'Diversity’ Means Student Group Is Not Allowed to Include Pledge of Allegiance or Red, White & Blue During Veterans Day Chapel Service

Students at Seattle Pacific University, an evangelical Christian college, are set to hold the school's first Veterans Day chapel service "in a long time."

"It's been an uphill battle to get to this point," the Military & Veterans Support club noted on its Facebook page.

But a couple of missing elements in the service are leaving a bad taste in many students' mouths.

Turns out they can't say the Pledge of Allegiance or present the colors "given that there are diversity of views on campus whether such elements should be part of a Christian worship service," the school said in a statement.

Image source: AP

To say that students organizing the event are upset is an understatement.

“We should be able to pledge allegiance to the flag inside of our own church, in our own house of worship [for] the same people who died for that same right,” club member Daniel Fenlason told KCPQ-TV.

But other students apparently made it known they don't agree with holding a military service in the the campus church, First Free Methodist, but they haven't come forward, KCPQ reported.

A letter to faculty who are veterans from campus chaplain Bo Lim obtained by The College Fix noted in part that, if the goal of the service — for which attendance is optional —  is “to help our community support military persons within our midst, I think by including the pledge it would be a distraction from this cause."

It's apparently not the first time Lim has spoken out.

The College Fix added that after a grand jury decided not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown last year, Lim invited the SPU campus to a candlelight vigil and wrote: “Many in our country, including those on our campus, experience [sic] grief, outrage, bewilderment, fear, and disillusionment after hearing the grand jury decision."

The SPU community reportedly has debated patriotism over the years, as some students and staff hail from pacifist backgrounds, the College Fix added.

Here's the full message from the Military & Veterans Support club:

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