Gabriel Hallberg, the associate director of the Queer Leadership Council (QLC) and MCAS ’26, criticized Boston College’s policies for LGBTQ+ students and incoming University president Rev. John “Jack” Butler, S.J., for his comments regarding the establishment of a standalone LGBTQ+ center on campus during the public comment portion of the UGBC Senate meeting on Tuesday night.
“You cannot claim to love everybody and then discriminate in how you give your love and who you give your love to,” Hallberg said. “Jesus asks us to love unconditionally without discrimination and with special care for the most vulnerable.”
Hallberg dismissed BC’s reference to Jesuit and Catholic values as justification for not providing a standalone center, pointing out that several Jesuit universities have LGBTQ+ resource centers.
“The Jesuit and Catholic values and beliefs’ argument and opposition to a resource center—the one that’s most frequently proposed—is one that is growing increasingly weak,” Hallberg said. “Boston College is feigning ignorance and choosing to actively and passively harm their queer students when there are plenty of examples from our Catholic and Jesuit sibling universities of how to support LGBTQ students with a resource center while faithfully upholding Catholic doctrine.”
According to Hallberg, BC’s mission of being men and women for others should foster inclusivity and the allocation of resources for marginalized communities on campus.
“This [mission] means to push in resources instead of pulling out students who we mark as other or different,” Hallberg said. “To create a loving community means to object to actions and systems that are discriminatory. Otherwise, we are complicit in the oppression of God’s children.”
UGBC and University administrators need to use their influence to do more for queer students, Hallberg argued.
“There are different ways to exercise authority as an administrator, and the only way QLC exists—the only way we have at least some LGBTQ resources somewhere in the University and the only way we could one day have a fully independent LGBTQ resource center—is because of administrators choosing to use their power in innovative ways that do not transgress, but instead circumvent the status quo, procedure, and policies,” Hallberg said. “But this is not what is currently happening.”
Hallberg ended his comment by calling on the UGBC Senate to support queer students on campus and pass a resolution condemning Butler’s comment.
“There are good people with good intentions working their hardest to make changes that need to happen,” Hallberg said. “However, I am calling upon you to feel the spirit of magis within you and be more. You were elected to lead, and now is the time to do precisely that.”
Several senators thanked Hallberg for his comment, expressing their hope for further action by the Senate.
“I think the fact that [Butler] said this now, his complicitness in what’s been going on at Boston College, his continuation of this trend of denying LGBTQ people their full humanity at BC—I have no choice but to condemn it,” said Maeve Yurcisin, student senator and MCAS ’27. “I hope that UGBC can listen to what Gabe said and do something more about this.”
Colleen Dallavalle, associate vice president for student engagement and formation, reiterated that student affairs is open to any student on campus.
“My door is always open for you and for anyone in the Senate, if anyone ever has things that they want to talk to us about in student affairs or about your experience overall,” Dallavalle said. “I think that the best way that we can move forward is through dialogue, through conversation.”
Meghan Heckelman, UGBC president and LSHED ‘25, ended the meeting by acknowledging the discomfort surrounding LBGTQ+ issues on campus and emphasizing her desire to find ways to better support all students.
“I think everyone should be sitting here with your chest a little bit tight and feeling a little bit uncomfortable by what is happening,” Heckelman said. “It’s a sad day when members of our community don’t feel welcomed and don’t feel loved. I hate to hear that, so I want to do what I can in my capacity to best serve you.”
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