Dear Fr. Jenkins, It is time for the murals to go. The 12 Luigi Gregori murals have adorned the main hall of Main Building for over 130 years, greeting millions of campus residents and visitors with a highly problematic vision of Western triumphalism, Catholic militarism and an overly romantic notion of American expansion. Christopher Columbus, as admitted by the University published pamphlet and widely acknowledged by modern scholarship, was an owner and distributor of humans as slaves. Columbus’ fortune, fame and wealth came from the destruction, mutilation and transaction of Native American and African persons. According to the University’s own pamphlet, the murals are specifically designed to “create a heroic impression” of someone who owned, traded and sold humans as slaves, as well as someone who initiated one of the largest genocides in human history. The murals welcome every newcomer and greet every football fan with their place of honor in Main Building, posing a clear answer to the question, “Who is Notre Dame?” And while the reasons for removing the murals have been repeated many times by many individuals and groups over the last three decades, we must continue to repeat them until something is done. First, to any Native American student, staff member, faculty member or visitor who enters Main Building, the murals offer the most debasing form of insult. The Native persons are depicted as stereotypes, their destruction is gilded over and their slavery is celebrated. The murals commemorate and laud the beginning of the centuries-long systematic removal of Native American persons and culture from the United States. While recent efforts to honor the past relationship between the Pokagon Tribe and Notre Dame are commendable, true progress will be impossible until the murals are removed. Second, to any student, staff, faculty or guest who identifies with an historically oppressed group, the presence of the murals in 21st century America mocks every attempt to make campus more inclusive, more diverse and more culturally sensitive. African slaves are depicted comically, and Columbus’ incipient role in the buying and selling of humans as chattel is depicted as a holy and Christian act. Once again, while the University has made strides to become more ethnically diverse in recent years, the continued central presence of the murals nullifies the inclusive message that, for example, the iconic image of Father Hesburgh and Dr. King attempts to demonstrate. Third, art history is replete with racial biases and problematic tensions. Such tensions belong in museums where they can be studied, not alongside Notre Dame’s most honored award recipients and former presidents. This includes Fr. Sorin, after whose image Gregori modeled Columbus specifically in order that Columbus be more revered. To claim, as the University does, that one could revere other figures on the walls of Main Building but view the murals dispassionately, “in an almost clinical way,” can only be described as willful blindness to the reality of the effect of the paintings. Fourth, and finally, the theological message of the murals is one the University should utterly disavow and repudiate. For example, several of the images offer the explicit theological message that the sufferings of a slave trader are analogous to the sufferings of Christ. Many popes have apologized and worked to make amends for the harm done to Native and African populations in the name of Christ. The Church as a whole regrets and repents the abominable actions of torture, enslavement, rape and systematic execution that became commonplace with the advent of Columbus’ voyages. God will judge historical persons according to God’s own merits, but the Church demands that those of us following Christ today must strive for universal human dignity