhaps Mike and I weren’t particularly chummy because it didn’t seem that we had too much in common. Physically, Mike was shorter than me and had a curly head of hair. I was a taller, skinny kid with straight, longish hair. Mike spoke with a noticeably eastern New England accent and liked Boston Bruins hockey legend Bobby Orr. I had an annoying, nasal central New York accent, and worshiped New York Ranger all-star goalie Ed Giacomin.
      [As if by design, the Bruins won the Stanley Cup the year Mike and I graduated. And wouldn’t you know it: Mike’s hockey hero, Bobby Orr, was named the ’72 playoff’s MVP. Orr was given the award immediately after the Bruins shut-out (who else?) my New York Rangers and my goalie-hero, Ed Giacomin, in the last game 3 – 0 for a 4 – 2 series Stanley Cup victory.]
      Sports teams aside, Mike and I went our separate ways moments after Sen. Ted Kennedy finished his address to the ’72 graduates on the steps of Durick library that pleasant May afternoon. Mike soon joined the U. S. Army, and was stationed mainly in Germany as an English-German interpreter.
      After leaving the service, Mike returned to the Boston area and worked for the U.S. Labor Department while he attended Suffolk University Law School in the evenings. After he graduated from law school, Mike clerked for a year for a judge, then moved to Washington, D.C. where he worked as an attorney for the Labor Department.
      I was a bit more of a gypsy, securing a Master’s degree in journalism at Syracuse University immediately after graduating from Saint Michael’s; worked as a political reporter at a daily newspaper; then returned to S. U. and its College of Law two years later to get a law degree; did a stint as an administrator of continuing legal education seminars for the New York State Bar Association; taught writing courses for nearly a decade at a Florida university; did another tour of duty with a daily newspaper; taught at several community colleges, and now currently float between the worlds of journalism and academe.
      Despite our personal and professional dissimilarities, Mike and I did share some rather obvious affinities: we were about the same age; same gender; both of us had law degrees; we were Roman Catholics, and Mike and I were alumni of Saint Michael’s College. Less obvious to most, perhaps all, of our Saint Michael’s classmates is the fact that Mike and I were part of a newly emerging — but always present — social minority in the U.S. and on Catholic college campuses across the country: the gay Catholic student.
      For many sexual minority students, life at public, non-sectarian colleges or universities can be stressful, despite notions of so-called “political correctness.” But, life for sexual minority students attending Catholic colleges can be extraordinarily difficult, even in an early 21st century “enlightened” culture.

      But consider how difficult life was for students such as Mike, me or any other non-heterosexual Catholic college student in the late 1960s and early ‘70s. Remember that there were no gay-friendly student organizations such as the current Ally, St. Michael’s contemporary gay-friendly support organization. And way back in the days of peace, love, and understanding, there were no provisions in the College catalogue protecting lesbian and gay students against sexual orientation discrimination
      At Saint Michael’s College in the late 1960s and early 70s, “gay” mostly meant happy, not homosexual. And even less-than-subtle rumors and trash talking about the perceived homosexuality of a student could quickly result in that student becoming a campus pariah The social, legal and political impact of the 1969 Stonewall riots hadn’t made it to Colchester yet. Besides, many of us then were trying to liberate ourselves from ourselves; idealistic notions of sexual liberty seemed distant and somewhat implausible.
      Being a closeted gay or lesbian student then at SMC was “in”; being out was … well, “out.” I should know: I did my best to pretend that I was the poster boy for heterosexuality on campus.
      As a student, as a class president and as a hockey club goaltender at SMC, I did the most I could to be hidden, locked and buried in the deep recesses of my own self-made and perpetually maintained closet. At that uncertain time of my life, I had no urge to proclaim the now familiar “I’m-here-I’m-queer-get-used-to-it” mantra used recently by many gay rights activists.
      The issue of homosexuality, bi-sexuality — or anything other than heterosexuality — was rarely, if ever, discussed objectively then. If the subject matter did come up, it was always in an extremely pejorative sense — the conversation typically laced with “faggot” or “queer” descriptives.
      Strangely, during the supposedly sophisticated era of moon landings, student demonstrations, the struggle for women’s rights, and the three days of peace, love and music at Woodstock, homosexuality was a taboo subject on the SMC campus. Perhaps this was so because some people still considered homosexuality to be a serious mental illness. After all, it wasn’t until December 15, 1973 that the American Psychiatric Association, while considering a resolution calling for civil rights legislation that would ensure gay, lesbian and bisexual folk the same protections guaranteed to others, also dropped homosexuality and bi-sexuality from its list of mental illnesses.
      But, it now gives me very little solace to know that young gay men like Mike and me weren’t considered to be crazy by the professionals. Still, it was the early 70s, and it was still very much open season on what Archie Bunker used to call “fairies” and “fruits” on CBS’s extremely popular All in the Family — despite proclamations to the contrary by mental health professionals.
      When Mike and I received our degrees from Saint Michael’s, homophobia — latent, patent, institutionalized or otherwise — was still very much in vogue at SMC and at most colleges and universities in the nation. And heterosexism and homophobia was particularly acute at religiously-based institutions, such as St. Mike’s.
      College students then had other social and political concerns to occupy their passions: the war in Vietnam, the killings of four unarmed students at Kent State University by M-1-wielding Ohio National Guardsmen, a burglary at Democratic party headquarters at the Washington Watergate complex, and, of course, Richard Milhous Nixon. For most college students of that hippie-dippy era, “gay” issues were still relegated to the fringe.
      And, occupying the fringe area as I did then, I’d often acted as a hypocritical, homophobic, self-loathing closeted faggot, particularly when I’d join dorm mates, classmates or teammates in ridiculing mostly male students who were presumed to be gay. It seems that Mike and I lucked-out from being the subjects of “faggot” or “queer” catcalls or the like because, I guess, others had no clue about our real sexual orientation.
      But, that was then. This is now.
      In the several months—and now years—after I first read of Mike’s death, I’ve tried to understand and catalog some of the experiences of sexual minority students who followed Mike and me through Saint Michael’s College.
      In the nearly 30 years since Mike and I graduated from SMC, did those openly gay, lesbian or bisexual students who followed us feel comfortable on campus? I wondered. Had homophobia been a real concern to gay and lesbian students at Saint Michael’s? Had there been any notable anti-gay incidents on campus, particularly in light of the official Roman Catholic positions and declarations regarding homosexual orientation and homosexuals?
      My understanding was that St. Mike’s, like most Catholic colleges and universities, had progressed so that lesbian, gay, bisexual and questioning students could feel and be safe and comfortable while on campus.
      According to a recent SMC catalogue, it appeared that gay and lesbian students have been welcomed, and valued on campus. “Each student has a value and dignity which is respected in full,” the College catalogue reported.
      “Value and dignity?” Even for gay, lesbian and bisexual students? I wondered with a dash of cynicism.
      The reassuring words of former SMC President Paul J. Reiss in his 1993 annual report to the College distributed to the SMC community gave me encouragement.
      “Homophobic attitudes or actions fail to respect the rights and dignity of gay and lesbian students and staff; they are not consistent with the principles of the Catholic faith,” Reiss wrote.
      Although Dr. Reiss’ words seemed fairly middle-of-the-road for a Catholic college president of the early 1990s, they were rather gutsy, given the official social, political and financial relationships between the College and the greater, world-wide Catholic community .
      Also, I’d heard from several sources that the current SMC President, Dr. Marc vanderHeyden, encourages a Saint Michael’s College community that not only acknowledges, but also values, the differences in the human condition, including a student’s sexual orientation. But, when I visited with Dr. vanderHeyden in January 2001 to discuss this essay, I was quickly reminded about the practical politics regarding issues which some think are best discussed with a wink and a nod. The heated, politically charged climate concerning the struggle for civil unions in Vermont often made life for Dr. vanderHeyden tough.
       I found Dr. vanderHeyden supportive of LBGTQ students and their concerns in private, but publicly circumspect with respect. But some argue that vanderHeyden’s public circumspection is understandable, given the official positions of the Catholic Church on homosexuality, as well as the public divisions in Vermont regarding civil unions. It might be trite to say that vanderHeyden finds himself between a rock and hard place. It might also be true.

Kevin T. Althouse, 29 years latere - former humanities department faculty member at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (FL), research writer for People for the American Way Foundation (DC), writing instructor at Onondaga, Finger Lakes and Cayuga community colleges (NY). He lives with his two golden retrievers, "Riddle" and "Tiverton," in Auburn, New York - at the heart of the Finger Lakes region.

     I guess it was my reporter’s curiosity the led me to find out what my fellow alumni felt about whether lesbian and gay students should be made welcomed and secure on campus.
