It sounds rather elementary: no organization—large or small, public or private—should have the right to enforce its views on another. But Loyola University has challenged this seemingly simple rule by blocking the reorganization of a student group that advocates the right to an abortion.

Loyola has announced it will not recognize the Women’s Center, a 10-year-old student group, if a university committee “determines this organization advocates practices and principles that are at variance with those on which the university is founded,” according to a Loyola spokesman.

Women’s Center members have distributed literature on family planning and abortion options at Loyola’s student center, and the group is trying to meet in university facilities.

The issue here is not the morality or immorality of abortion, or the views of the Women’s Center or Loyola. The issue is the right to actively support your beliefs.

One group member said Loyola officials feel the group’s action “would be an embarrassment to represent views contrary to a Catholic university.” Loyola can support their stance by claiming separation of church and state. But isn’t the whole premise of a university to offer a variety of opinions and viewpoints and let students decide for themselves what they want to do next?

Apparently at Loyola, that isn’t the case.