in order to begin to mend the broken global body of Christ. There is no place in the modern Church, not to mention in a modern Catholic university, for glorifying a Christianity of murder and enslavement. Native students have been urging the administration to deal with the murals since at least the early 1990s. The administration, time and time again, has delayed, obfuscated, printed pamphlets and denied any ability to effectively fix the concrete problems the murals represent. As such, while it is tragic that a letter like this is necessary in 2017, as long as the murals remain unchanged, we must continue to protest, write, plead and demand their removal. There are many different options available to the University moving forward, and more discussion is necessary, but status quo is not enough. The easily overlooked pamphlets are not enough. In this era of political divisiveness and a renewed rise of dangerous nationalism, it is time for Notre Dame to remove its own version of a Confederate monument. It is time for the murals to go. Sincerely,
John P. Slattery, Ph.D. ’17
Dominic Acri ’18
Sicangu Oyate
Carrera Brown ’18
Diné
Molly Demel ’18
Chickasaw
Angela Dunsmoor ’18
Chippewa
Armani Porter ’18
Eastern Band Cherokee
William Wolfe, MBA ’18
Potawatomi Nation
James L. Weitzel ‘19
Diné
Mark Brinegar ‘20
Muskogee Creek
Jebraune Chambers ’20
Choctaw
Sarah Maazouz ’20
Cree Tribe
Grayson Maker ’20
Cherokee
Rebecca Parmenter ’20
Stockbridge Munsee Community Band of Mohicans
Hibram Sanchez ’20
Pasqua Yaqui
Lia Acri SMC ’21
Sicangu Oyate
Clare Armstrong ’21
Osage Tribe
Mikaela Murphy ’21
Cherokee
Keely Thornton ‘21
Choctaw Nation
Zoe Prendergast ‘21
Choctaw
Marcus Winchester-Jones ’21
Pokégnek Bodéwadmik
Steve Alagna ’11, M.Ed ’13
Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska
Summer Bernard ’17
Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians
Elizabeth Bird '91
United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma
Kameron Chappell ‘04
Cowlitz Indian Tribe
Stephanie De Luna ’14
Navajo and Taos Pueblo
Rosalie V. DePaola ’16, MS ’17
Muscogee (Creek)
Deswood Etsitty ’93
Diné
Otto J. LaPointe ‘97
Ponca Tribe of Nebraska
Vanessa Lucero ‘98
Tohono O’odham Nation
Tamera Miyasato ‘08
Mdewakantan
Tralynna Sherrill Scott ’06
Cherokee
Andrea Topash-Rios, ’95, MA ‘96
associate teaching professor of romance languages and literatures
Pokagon Band of Potawatomi
Monica Tsethlikai ’92
Zuni
Tara Wolfe
Caddo Nation of Oklahoma
Brian Collier
Institute for Educational Initiatives
John Duffy
professor of English
Kevin Barry
director of Kaneb Center for Teaching and Learning
Cecilia Lucero ’84
First Year of Studies
Fr. Don LaSalle
First Year of Studies
Robert Walls
professor of American Studies
Mike Hebbeler
discernment and advocacy director for Center for Social Concerns
Michelle Ware
First Year of Studies
Ricky Herbst
cinema program director
Steven Battin
professor of theology
Michael J. Cramer
associate professional specialist of biological sciences
David Flagel
assistant professional specialist of biological sciences
Karen Graubart
associate professor of history
Mary Celeste Kearney
director of gender studies; associate professor of film, television and theatre
Marisel Moreno
associate professor of romance languages and literatures
Jean A. Dibble
professor of art
Elena Mangione-Lora
associate teaching professor of romance languages and literatures
Chaz Barbour
Office of Information Technologies staff
Julia Douthwaite
professor of French
Deb Rotman
department of anthropology
Cheri Smith
librarian in Hesburgh Libraries
Monica Kowalski ’03, M.Ed ’05
Charlice Hurst
assistant professor of business
Joanna Lin Want
assistant teaching professor of University Writing Program
Catherine Bolten
associate professor of anthropology and peace Studies
Carolina Arroyo
