OPINION:
What should have been an unremarkable speech by a football player on a college campus on May 11 has stirred controversy. Harrison Butker, a kicker for the Kansas City Chiefs, gave the commencement address at Benedictine College, a small Catholic school.
The Atchison, Kansas, college has thrived thanks to its embrace of tradition and the Great Books. The school made a conscious decision to reject the nihilism fashionable at more famous academic institutions — you know, the ones currently paralyzed by uncertainty about what to do with the rising pro-Hamas campus insurgency.
That’s why Benedictine’s activities that day were free of disruptions. Mr. Butker received a warm welcome from students who listened to him speak for 20 minutes offering a solution to America’s moral decline.
“Our own nation is led by a man who publicly and proudly proclaims his Catholic faith, but at the same time is delusional enough to make the sign of the cross during a pro-abortion rally,” the 28-year-old athlete said. “He has been so vocal in his support for the murder of innocent babies that I’m sure to many people it appears that you can be both Catholic and pro-choice.”
The left’s condemnation of those words came so swiftly that anyone who didn’t hear them in context might think his simple statement of Catholic orthodoxy was somehow heretical. His message was that it’s not enough to claim cultural ties to a religion. One must also put faith into practice.
Mr. Butker explained the “diabolical lies” that encourage women to forgo family in favor of accumulating wealth and worldly honor. In contrast, he spoke in glowing terms of his wife’s vocation as a mother.
“It cannot be overstated,” he said, “that all of my success is made possible because a girl I met in band class back in middle school would convert to the faith, become my wife, and embrace one of the most important titles of all: homemaker.”
Leftists asserted that those words were undeniable proof of “misogyny,” but those present disagreed. The student body, which is 51% female, broke into rousing applause as he described the centrality of his wife’s role in the family.
“She is a primary educator to our children,” he continued. “She is the one who ensures I never let football or my business become a distraction from that of a husband and father.”
The NFL has distanced itself from the star player, and a change.org petition signed by over 200,000 people demands he be fired for his “hateful” comments. That seems pretty unlikely, since Mr. Butker’s record-shattering talents would be hard to give up. In his first three NFL seasons, he scored 426 points — more than any other NFL player up to that point in their career. Last season, he missed only two field goals.
He’s the definition of a reliable player, but his commencement message warned students that records and sporting achievements must eventually fade from the history books. Mr. Butker and his wife’s only lasting legacy — and source of happiness — is their children.
Those deriding this as “hate speech” reveal their goal is not to protect women, but to undermine faith and family.
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