      I maintained ties with Saint Michael’s since I graduated on May 15, 1972 by frequently checking out The Defender, the SMC weekly student newspaper through its website. I also subscribed to St. Mike’s ALUMNET, an e-mail listserv through which contributing alums can comment on just about anything — and indeed they do.
      It was in reading a March 1998 ALUMNET post written, coincidentally, by a 1972 classmate of mine, that I recognized that perhaps some of my classmates and fellow alums did not necessarily subscribe to the notion of respecting the rights and dignity of gay, lesbian and bisexual students, as the College’s written and very public policies then seemed to suggest.
      My listserv classmate was obviously not a happy camper about how he then perceived Saint Michael’s to have become a veritable Castro District, San Francisco-East.
      “As a member of the Class of ‘72. I am absolutely dismayed at what has happened to SMC,” my classmate wrote. “To a large extent, I believe that SMC has forsaken its Catholic roots in the name of diversity, particularly to what appears to be a very tolerant attitude toward homosexuality.”
      Since when are diversity and tolerance anti-Catholic notions? I wondered.
      It’s probably just as well that my listserv classmate probably hadn’t heard about what happened once to Jen Matthews, ’92.
      During the spring semester of her senior year, Matthews wanted to attend a semi-formal dance being held on campus. She brought her girlfriend as her date. “We were the only same-sex couple there,” Matthews said. “The reactions from the students were mixed, and many close friends were supportive. However, the rumor grapevine in the following days included stories of people saying I had just come with my girlfriend to make a statement. The truth was that we had come to the dance together because we were dating, so of course we wanted to go with one another — just like straight couples.”
      A year later, it was a gay male student’s turn to take center stage. Craig Mitchell, ’93, was a very popular guy on campus. Intelligent, athletic, articulate, and strikingly handsome, Mitchell had become a favorite DJ at 135 Pearl, a downtown Burlington club. The Saginaw, Michigan graduate was invited to represent his class during his class’s commencement proceedings as speaker, and part of Mitchell’s speech was a first for an SMC commencement.
      “I address you today,” Mitchell told the assembly, “not as an African-American student, and not as a gay student, but as a Saint Michael’s College student.”
      Thanks to Mitchell, the “gay” word finally made its way to the lexicon of SMC graduation lore.
      So, it seemed to me that some courageous SMC students and alumni were taking the College, kicking and screaming into the 21st century. The future for lesbian and gay students at St,. Mike’s looked promising.
      But, in the autumn of 1998, there was devastating news from Wyoming which reverberated throughout the Colchester campus.
      In October, Matthew Shepard, an openly gay University of Wyoming student, was beaten with the blunt end of a .357 magnum gun by two young, homophobic men who had been tweaking crystal meth for nearly five days. Shepard’s brutally beaten, unconscious body was tied to a cattle fence a few miles from Laramie. Shepard was left to die alone in near-freezing temperatures. Shepard’s face and head had been so brutally smashed by the assault that even his parents had difficulty recognizing their comatose son in the hospital, where he died four days later.
      A few weeks after the Shepard murder, The Defender, in an article about SMC student reaction to the Shepard case and homophobia at SMC, Theresa Krieger, ’99, identified herself as a lesbian.
      In theat article, Krieger told The Defender that “every now and again I get a reminder maybe you’re not safe (at St. Michael’s).”
      That reminder was reinforced in the form of an anonymous message left on Krieger’s school voicemail account soon after her Defender interview. According to College Security reports, a “very lewd and sexually graphic” message was left on Krieger’s voicemail by a male SMC freshman.
      That freshman student was suspended for the remainder of the academic year after he admitted that he had left the message.
      “This didn’t happen in a vacuum,” Krieger told The Defender after the incident. “Either passively or actively, there were people condoning this. In some sense we are all responsible for what kind of environment we create on campus.”
      At the time of the voicemail message episode, Krieger was president of Ally. Krieger’s experience demonstrated, at least to me, that it was still risky to be openly gay at SMC.
      Is it any wonder, though?
      To put it bluntly, the Catholic Church hasn’t exactly embraced their gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers.
      As with other contentious issues in the Catholic Church, such as abortion, birth control, or the roles of women in the Church, and now homosexuality, the Church often appears to take two steps forward and one backward, leaving sexual minority living in a perpetual Catch-22.
      In November 1998, an American Catholic bishops’ committee released “Always Our Children,” a pastoral message that urged fellow Catholic to be more tolerant of homosexual orientation as something not “freely chosen.”
      However, the National Conference of Bishops regards homosexual acts (sex) as “intrinsically disordered.” So, the bishops contend, with Vatican approval, that homosexuals must remain chaste (i.e., no sex) for as long as they’re unmarried — and, presumably, for as long as they’re not heterosexual.
      Heterosexuals who are married get the green light from the Vatican to have sex. But, what if homosexuals want to marry? That’s a moot question because no jurisdiction in the U.S. currently recognizes same-gender marriages. However, Vermont is currently the only jurisdiction in the U.S. that sanctions a same-gender “civil union.”
      However, as most Vermonters know, a civil union is not a marriage.
      Based on several media accounts, one would guess that The Most Reverend Kenneth A. Angell, the Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, is not exactly a supporter of same-gender unions or of sexual minority folks.
      “I will be praying in solidarity with supporters of traditional marriage throughout Vermont, our nation, and indeed the world, that someday we shall celebrate a constitutional amendment to preserve the sanctity of marriage,” wrote Bishop Angell on the Burlington Diocese’s web page.
      Pressure such as Bishop Angell’s can take a heavy toll on those at SMC who are bound by Church and Vatican dictates.
      And, just to seemingly make matters worse, the conservative Cardinal Newman Society for the Preservation of Catholic Higher Education maintained that “the essential elements of a Catholic education has been discarded for the sake of the mistaken notion of academic freedom,” and urged that Catholic colleges ban openly gay staff.

     If this often contradictory stuff is as confusing to you as it is to me, consider what all of this might mean to contemporary Catholic college gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender students who are trying to be otherwise faithful stewards of and to their faith. Specifically, given those sometimes confusing and contradictory messages from Church, government and college authorities, one wonders where it leaves gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender Catholic students, specifically those at Saint Michael’s College.
      I tried to get answers to some of my own questions born of confusion by asking mostly recent St. Michael’s gay alums what campus life was like when they were students. Frankly, I was absolutely certain that my respondents would tell me that, out of frustration, they’ve disassociated themselves from Saint Michael’s College, if not the Roman Catholic Church. I was also absolutely sure that they had become cynics, feeling that their College and Faith had deserted them.
      Fortunately, I was also absolutely wrong.
      It seems that many of the positive changes toward LBGT students at St. Mike’s have been brought about, in large measure, by courageous SMC students, young men and women, who feel very strongly that they can be loyal to their faith as well as to their divine gifts of sexuality.
      Along with the several students who’ve managed to light the way for others, faculty and staff have also often served as beacons for LBGT students during some very stormy and dangerous times — perhaps jeopardizing their own personal or professional lives.
      According to many current and recently graduated students, Dr. Dave Landers, the Director of the Student Resource Center and Linda Hollingdale, the Center’s assistant director, are two of those beacons.
      “Dave became, and remains, a counselor, a friend, a mentor, a father … and is among a small group of the most influential people in my life,” said William J. Rogers, ’98, a former counselor with the SMC Admissions department, and now the current Executive Director of OutRight Vermont, a Burlington organization dedicated to counseling and directing gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth.
      Landers said that if Michael Ward and I were now attending SMC as openly gay students, we’d probably find it a comfortable and safe experience, and that we’d probably be able to feel that way without encountering many of the problems and hassles that would have most assuredly hit us a generation ago while we were students.
      “More and more current students are being educated about sexual orientation issues earlier in their experiences here, and so the difficulties you experienced here are not the same today,” said Landers. “Now I speak at every orientation and one of my standard lines is, ‘Saint Michael’s College doesn’t just accept differences, we celebrate them. We are a better place because we have gay and lesbian and bisexual students here.’”
      And it appears those sexual minority students, as well as those who are questioning their sexuality, often describe Saint Michael’s as an excellent place to discover themselves and their sexuality.
      Rogers said that he came out at Saint Michael’s. “I came here a fairly independent, well-traveled, ‘non-traditional’ transfer student who knew something in his life needed a change,” Rogers said. “I happened to meet a group [at SMC] of the most caring, supportive, nurturing, challenging, wonderful people I have ever bad the good fortune to know.”
      Susan Wilson, ’98, said that she found SMC a great place to define herself as a lesbian because of the sustenance given her by the College and staff.
      “When I came out my sophomore year, there were only two other out lesbian students on campus,” Wilson said. “I was able to come out because of the openly gay and lesbian staff and faculty on campus. They were good and helpful people, and I looked up to them. In cliché terms, they were my role models.”