associate director of undergraduate studies of political science
Philip J. Sakimoto
First Year of Studies
Katrina Barron
associate professor of mathematics
Leo Guardado
graduate student
Margaret Anne Doody
Glynn Family professor of literature
Jill Godmilow
professor emeritus of film, television and theatre
Amitava Krishna Dutt
professor of political science
Beth Gelroth Klein
Law Library staff
Mark A. Sanders
professor of English and Africana studies
Gayle Carter
department coordinator of Africana studies
Susan D. Blum
professor of anthropology
Emily Wang
assistant professor of German and Russian
Agustin Fuentes
professor of anthropology
Jennifer Warlick
associate professor of public policy and economics
Darlene Hampton
academic advisor in First Year of Studies
Annie Selak
former rector, 2010–14
Michelle Wirth
visiting assistant professor of psychology
Atalia Omer
associate professor of peace studies
Stephen Fredman
professor emeritus of English
Anne Hayner
associate director for alumni relations of Kroc Institute
Anna Geltzer
assistant director for education of Reilly Center
Liz Dube
head of preservation of Hesburgh Libraries
Neil Chase
administrative coordinator of Medieval Institute
Valerie Sayers
professor of English
Christine Becker
associate professor of film, television and theatre
Melissa Marley Bonnichsen
seminars director of Center for Social Concerns
Leonor Wangensteen ’03, MA ’09
First Year of Studies
Crystal Spring
graduate student
Anna Fett
graduate student
Kyle Lantz
assistant director of Center for Social Concerns seminar program
Laura D. Walls
professor of English
Todd Walatka
assistant chair for graduate studies in theology
Lisa Oglesbee
coordinator of English for academic purposes in the Center for the Study of Languages and Culture
Bryan Ricketts ’16, ’17
Ray'Von Jones ’16
Maya Jain ’17
Julia Feder ’14
Katalin Fabian, MA ‘90
Olivia Furman ‘17
Raquel Falk ’20
Shanna Gast ’11
Molly Burke ’15
Lindsey Wieck ’16
Cassidy Leyendecker ’17
Julia Buff ’15
Sarah Morice Brubacker, Ph.D. ’11
Janna L. Hunter-Bowman '17
assistant professor of Christian social ethics and peace studies
Emma Fulce ‘12
Elizabeth Curtin ‘15
Bridget O’Brien ‘05
Katie Grimes, ’05, M.T.S. ’09
Megan McCabe, M.T.S ’10
Lauren Price ’05
Corbin Johnson ’11
Alex Rice ’16
Michelle Sawwan
graduate student
Mary Patano ’17
Andrea (Swinehart) Staron ’03
William Stewart ’12
Elizabeth Zapf ’86
Pacifico Soldati ’07
Daniel Passon ’16
Karen Lawler ’05
Ellen Kennedy ‘05
Daniel O’Hare, M.T.S '03, Ph.D. ’09
Kaitlyn Dudley Curtin ’11
Elizabeth Hascher ’18
Steven Fisher ’16
Keziah Conrad, MA ’08
Amy Johnson, MA ‘95
Amy Scanlon, MA ‘97
Winifred Romeril, MA ‘93
Sharon Kniss, MA ’14
Laura Snider, MA ’10
Clint Robert Niehus, MA ’17
Erica Vesnaver ’12
associate director of Alliance for Catholic Education
Grace Deardurff ’14
Kelsey Behan ’13
Peace Maari ’16
Kelly Cronin ‘15
Catherine Carothers ’15
Casey Baker ’17
Aniela Tyksinski ’17
Mary Connolly ’17
Gabrielle Dohmen ’17
Katherine Baltes ’17
Kyra Blas ‘18
Becca Williams ’17
Jonathan Brenneman, MA ’16
Luis Miranda, MA ’17
Morgan Rooney ‘17
Jennifer Betz ’02
Kaitlyn Krall ’16
Adriana Holguin ’00
Enrique Lorenzo ’16
Yurianna Kim ’08
Michelle Saucedo ’10
Carrol Kelly SMC ’87
Hector Avitia ’10
Daniel Gonzalez ’95
Mary (Etsitty) Kieyoani ’96
Jaime Luna ’09
Maya (Noronha) Duff ’05
Marcelo Reyna ’93
Ashleigh A. Renteria ’11
Katie Ward ’19
Katie Hieatt ’20
Michael Dunn ’21
Samuel Cho ’18
Adam Moeller ’18
Isabel Rooper ’20
Anthony Luc ’19
Kaleem Minor ‘20
Qai Gordon ‘18
Trebor Goodall ‘19
Tyler Newsome ’18
Juan Hernandez ‘19
Elizabeth Hoch ’21
Rosemary Agwuncha ’18
Emily Moll ’21
Lillian Merrigan ’20
Kaitlyn Cortez ‘18
Kelly Valenzi ’18
Liam Maher ‘18
Enzo Ambrose ’21
Hannah O'Brien ’19
Lily Falzon ‘18
Katie Laskey ’17
Sophia Costanzo ’19
Katie Durine ‘18
Beatriz Guzman ’20
Ben Schultz ‘18
