Retiring the Valpo Crusader

When I was student-body president at Concordia University--Portland ('82-'83), we had some discussions about whether "the Cavaliers" was an appropriate mascot/symbol for our Lutheran institution. We knew enough about the term to know that, in its adjectival form, it was synonymous with "reckless," "haughty," "disdainful," "contemptuous toward others." The mascot did not seem to fit with the ideals of Christian leadership and service that were emphasized by Concordia's faculty and administration. Still, I had more important goals to attain that academic year, such as starting the school newspaper and trying to get better food served in the cafeteria, so we didn't pursue a mascot change at that time. (It has been almost a year since that school was shut down.)

In the foundational theology course that I teach at Valparaiso ("The Christian Tradition"), we spend a few class periods examining the Crusades, not merely because of Valpo's historic mascot (which dates back to 1942, when it replaced a German symbol that was out-of-step with where the country was at that time), but because those two centuries marked significant cross-pollination between Europe and the so-called Middle East, between Latin and Greek Christendom, and between Latin Christendom and Islam. It's a mixed, ambiguous history, one that has mostly negative connotations, if not entirely negative consequences.

Despite whatever positive cultural and economic outcomes may have inadvertently developed from that period of church history, the crusaders' overall impact on civilian Jews, Muslims, Orthodox Christians, and Syrian and Armenian Christians was very negative, to put the matter mildly. While the image of a crusader can be romanticized or interpreted in Christian vocational terms, that seems to minimize and marginalize the horrific actions that certainly happened in abundance to such civilians in those centuries.

Because of these negative, historic connotations and in light of our university's mission to be an inclusive academic community that seeks to welcome individuals from groups that historically were targeted by those medieval crusaders, I have quietly encouraged a change of mascot for several years (as has my wife, who helps to run our library).

This past week Valpo's interim president, Colette Irwin-Knott, announced that the university would indeed be "retiring" the Valpo Crusader mascot. To listen to her message, go here. 

While some will object to this change, it makes sense to me for all sorts of reasons. Let me focus on merely a theological one. Luther himself criticized the cruciata for all "the heartbreak and misery" that they and indulgences and crusade taxes had caused. (The practice of selling indulgences, which Luther had criticized in his 95 Theses, had largely arisen to help pay for those crusaders.) In a treatise that the Reformer wrote a little over a decade after posting his famous theses, he noted that "with [indulgences and crusade taxes], Christians have been stirred up to take sword and fight the Turk when they ought to have been fighting the devil and unbelief with the word and with prayer" ("On the War against the Turk" [1529], LW 46.186). Luther here drew attention to Christ's teaching in Matthew 5.39-41 and to the theology of the cross. "Christians shall not resist evil, but suffer all things and surrender all things" (LW 46.164). Luther criticized previous popes who, in his judgment, had never intended to wage war against the Turks, but had instead used "the Turkish war as a cover for their 'game' and had robbed Germany of money by means of indulgences whenever they took the notion." Luther was angry that Christians and princes were "driven, urged, and irritated into attacking the Turk, and making war on him, before they amended their own ways and lived as true Christians" (LW 46.165).

For Luther, the history of the crusades is not positive or uplifting. The symbol of a medieval "crusader"  certainly does not fit with Christ's teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. That symbol seems to run counter to the ethos and identity of a liberal-arts university that is grounded in the Lutheran tradition of scholarship, freedom, and faith. This ethos, to which our interim president referred in her message, is antithetical to crusader militarism, bloodshed, destruction, and fighting. As Luther noted, nothing but ill fortune ultimately accompanies "the crusader." (Aside: Some of Valpo's athletic history supports this Luther-an observation.) The crusader image inherently entails un-Christian, anti-Christian actions of pillaging, raping, and murdering; it inherently represents individuals who misuse the image of the cross to "fight against the infidel in the name of Christ," when, according to Luther's teaching, Christians should only be using God's gifts of word and Spirit, accompanied by prayer. The "crusader" image contradicts the basic theology of the cross that is at the heart of Valpo's Lutheran identity. That theology opposes all crusading "theologies of glory." The latter turn the cross into a bludgeon and sword and spear, and they turn the cross of Christ into a symbol of hatred and violence. (It is interesting to me that certain religious combatants in our contemporary American "culture-wars" end up doing the same thing to the cross that so-called "Christian" crusaders did between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries.) 

