Opinion: Finis Disputationis

As I write this, it has been 24 hours since the assassination of Charlie Kirk, who was killed while speaking at a college campus event centered on free speech and debate. Gunned down on a university stage in front of thousands of young students, while engaging in and demonstrating what academics used to call “disputatio.” Placards with the words “Prove me wrong” still hang at the murder scene.

Charlie Kirk was a phenom. Courageous. Committed. In love with his country, his family, and with Jesus Christ, his Lord and Savior. Kirk spoke about each very joyfully and determinedly. Remembering Kirk on X just hours after his death, Bishop Robert Barron described him as “a man of great intelligence, considerable charm, and real goodness of heart.” He recalled texting Kirk recently after he witnessed him “debate twenty-five young people who were, to put it mildly, hostile to his views.” He complimented Kirk for keeping his “cool and his charitable attitude in the face of some pretty obnoxious opposition.”

Describing Kirk as “a great debater and also one of the best advocates for civil discourse,” Bishop Barron remarked that Kirk was “first and last, a passionate Christian.” And, as a passionate Christian, Charlie Kirk managed to engage the minds of millions of college students all across the country. He did it in person. Out in the open. Quite literally–in the wide-open spaces of college quads–just like the one at Utah Valley University where an assassin shot a single bullet through his throat, ending his life and shattering the lives of his young wife and two children.

Since his murder occurred on a university campus, one might expect to have already read statements from dozens, or even hundreds, of college presidents. But with a few exceptions, they have been quiet. Remember, by comparison, the campus response to George Floyd? January 6? These things occurred nowhere near a college campus. Yet university administrators wasted no time tearing themselves away from CNN and MSNBC to denounce “systemic racism” and “insurrection.” Colleges rushed to ensure stakeholders knew that they and their students were committed to justice and civic virtue.

Those events, we were told, were teachable moments. So, where are those college presidents now?

Where were those administrators a few years ago when an unprecedented and uncontrolled surge in illegal immigration raged across the country, resulting in the brutal murder of Laken Riley, a beautiful 22-year-old nursing student who was killed by an illegal immigrant while actually running on a college campus? While young female college students across the nation–and their families–worried that they, too, could have a similarly dangerous encounter on or around a sanctuary city’s university campus, their concerns were met with crickets.

In fact, instead of alleviating the real worries of students and families, some schools actually held meetings to discuss the possible trauma students might experience if ICE agents showed up to arrest illegals on campus. Given that, perhaps it should not be surprising that a day after a 31-year-old conservative Christian activist who captured the hearts and minds of countless young people was viciously gunned down in front of a crowd of thousands in the middle of a bustling college campus, we haven’t heard much from college administrators.

So, let us be clear here. We don’t need focus groups to write the copy or run it by a team of public relations experts. The statement writes itself: Charlie Kirk’s murder was a heinous, deplorable act of hatred which every American educator should condemn. It is a reminder that evil is real and unrelenting. Period. Full stop.

Unfortunately, in the context of other campus chaos the past several years, Kirk’s assassination provides the clearest reminder yet: too many colleges continue to foster a shockingly low tolerance for civil discourse and campus speech and an astonishingly high tolerance for actual campus violence. Yesterday’s heinous act makes it abundantly clear that such moral confusion has fatal consequences.

Kirk’s life’s work–bringing reasoned, open debate and the search for truth back to the academy–is unfortunately not the life’s work of many of our universities. Their safe spaces are an embarrassment; their silence is deafening.

R.I.P, Charlie Kirk. God help us all.