      Wilson, as with many of SMC’s openly-gay students, assumed student leadership roles on campus. Wilson, then a theatre major, served as a Resident Assistant, co-chair of Ally, and was an active a participant in the Emerging Leaders Program. She said that it’s not just gay faculty and staff who provide support and guidance for LBGTQ SMC students; several heterosexual faculty and staff members have served as unofficial, but strong, LBGT “allies.”
      “Especially [associate professor] Diane Lynch,” Wilson said. “Can I say her name? She rocks!”
      Still, as at many colleges or universities, life for openly gay or bisexual students at SMC isn’t always a piece of cake, as the fall ’98 voice-mail episode clearly demonstrates. Being other than heterosexual at St. Michael’s often comes with a price for many.
      “I think that it is still hard to be gay on campus today,” said David Grenier, ’97 of Burlington. “Especially with the recent marriage debate. It has sort of split the college.”
      In 1999, in a case that Vermonters know all too well, a case which has national implications, the Vermont Supreme Court ruled that the Vermont State Legislature had to afford same-gender couples similar legal protection as married couples currently enjoy.
      In 2000, the Vermont Legislature and Governor Dean followed the state Supreme Court directive and created the now-famous “civil union” statute for same-gender couples.
      Coincidentally, the Baker et al. v. Vermont case has a rather significant Saint Michael’s College connection. Two of the successful petitioners in that case were Peter Harrigan, ’83 and his partner, Stan Baker. Harrigan is currently a popular SMC associate professor of Fine Arts.
      Although it appears that most at St. Michael’s has been supportive of Harrigan, there are, undoubtedly, many forces and personalities both in and outside the College who have not been nearly as supportive. And some are particularly non-supportive in a rather public way.
      Harrigan told The Defender in a March 2000 interview that he has walked a fine line on campus. “It is difficult because the Catholic Church has certain beliefs of teaching about homosexuality,” Harrigan said. “Yet, at the same time the College has a strong commitment to social justice and civil rights, so I can’t see why it would be difficult for people in the community to reconcile these two things or figure out how to respond based on that dichotomy.”
      So, despite—and probably in some cases, in spite of—official Church and Diocese policy, life goes on for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning faculty and staff at St. Michael’s College.
      But there’s some irony about how life goes on for sexual minority students at St. Mike’s: Students have reported that those in the Office of Campus Ministry — one of the dwindling number of official links that the College still maintains with the Catholic Church — have been significantly helpful
      “Campus Ministry is wonderfully supportive and open to having gay students be part of the Masses and other programs they have,” Joe Kelleher, ’01, said.
      Kelleher knows the campus well. He’s held several leadership positions while a student at Saint Michael’s: a resident assistant, MOVE core team member and co-chair of Ally. Although he was born without a right arm, Kelleher was part of the 3,000-plus riders in the 2000 annual Boston-to-New York AIDS ride. The ride raised $7 million; Kelleher personally raised $2,500.
      Still, as altruistic, intelligent and gutsy as Kelleher is, he and millions of others like him continue to be the objects of debate, derision, and disgust simply because they’re gay.
      Yet Joe and all the rest move ahead with their lives, doing the best they can, all the while hoping and praying that society, and those who form the greater Roman Catholic community, will soon come to realize that each person has value and dignity “which should be respected in full,” and that a person’s sexuality, whatever orientation, is an integral part of that value and dignity.
      Then those of us who comprise the Saint Michael’s gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender alumni family might look back on our experiences at SMC and muse as gay alum Bob King, ’84, recently did: “I treasure my memories of St. Mike’s and am thankful for the time I spent there. I made some life-long friends and learned a great deal — not the least of which was about myself.”
      My guess is that my classmate, Mike Ward, and all the other gay alums of Saint Michael’s College who preceded, as well as those who will follow us at the Happy Hilltop, are nodding their heads in agreement.
      Because, as with folks such as Joe Kelleher, Bob King, Peter Harrigan, Sue Wilson, David Grenier, Randy Orso, Jennifer Calkins, B. J. Rogers, Theresa Krieger, Jen Matthews, Craig Mitchell, Allison Davis, Peter McDonough, Paul Leduc and countless other SMC alums, Mike and I weren’t really alone at Saint Michael’s — although some of us didn’t know it at the time.
      Perhaps that’s the “deeper meaning” that I’ve been missing all these years.