In view of the violence and (culture) wars in our own world that are so frequently tied to religious symbols, the leaders of Valpo have decided that now is the time to retire the Valpo Crusader mascot and to move to a more positive image, one that fits better with Lutheran values. For Lutheran Christians, "CRUX sola est nostra theologia," the cross alone is our theology, not in the way of the cruciata, but rather according to Paul's teaching in First Corinthians and to Luther's arguments in the Heidelberg Disputation.

As a Lutheran theologian at Valpo, I want to use Luther's Heidelberg insights, where he classically set forth what would come to be called "the theology of the cross," to criticize all such theologies of glory, medieval as well as contemporary.

As retired LCMS District President David Benke stated in another forum earlier this week, on the same subject of Valpo's change of mascot: "Of course Martin Luther was no fan of Crusader theology. It's a theology of glory, of conquest, a mixing of the Realms, and outgrowth of Empire - which Luther also spoke candidly about - and it takes us away, most especially in these times, from our own roots in Divine reconciliation for the world through the foolishness of the cross.  The cross used as a symbol of war and conquest is 180 degrees from the cross as an instrument of the death of God's only-begotten Son and the Savior of the world.  The Empire began with the vision "in hoc signo vinces," during a battle with swords and staves.  In "post-Christian" times, we have a deeper cruciform message and witness to offer the world than the Crusaders."

What should replace the outdated mascot?

I suggest we move away from animals and martial symbolism. 

Our motto is "In luce tua videmus lucem" (In Thy Light We See Light). So why not something like "The Valpo Flame"? That fits with the title of the book about Valpo's history by my late friend and colleague, Dick Baepler (Flame of Faith, Lamp of Learning). "The Flame" is simple, almost elegant, and much of the school's "branding" could easily be tweaked to fit with that image. True, a "flame" can also be negative in some contexts--as can most any object, e.g., a knife in the hand of a murderer in contrast to a knife in the hand of a skilled surgeon--but the biblical symbolism outweighs the negative. (I can imagine Valpo athletic contests being graced with students shouting and dancing to Cheap Trick's "The Flame," or to the songs of the same name by the Fine Young Cannibals and Arcadia. Tina Arena's "The Flame," which was the official song of the 2000 summer Olympics, could also be sung.)

Perhaps "The Valpo Lightning," which ties nicely to our university's motto and to Luther's experiential-spiritual turning-point, when lightning was the catalyst for his decision to enter the Augustinian monastery, and it also ties nicely to one of Valpo's strongest degree programs, meteorology. (Not too long ago, Wheaton College changed its mascot from the "Crusader" to "the Thunder." Valpo's Lightning, Wheaton's Thunder....)

Valpo Light? (That sounds too much like a low-cal beer or, worse, a suggestion that Valpo offers an inferior form of education.)

The Valpo Torch? (That is already the name of the school newspaper, but it could work.)

The Valpo Torchbearers? (too many letters and it could also give rise to students as an angry mob, as in Frankenstein or what we witnessed in Washington on Jan 6. We ought to move away from symbols that bring to mind angry mobs, crusaders of a different bent....)

The Valpo Flash? (We wouldn't need to have red athletic uniforms with a lightning bolt on the front; we could keep our current school colors and develop our own unique symbol....)

The Valpo Storm? (Also fits with Luther's personal experience and the meteorological emphasis; the Valpo Tornadoes is a bit over the top, imo.)

Regardless of what is ultimately decided, I'm pleased we're moving away from the crusades. It is difficult to reconcile Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount with a celebration of "the Christian crusader" who sought to lop off the heads of infidels in the name of Christ and who welcomed the booty and other rewards/prizes (material and purgatorial) that were promised to come from such militaristic pilgrimage and conquest. The crusades reflect the pagan Germanization of Christendom, the melding of anti-Christian militarism and Christian discipleship, a synthesis that is at odds with Jesus' teaching about discipleship. Crusading ideology praises the killing of infidels and rejoices in the (re)-taking of property and turf for the sake of the church's earthly power and glory. That Germanic tribal-pagan holdover of militarism and its influence upon medieval understandings of Christian discipleship represent a perversion of Christian teaching. Instead of "blessed are the meek, the poor in spirit, the peacemakers, etc.," for the Germanic Christian of the crusading type the beatitudes were changed to become: "Blessed are the rich, for they will possess the earth and all its glory," and "Blessed are the war-like, for they shall win wealth and renown" (to cite the hyperbolic quip of one historian). As important as Karl der Grosse was for the historical development of European Christendom, he, too, reflected this pagan ideology that would directly contribute to the rise of the ideal Christian disciple as "crusader."

Valpo ought to find a better symbol/mascot that actually reflects our university's mission and motto.