Banned Books Week: a Catholic response

CNA Staff, Sep 24, 2024 / 14:55 pm

Public schools and libraries nationwide are celebrating Banned Books Week this week as part of a movement that targets a parent-led movement to remove books with explicit adult content from school libraries.

The American Library Association (ALA) founded the annual campaign to promote “banned” books in 1982, and each year, it releases a top 10 list of books based on data the organization compiled on “demands to censor library books and resources.”

Every book listed on the ALA’s “Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2023” features sexual content. The No. 1 book, “Gender Queer,” is a graphic novel featuring sexually explicit images. The third book on the list, “This Book Is Gay,” is a self-proclaimed “instruction manual” featuring sexual content and illustrations.

David Bonagura, a Cardinal Newman Society fellow and adjunct professor of theology at Catholic International University, said that restricting books in public school libraries is about protecting children.

“Many of these books introduce children to complex sexual issues before they reach puberty,” Bonagura told CNA. “Such books are harmful and have no place in school curricula or school libraries.”

The role of a Catholic library

Colleen Richards, a faculty member at the Institute for Catholic Liberal Education (ICLE), sees Banned Books Week as an opportunity to consider how educators can “continue forming the hearts and minds of students to recognize genuine beauty, truth, and goodness.” 

“We recommend that schools review the volumes in their libraries — not only for content that is sexually explicit but for content that is beneath the dignity of the sons and daughters of God,” Richards told CNA.

“What forms a beautiful sacramental imagination? What elevates the mind? What inspires and ennobles the human heart? It is time to reevaluate books that celebrate mediocrity and promote cynicism because civilization has much more to offer,” she continued. “Let us take to heart the cultivation of the souls of our students!”

Richards said these questions should be discussed in faculty meetings and communicated to parents.

“Parents are the primary educators of their children, so let us give them more support in choosing great literature to be read in their homes,” she said. “And students grow into adults; let us give them sound principles for choosing literature once they are out in the world.” 

Catholic school libraries fulfill a different role from secular ones as the “mission of Catholic education is to form students in sanctity in this life for salvation,” noted two Catholic educators, Denise Donohue, vice president for education resources at the Cardinal Newman Society, and Dan Guernsey, an associate professor of education at Ave Maria University and senior fellow at Newman.

“Providing students with wholesome literature that satisfies the moral imagination and assists in the formation of virtue and full human flourishing are the prescription for this, not writings that denigrate the human person or leave students with sinful thoughts or feelings of shame or despair,” the two co-wrote in the Literature, Library, and Media Guide for Catholic Educators, published by the Cardinal Newman Society.

“As Catholic education’s mission is different, a Catholic school library is also different since all elements within an institution — including its library — should adhere to its mission,” the two noted. 

ICLE has developed a list of book recommendations to help Catholic school librarians stock their libraries with Catholic principles in mind. 

“The challenge to Catholic educators is to know their own Catholic identity and confidently stand in it,” Richards added. 

“What does Jesus Christ mean when he says we are to be in the world but not of the world?” she continued. “There is a great difference between the world’s definition of good, which means getting and doing what one wants, and the Church’s understanding of ‘the good,’ which is receiving God himself and living according to his loving will.”

The battle over books 

There has been an uptick in parents, organizations, and state governments taking steps to remove age-inappropriate materials from libraries since the pandemic began in 2020 and school was brought into the family home.

Take Back the Classroom is one of the organizations combating inappropriate books in schools by informing parents. The group highlights inappropriate young adult books that are in public schools across the U.S. and provides parents with a “book report” to help parents more easily request that the book be removed from public school libraries. 

In response to the prevalence of inappropriate books targeted toward K–12 readers, South Carolina and Tennessee passed regulations this summer restricting books with sexual content in schools, following Iowa, Florida, and Utah’s recent laws with similar restrictions.  

Two organizations that advocate for these explicit books in school libraries released preliminary reports on books removed from school libraries on Monday for the launch of Banned Books Week.

PEN America found an increase in book removals in 2023-2024, noting that more than 10,000 books were removed from school libraries. However, the ALA released a report on Monday finding a dip in complaints about books in school libraries so far in 2024. The Associated Press reported that the difference is likely due to the differing means of categorizing removed books. 

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The ALA pledges that its movement is about “defending the freedom to read,” ALA president Cindy Hohl said in a press release.

“As these preliminary numbers show, we must continue to stand up for libraries and challenge censorship wherever it occurs,” Hohl said.

Filmmaker Ava DuVernay, the 2024 Banned Books Week honorary chair, said that Banned Books Week is “vitally important.” 

“By banning books, we deny ourselves the opportunity to learn from the past and to envision a braver future. Books have the power to open minds and build bridges,” she said. “This is why certain forces do not want the masses to engage with books. They fear progress and growth in new, bold directions.” 

But Bonagura said that “book bans” are about protecting children, not censoring thought.

“So-called ‘book bans’ have never been about censorship or restricting freedom, as critics allege,” Bonagura noted. “Rather, they protect children in schools from exposure to gender and sexual ideologies that distort the meaning of human sexuality.”

PEN acknowledged that many of the books are selected for their sexual content. 

“In part because of the targeting of sexual content, the stark increase includes books featuring romance, books about women’s sexual experiences, and books about rape or sexual abuse as well as continued attacks on books with LGBTQ+ characters or themes, or books about race or racism and featuring characters of color,” a statement from PEN read. 

Take Back the Classroom criticized public schools and libraries for embracing Banned Books Week in a statement earlier this week.  

“School libraries across the country are taking advantage of the call [to celebrate banned books] to display and promote their collection of obscene, warped books, videos, and graphic novels,” the group noted. “They encourage students to read these pervasively vulgar books.”