Perez Grinston ’16
Claire Migliore ’19
Amy Mansfield ’19
Celene Olguin ‘18
Baylea Williams ‘18
Maria Vigil ‘18
Marissa Ray ‘17
Promise Choice ’18
Juliana McCabe ’19
Emma Scheibel ’20
James Zwierzynski ’19
Lauren Boutros ‘19
Flora Tang ’18
Carolyn Yvellez ‘18
Arielle Sims ’17
Natasha Reifenberg ’18
Daniel Esparza, ’18
Laura Gruszka ‘17
Lawrenzo Howell ’18
Eric Ways ‘18
Steven Jessen-Howard ’18
George Timmins ‘19
Joey Wikelski ’18
Cynthia Tran ’19
Juliana Tiscareno ’19
Patrick McCabe ’21
Matt Laboe ‘18
Roslyn Joseph ‘19
Quinn Scallon ‘20
Cindy Lee ’18
Amanda Ball ’18
Abigail Cho ’20
Sean Ebben ‘21
Julia Erdlen ’18
Jaime Spencer ’21
Chris Toudouze ’21
Danica Crowley ’20
Samuel Jackson ‘20
Vivian Weinman ‘21
Jack Gallaher ‘18
Sean McMahon ’19
Sean McFeely ’19
Grace Garvey ‘19
Sara Berumen ’20
Nancy Dankwah ‘21
Carlos De Loera ’19
Matthew Aubourg ‘21
Margaret D’Auria ‘21
Alexandra Martínez ’21
Allison Hubbard ’19
Faith Harris ’21
Maria Esteve ’21
Bailey Logan ’20
Madeleine Thompson ’19
Mati Nemera ’18
Daniel Bland ‘18
Shantae Harris ’21
Lauren Watts ‘21
Anastasia Reisinger ‘21
David Stewart ’19
Ben Huls ‘21
Erin Egan ’21
Maria Sierra Caceres ’20
Kate Flanagan ’21
MaryKate Drennan ’21
Sylvia Ciocca ’19
Robert Wozniak ’18
Ana Lamberto ’20
Karla Burgos-Morón ’19
Silvia Camara ’19
Godsee Joy ’20
Grace Curtin ‘18
Joseph Tang ’18
Matthew Williams ’18
David Kelly ’18
Isabel Weber ’20
Rose Ashley ’19
Brandon Grier ‘21
Cristina Chavez ‘20
Morgan White ‘18
Delaney Roberts ’20
Timothy Burley ’21
Leah Harmon ’21
Gabrielle Brookins ‘19
Alice Felker ’20
Allyson Dewey ‘20
Jack Cobain ’18
Jacob McKenna ’18
Isabella Delgado-Castillo ’20
N'Kaela Webster ‘21
Malaysha Stewart ’18
Michaela Echols ’21
Hiba Kahouli ’18
Donald Luc ’19
Madeleine Andreas ’20
Katherine Fugate ’20
Kate Lenahan ’20
Joselia Souza ‘19
Chloe Spurgat ‘20
Drew Lischke ’20
Brenna Leahy ’18
Roxana Rodriguez ’18
Karly Brown ’21
Reggie Whittaker ’20
Tess Ngochi ‘21
Leesa Greenwood ’20
Maddy Schierl ‘21
Allegra Wallingford ‘18
Julianna Vidales ’18
Naana Ocran ’20
Madison Loftin ‘19
Ryan Klaus ‘18
Gabriella Marines ‘21
Dan Marshall ’20
Savanna Morgan ’20
Aidan Mullaney ’20
Eileen DiPofi ’20
Sierra Rainey ’19
Samuel Costanzo ’12
Morgan Widhalm ’17
Xitlaly Estrada ‘17, ‘20 J.D. Candidate
Mujahid Osman ’19
John McLean
graduate student
Heather DuBois
graduate student
Jamee Elder
graduate student
Jesse James
graduate student
Sarah Naramore, Ph.D., history and philosophy of science
Kyle Lambelet, Ph.D ’17, postdoctoral fellow
Aliyah Abu-Hazeem, Ph.D., sociology
Peter Ryan, Ph.D., sociology
Nancy Díaz, Ph.D., sociology
Matthew Chandler, Ph.D., sociology and peace studies
Danae Jacobson, graduate student
Monika Yadav, graduate student
Karie Cross, Postdoctoral Fellow, Peace Studies and Political Science
Yijing Deng ’22, graduate student
Ruiyang Chen ’22, Graduate Student, Electrical Engineering
Yu Shi ’22, Graduate Student, Electrical Engineering
Angela Lederach ’07, PhD Candidate, Anthropology and Peace Studies
Todd P. Marek, Doctoral Candidate, Anthropology Department
Lailatul Fitriyah, PhD Candidate, Theology
Amanda Daniela Cortez, Doctoral Candidate, Anthropology
Dania Straughan MA ’16, Kroc
Paul Anh McEldowney, PhD candidate, Philosophy
Angela Chesler, PhD student, Kroc and Political Science
Garrett FitzGerald, PhD Student, Peace Studies and Political Science
Mallika Sarma, PhD student, Anthropology
Symone A. Johnson, Ph.D. Student, Anthropology
Laura Weis, PhD Candidate, Peace Studies and History
Clair Mesick, PhD Candidate, Theology
Kayla Hurd, Graduate Student, Department of Anthropology
Michael Yankoski, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies
Sebastian Murgueitio Ramirez, Graduate Student, HPS
Boyna Bear, Osage, NACA Inspired Schools Network Fellow
Scott Conroy
Brandon Scott, Executive Editor, Cherokee Phoenix Newspaper
