This time, the issue is a 12-week, student-led workshop called FemSex, modeled after courses at the University of California-Berkeley and Brown University to engage students in "the exploration of social forces through the lens of female sexuality."
Among the workshop activities that critics found objectionable: coloring anatomical images of vaginas, refered to by a reappropriated feminist term that many consider offensive. And, creating "an anonymous piece of erotica exploring fantasy and desire."
The Female Sexuality Workshop, which started five weeks ago, was given the green light by the campus's Gender and Sexuality Resource Center.
But about a week ago, Marquette University President Father Scott Pilarz and Provost John Pauly pulled the university's sponsorship and forbid the workshop from held at the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center.
In a statement released Monday night, university spokesman Brian Dorrington said Marquette's leadership initially wasn't aware of the specific programming planned for the student-led FemSex workshop.
University leaders reviewed the workshop outline after receiving a complaint from a former student, and found that "aspects fell outside the center’s stated purpose," Dorrington said.
"Because of this, the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center is no longer sponsoring the student-led workshop," Dorrington said, declining to elaborate on the reasons. "To be clear, this was not an academic course and was not led by faculty. It was student programming that took place outside the classroom, which like all student activities, is subject to university guidelines."
Marquette graduate student Claire Van Fossen said the workshop will continue, at an undisclosed location.
Van Fossen, a Trinity Fellow working on her masters degree in nonprofit management, said FemSex "does not teach any curriculum, push any agenda, condone any behavior, or act as therapy."
The FemSex syllabus for the Marquette workshop states it encourages exploration of identities through group discussions, activities, and individual exercises, Van Fossen said in an editorial submitted to the Journal Sentinel.
The workshop, Van Fossen said, "explores what it means to take ownership of one's sexuality, body, pleasure, language, and education, and that peer facilitators foster introspection and encourage participants to develop empowered, informed relationships with themselves and others.
"Thus, at its core, FemSex is about introspection, discussion, exploration, and self-empowerment," Van Fossen said. "Or are those anti-Catholic now, too?"
Ethan Hollenberger, the 22-year-old Marquette alum whose challenge against the workshop prompted Marquette's review of the content, said Tuesday the issue he and other students took with the FemSex workshop was the university's sponsorship.
Hollenberger, a founding member of the Young Americans for Freedom chapter at Marquette, said in a blog post for the Young America's Foundation that he emailed Pilarz when he heard about the workshop, "seeking comment and a defense of the workshop."
"While Marquette’s leaders standing up for the principles of the school is applauded, they only did so after tough questions and pressure," Hollenberger said in his blog post. "FemSex should have never been considered for university sponsorship in the first place. Marquette administrators have an established pattern of retreating after public outcry. If not for watchful conservatives, FemSex might be officially sanctioned today. "
Culturally, Marquette is a Catholic Jesuit University, Hollenberger said a separate email to the Journal Sentinel.
"FemSex teaches Marquette students to give into a debased and anti-Catholic view of sex and desire," Hollenberger said. "Defenders of FemSex would undoubtedly argue that the beliefs of the Catholic Church are archaic and no longer applicable in the modern world. What would their position be if a workshop defended the Church's beliefs in the context of today's culture?"
"As a small group of individuals, these women can meet and talk about any topic of their choosing -- provided the Catholic institution doesn't sponsor or recognize them as a group," Hollenberger said.
Van Fossen said the center where the workshop was to be held was a space founded for "the pursuit of dialogue, growth, and empowerment around issues of gender, sex, and sexuality."
Marquette University "fully supports the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center and the goals set forth in the center’s charter," and has done so since the center's inception, Dorrington said.
"The charter for the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center states that it 'maintains fidelity to the University’s Catholic Jesuit heritage and character by attending to the needs of its students, both social and intellectual, and fostering knowledge and justice on issues having to do with gender and sexuality,' ” Dorrington said.
The workshop initially came under fire when Marquette political science professor John McAdams earlier this month published an article on his personal blog, "Marquette Warrior," denouncing FemSex as anti-Catholic and criticizing the university for sponsoring it.
McAdams alleged in his blog that FemSex workshops at other universities tell women "that men are evil exploiters."
"The image of college women one gets from FemSex is that of whining neurotics," McAdams said in his blog post. "Really, which would be better for the cause of women’s equality: studying to make a good grade on a Physics exam, or attending a feminist hen party to obsess on sex? FemSex, in reality, is the ultimate way of treating women as sex objects."
The term used in connection with the coloring of images of vaginas may have seemed vulgar, Van Fossen acknowleged. But it should not have resulted in rescinding sponsorship of the workshop, she said.
The workshop was open to people of all genders, Van Fossen said. The workshop "in no way conflicts with Catholic theology, unless creating a safe space in which to discuss these topics is anti-Catholic," she said.
Van Fossen blamed Hollenberger for turning Pilarz and other Marquette administrators against the workshop.
And Pilarz, she said, "betrayed student trust by failing to do his due diligence regarding the claims that had been made about FemSex at Marquette and by refusing to engage with students and advocate for their interests in the matter."
"During the past two years, Marquette University has worked diligently to implement and embed many educational programs on the important topics of gender and sexuality," Dorrington said.
"The center allows us to delve into issues of gender and sexuality with respect, sensitivity, academic rigor and concern for social justice," Dorrington said. "We cannot think of any more important initiatives than the prevention of sexual violence and discrimination based on gender or sexuality."
Since its opening, the center "has provided many educational programs for students, faculty and staff," Dorrington said. "The university will continue to support the educational and intellectual exploration of issues of gender and sexuality as we work to foster human dignity and justice."
The university drew national attention in May 2010 after rescinding an offer to Seattle University professor Jodi O'Brien for an open deanship at Marquette's College of Arts and Sciences.
In making that decision, Marquette cited concerns relating to the school's "Catholic mission and identity" and the university's incompatibility with O'Brien's writings. O'Brien is a lesbian scholar, but Marquette at the time said the decision had no connection to her sexual orientation.
The decision attracted national attention and raised issues about the mission of Catholic higher education, academic freedom and the role of gender and sexual orientation in academia.
At the time, dozens of faculty members from both Marquette and Seattle University bought a full-page ad in the Journal Sentinel condemning the university's decision and demanding that she be given the dean's job, along with an apology. The university later reached a settlement with O'Brien.
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