Has a Christian College Ever Put On “The Vagina Monologues”? February 15, 2009

Has a Christian College Ever Put On “The Vagina Monologues”?

By Guest Contributor
February 15, 2009

Since Valentine’s Day was yesterday, a lot of colleges across the country had their annual performances of Eve Ensler‘s The Vagina Monologues.

I’m just curious. Given the nature of the monologues, has any Christian college ever staged a production of the show?

I can’t imagine they would, but perhaps I’m wrong.

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  • Eric

    I went to a Lutheran College (Valparaiso University) who has put it on every year as far as I know.

  • Nick

    Notre Dame (Catholic obviously) puts it on every year. The wackjobs freak out and protest and such, but the show goes on.

  • Well, one of the scenes has some woman talking about seducing someone who is underage (though not all presentations show this particular scene). I can understand why some might object to that.

    Another scene has some young woman rolling around on the floor and moaning; I tried my best not to snicker.

    My wife was cast as the “down there” lady; she played it a bit southern.

  • Michael

    Davidson College, a Presbyterian (PCUSA) college north of Charlotte, North Carolina has a group do it every year. I’m not sure they do it on Valentine’s Day, but it is done.

  • Jack

    Georgetown does it all the time with no resistance at all (though there may have been the first time). Georgetown is Catholic- but Jesuit and more liberal than Notre Dame so take that for what its worth. Most of the top universities have really robust free speech rules to compete for the best students. But if you drop down to the next tier censorship gets pretty common.

  • Laura

    I got to a jesuit university and our students put it on but the college wouldnt let them perform it on campus and they had to rent space in a near by building.

  • ubz

    Furman University did it the two years i was there

  • Tristan

    I also go to a Jesuit institution, Saint Louis University, that had the show on campus several years ago, but wasn’t allowed to perform on campus again due to protests. Now the show is a few blocks off campus.

  • Texas Christian University did it this year, despite the overwhelming population of conservative Christians.

  • A Google search found this list of Catholic and Protestant schools with Vagina Monologue productions on campus (courtesy of the conservative “Free Republic” web site):

    Catholic Schools showing the Vagina Monologues
    http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1337974/posts

    The answer to your question is apparently a lot of them.

  • Jen

    Oh my god, second reason to bring up my Jesuit college today! We performed it every year, and at our Rome campus as well. I don’t think it really upset all but the most conservative students, who got mad there was no “educational” reason for the show, as if that is the only reason to have any events on a college campus.

  • Jason Orlando Hawk

    I do not personally attend the college in question, but a Wesleyan college in my home town did that play 4 years ago as part of their spring production. I was unaware of it at the time, but a girl I used to date apparently helped with the staging. Haven’t heard of any particularly nasty backlash…

  • Rachel

    Mmm, it definitely didn’t go over well at my school. I went to University of Portland, a Catholic college. The agreement with on-campus student groups was that they could use school facilities for anything they wanted, as long as they organized the whole bit and took care of the costs. That all changed when a group decided to invite a production of the Vagina Monologues on campus – they were ready to take care of everything, and the school president essentially banned it, saying it wasn’t consistent with the school’s values.

    The students, after all this work, had to find another venue willing to host the production and ended up busing somewhere off campus to see it.

    I suppose UP, in its original “anything goes” proclamation, was trying to give off an air of intellectual and social open-mindedness in a city that’s well-known for both. Sadly, it wound up being all talk and no substance.

  • SarahH

    Albion College, where I went to school, is pretty much secular now, but has a long history with the Methodist Church. When the Vagina Monologues were performed (twice while I attended – they do it every two years) there was overwhelming support from the staff, and lots of kids wore the “I <3 My Vagina” and “Ask Me About My Vagina” t-shirts.

    The students who got riled up and protested weren’t Methodists – mostly the College Republicans and a handful of fundamentalists. So the denomination associated with the college had no problem with it – students from other denominations did.

  • William Jewell College – a conservative mostly Baptist college in Liberty, Missouri – put it on recently, I’m pretty sure. Fascinating place for that to happen if you ask me…

  • Nick Wedig

    Our Catholic university showed it for a few years while a nun was president, but when she was replaced with a layperson president, the new president banned the play.

  • belongsomewhere

    A cousin of mine says that Holy Cross began to do productions of it shortly after she graduated.

  • My college, DePaul University, has been showing it for several years– possibly the past 10, if the signs are to believed. Then again, the fact that DePaul is Catholic is our best-kept secret. We’re a pretty darn secular school.

  • Zach

    I go to Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, WA and we have had it every year for at least ten years or so. It always draws a huge crowd.