ARTICLES

USD to Appoint Homosexual Head of Religious Studies

GAY NEWSPAPER REPORTS "WIDESPREAD FACULTY SUPPORT"

By Tom Barbarie

Francis Lazarus, provost of the University of San Diego, has confirmed reports that an openly homosexual professor has been named chairman of the Religious Studies department at the Catholic institution.

Dr. Joseph Columbo is slated to take over as department chairman, as reported in the November 6 edition of the Gay and Lesbian Times, a San Diego weekly. "We've reviewed the matter and the situation is Dr. Columbo is in line to become chairman at the start of the next academic year," Lazarus said.

Columbo is currently on sabbatical until February 1, 1998, and several telephone calls to his home went unreturned. But in May 1994, News Notes reported on a conference at USD the previous month titled "Living with Dignity/ Dying with Dignity: Gays and Lesbians in San Diego Speak About Their Community." Columbo, a professor at USD since 1984, spoke about his homosexuality at the gathering.

"We [gays] want to be afforded...the same rights as the heterosexual community," he said. And later on: "Of course, there is the great word 'choice.' 'Didn't you choose to be gay?' Well, I know for certain it has not been in the usual sense of the term, 'choice.'... I chose to go to the University of Chicago. I chose to clean the litter box....However, I would choose to be gay again. Most of my friends might not choose to be gay again simply because it is so damn distracting."

The article in the Gay and Lesbian Times predicted a "showdown" of an unspecified nature had the Columbo appointment, which was said to enjoy widespread faculty support, been rejected by the USD administration. According to the report, the school is experiencing a struggle on the issue of homosexuality, with most faculty and students favoring non-discrimination, while a minority of faculty and the administration -- spurred by fears of donor cutbacks -- seek to avoid making concessions to campus homosexuals.

The article quoted one student as saying that anti-homosexual graffiti and death threats have been swept under the rug at the school. It also accused philosophy professor Dr. John Donnelly of delivering a three-hour lecture to a lesbian student who said she had received death threats. Donnelly told the girl, who was not identified, that she was bound for hell, the report added.

Contacted by News Notes, Donnelly denied the allegations. "I never said that to anyone," he replied. "To do that would be absolutely contradictory to everything I believe."

He said he recalled talking to a female student in the fall of 1993 who said she was a lesbian and had received death threats. The two enjoyed cordial relations long after the talk, Donnelly said. Asked for his reaction to the Columbo appointment, Donnelly would only say, "No comment."

One former student of Donnelly's who asked not to be identified said that in his opinion, behavior such as Donnelly was accused of would have been completely out of character.