Holy Cross College Considers Dropping ‘Crusaders’ Nickname, Mascot
The College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts is setting up a commission to consider whether to change its sports teams’ name—the Crusaders.
School president Rev. Philip Boroughs announced last week that a working group of students, faculty, staff and alumni would hold at least two campus events to hear thoughts about changing the name or the mascot, a knight with a sword and shield. The commission will present its findings in January.
“The Crusader name is an undeniable part of Holy Cross’ history,” the college said last week, adding, “At the same time, we acknowledge our responsibility to thoughtfully examine the sensitivities and implications this name may bear in light of the Crusades.”
Christian crusaders killed thousands of Jews and Muslims during battles in the Middle Ages. (Muslim fighters also killed thousands of Jews and Christians during that same period.)
Holy Cross history professor Sahar Bazzaz told the Worcester Telegram in April that Holy Cross calling its team the Crusaders is like a university in Baghdad calling itself the “Jihadis”— they are both ”someone who is fighting in the name of religion,” she said.
Many other universities with the nickname “Crusaders” changed their names in the years after the 9/11 terror attacks in light of heightened religious sensitivities.
Holy Cross’s campus newspaper, also called the Crusader, is also considering a name change. “The Crusader” is also the name of the Ku Klux Klan’s newsletter.
Contact Aiden Pink at pink@forward.com or on Twitter, @aidenpink
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO