Winding Down for the Summer

The past month was busier than I had hoped, precluding me from following up on all the Baptist higher ed goings-on I mentioned in late April.  Still, we commented on a few stories of interest:

• Most alarmingly, we shared the news that an OBU student was asked not to return to his/her campus job and was bullied by senior administrators for questioning the new Fine Arts dean's re-direction of the department.
• We had two posts on the apparent lack of editorial independence (or judgment) at The Bison, OBU's student newspaper.
• We commented on OBU's selection of U.S. Representative James Lankford as 2013 commencement speaker.  In the end, Lankford's congressional duties precluded him from being available to address the graduates.
• In Kentucky, state Baptists revolted against KBC-affiliated Campbellsville University as news spread that a biblical literalist who taught religion there initially had his contract non-renewed.  We assessed the situation and commended KBC Executive Director Paul Chitwood for his masterful handling of the situation.
• I came clean about my love for the Gaither Vocal Band. Really!
• We congratulated the OBU Class of 2013 and reminded them that, even though the positives strongly outweigh the negatives, OBU's reputation suffered needlessly during their 4 years.  They were done a disservice and their investment was devalued.

I may post a few more stories in June relevant to OBU in particular and post-Takeover Baptist life in general.  But things will be winding down.  Over the summer, I'll offer occasional commentary on news relevant to Baptist higher education.  And I certainly invite others to submit book reviews, offer perspectives, or share their stories.  We can use the summer as a time for community building.

Many of you disagree, but I perceive that things have stabilized significantly at OBU over the past 18 months (coincidentally, the same span of time this blog has existed).  Sure, things have happened that made moderates roll their eyes (OBU administrators cozying up to SBC elites, the surprising number of right-wing hard-liners preaching in Raley Chapel this spring, etc).  And it was extremely distressing to learn that in the Hobbs College of Theology and Ministry, all usual and customary practices for faculty searches have been discarded.

But every indication is that plans to re-make the OBU faculty in the image of the post-Takeover SBC have been thwarted.  We remain concerned about the situation in the College of Fine Arts.  We will be watching the leadership transition in the College of Nursing as closely as possible.  But the administration seems less inclined to be as openly hostile toward the faculty as it was a couple years ago.

Time can heal.  Understanding can grow.  People can learn from their mistakes.  I assume that OBU and BGCO leaders want the best for OBU.  We've seen so many other schools that fundamentalists have virtually destroyed.  I hope no one wants that for our beloved OBU.  It's true that OBU suffered a significant setback early in the Whitlock presidency.  But we are still in a lot better shape than almost all Baptist state convention-affiliated colleges.

Finally, I need to take a break.  Fundamentalism drags me down.  This effort has not been conducive to my own spiritual formation -- an evolution I have long neglected but one that I intend to pursue.  I trust you will all understand.

Our Facebook and Twitter communities will remain active, but blog updates will be few.

If anything comes up or you want to discuss any issues relevant to OBU, Baptist life, or anything else, feel free to email me.

-Jacob

"I Then Shall Live"

You may be surprised to learn this, but I watched a Gaither Vocal Band special on CBN last night.  I was attempting to find the Washington Nationals vs. Atlanta Braves game, but I stayed with CBN for a while.  Normally, I'm a church snob of the highest order, preferring ordered, liturgical worship with sacred choral music.  So it would be easy to look down my nose at Southern Gospel music in the white or black American fundamentalist traditions.

But I don't.  I really like a lot of the music, especially when it is done well.  One of the biggest problems moderates have with gospel music is the fundamentalist theology that pervades most of the well-loved songs.  The lyrics tend to emphasize that the focus of the Christian experience is in the hereafter, not the here-and-now.  Jesus' death is usually emphasized and glorified to the point where one wonders if his life and teaching meant anything at all.  Theologically, the songs not only take penal substitutionary atonement for granted, they describe it in vivid detail.  Washed-in-the-blood-of-the-lamb metaphors are common.

Even so, the Gaithier Vocal Band has been producing top-quality gospel music for decades.  Last night on CBN, I came across these lyrics for the first time:

The tune is Jean Sibelius's familiar FINLANDIA.  Most Protestants will know it as the tune for the hymn "Be Still My Soul," a hymn that is particularly meaningful to me because it was sung at my grandfather's funeral.  Liberal Protestants may also know the hymn "This Is My Song," which uses the same tune and can be found in most mainline church hymnals.

Though the clip above does not show it, the CBN program I watched last night featured an interview with Gloria Gaither.  She explained that the inspiration for the song came from Francis Schaeffer's 1976 book, How Then Should We Live?  Schaeffer provided much of the intellectual leadership for the formation of the Religious Right political movement.

Personally, I like Gloria Gaither's theology a lot better than Francis Schaeffer's.  But, being a woman, she is of course useless and unwanted to fundamentalists as a theologian.  Still, I think she has done a masterful job of articulating a positive, active vision of the Christian life.  The last few lines, italicized in the text below, will be particularly meaningful to the men (and yes, women) who are called to full-time vocational Christian ministry.

Blessings to all of you, this Lord's Day and always.

I then shall live as one who’s been forgiven;
I’ll walk with joy to know my debts are paid.
I know my name is clear before my Father;
I am His child, and I am not afraid.
So greatly pardoned, I’ll forgive my brother,
The law of love I gladly will obey.  

I then shall live as one who’s learned compassion;
I’ve been so loved that I’ll risk loving too.
I know how fear builds walls instead of bridges;
I’ll dare to see another’s point of view.
And when relationship demand commitment,
Then I’ll be there to care and follow through.  

Your kingdom come around and through and in me;
Your power and glory, let them shine through me;
Your Hallowed name, O may I bear with honor,
And may You living Kingdom come in me.
The Bread of Life, O may I share with honor,
And may You feed a hungry world through me. 
Amen. Amen. Amen.  

Text © 1981 Gaither Music Company. Music © Breitkopf & Hartel (Outside U.S.
only). All rights reserved. 

Spring Break Reading 2013

Following last year's tradition, I probably won't post any new content during OBU's Spring Break.  But, as with last year, I do want to leave some links to recent stories you may have missed.

In January, we welcomed everyone to 2013 and explained our long break from blogging following November's Homecoming festivities.  We also laid out an agenda for the first part of 2013.

More recently, guest bloggers provided two widely-read series:

Cedarville University Series by CU Alumna Sarah Jones
Part 1 - Cedarville: A Very Brief Introduction
Part 2 - The Worst are Filled with Passionate Intensity
Part 3 - Things Fall Apart
Part 4 - The Center Cannot Hold

Feminism at OBU Series by 2002 OBU Alumna Cortney Stone
"Thy Daughters True": Feminism at OBU - Part 1
"Thy Daughters True": Feminism at OBU - Part 2

"Thy Daughters True": Feminism at OBU - Part 3
"Thy Daughters True": Feminism at OBU - Part 4

I also had fun writing a few miscellaneous posts in February.  One chronicled FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover's 1938 commencement address at OBU.  In another post, I wrote of my visit to the U.S. Naval Academy Chapel in Annapolis, MD.  Also, in response to the brouhaha over Tim Tebow cancelling an appearance at FBC Dallas after learning of its pastor's incendiary remarks, I wrote a response that blamed the problem not on Tebow, but on certain evangelicals' extremism -- an extremism that earlier generations of evangelical leaders wisely avoided.

More relevant to our immediate purposes at Save OBU, I point you to two other important stories we covered in February.  First, see our write-up of former OBU administrator Tom Terry's address in Raley Chapel.  Second, I wrote a piece on the Winter trustee meeting.  We'll say more about the trustee meeting in weeks to come as we continue to ponder the BGCO's outsized influence at an institution where it provides an ever-shrinking share of the operating expenses.

Most importantly, please consider circulating this commentary to your friends and colleagues in evangelical higher education.  With new leadership and many of its member institutions prospering, the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU) is poised to exercise considerable leadership as it has for many years.  Yet, as a growing number of CCCU schools struggle against fundamentalist resurgence, the council has been silent.  Will the CCCU continue to sit idly while fundamentalists run some of its member schools into the ground?  Or can the council highlight what its successful members have done to stave off the threat of fundamentalist encroachment?  It's a vital question, and the answer remains unseen.

If you're an OBU student or staff member, we especially wish you a very restful spring break!  If you're affiliated with another college celebrating another week, our best wishes to you, too.  And if spring break is for you nothing more than a distant memory, well, I hope you remember it fondly.

Thanks to so many of you for your support.
-Jacob Lupfer

Tim Tebow, FBC Dallas, and Evangelical Extremism

As longtime readers know (and hopefully appreciate), Save OBU is completely uninterested in secular politics and "culture wars."  This is a bit of a challenge for me personally because I essentially work in the culture war and politics business.  I'm writing a doctoral dissertation on evangelicals' contraception attitudes. Though at Save OBU my interest in Southern Baptist institutional life is primarily centered on higher education, I am constantly exposed to SBC/evangelical elites and other thought leaders who appear at least as interested in worldly politics as in the Kingdom God sent Jesus to proclaim.  It's true that most Save OBU supporters are culturally and theologically conservative, but I've learned that we have a lot of moderates and maybe even a few liberals in our ranks.  For the sake of unity, I've tried to steer clear of politics and culture wars.

Given all that, it would seem that New York Jets backup quarterback Tim Tebow's announcement Thursday that he will not speak as scheduled at First Baptist Church of Dallas in April is irrelevant to our cause.  But on reflection, I do think the episode is indicative of something we talk about here all the time: SBC elites' ever-increasing fundamentalism and extremism.

As the story unfolded Thursday, three things struck me.  First, FBC's response to Tebow's cancellation was tacky, passive-aggressive, and reflected poorly on the church.  Second, the whole affair says a lot more about FBC's pastor, the Rev. Dr. Robert Jeffress, than it does about Tim Tebow.  Jeffress has a long history of controversial statements.  Tebow, on the other hand, has a long history of living his faith joyfully and publicly under intense scrutiny.  But what struck me most was seeing not one but several news headlines proclaiming that Tebow had cancelled an appearance at the "controversial First Baptist Church of Dallas."

For those who missed the story, you can find Tebow's announcement here, the church's press release here, and a partial compendium of Dr. Jeffress's statements here.

Given his record of provocative public statements, most notably about both major party presidential candidates in 2012 but apparently also about Catholicism, it's unsurprising and unremarkable that Dr. Jeffress would be labeled controversial. But FBC Dallas itself?  Isn't that a little unfair?  It got me thinking.

First of all, I thought Tebow was very classy to phone Dr. Jeffress in advance of announcing his decision publicly and to acknowledge "the faithful members of the historic First Baptist Church of Dallas."  Culturally, institutionally, and politically, it's undeniable that the congregation has moved somewhat to the right along with its pastors, the alternative Baptist state convention in Texas, and the entire Southern Baptist Convention's leadership.  Of course, the disappearance of moderates and others who rejected having their religion conflated with a political party has also pushed the median member further to the right.

But let's face the facts.  The people of FBC have always been conservative.  Before and after the Takeover, FBC Dallas was a (if not the) flagship church of the SBC.  Its longtime pastor, the Rev. Dr. W. A. Criswell, was a typical fundamentalist who preached inerrancy and premillennial dispensationalism.  (He was also lukewarm at best toward racial integration until it was no longer socially palatable to be racist.)  But just as no one could have called FBC controversial, few would have considered Dr. Criswell to be a controversial preacher.

So what has changed?

The legion of SBC elites who unleashed a storm of criticism on Tebow would have you believe that the media are at fault --- that they have forced Christians out of the public square, intimidated Tebow into bowing out, and labeled every conservative "controversial" or worse.  Even the Rev. Rick Warren, who should know better, joined the whine-fest.  But this is total and complete nonsense.  I remain utterly baffled that the majority religion in the freest nation on earth can sustain an imaginary persecution complex.

The First Baptist Church of Dallas wasn't controversial 50 years ago because its pastor wasn't controversial.  Southern Baptists weren't controversial because their seminary presidents and agency heads didn't double as political party operatives.  Baptists pretty much abided by the centuries-old consensus on what it meant to be Baptist.  And the evangelical impulse to engage the culture (contrasted with fundamentalists' separatism and obnoxiousness) was generally in line with that historic consensus.

If FBC Dallas is controversial today, it's because Dr. Jeffress is controversial -- not because the congregation or the media or anything else has changed.

You see, Dr. Criswell may not have supported George Romney for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination, but he didn't publicly call him an unchristian, Hell-bound cult member, as Jeffress did when speaking about Mitt Romney.  And Criswell certainly didn't suggest that George Romney's religion disqualified him from public office.  Criswell did not like LBJ or Jimmy Carter, but he didn't say that they were paving the way for the antichrist, as Jeffress said about President Obama.  Like so many of today's SBC leaders, Dr. Jeffress wants to retain evangelicals' cultural engagement but has embraced the worst aspects of fundamentalism: anti-intellectualism, a completely delusional persecution complex, and a tone that seems to be deliberately as offensive and obnoxious as possible.

Even more obnoxious than FBC's angry and rude press release was Jeffress's pathetic attempt to force Tebow into his crazy camp:

"There doesn't seem to be any daylight between what we believe," Jeffress said, noting that Tebow is a member of First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Fla.  "He simply attributed it to needing to stay away from controversy."

Tell you what, Dr. Jeffress.  Let's let Tebow speak for himself regarding whether he believes, like you, that homosexuality leads to pedophilia or that the president is paving the way for the reign of the antichrist.

Personally, I'm ambivalent about Tim Tebow.  It occurs to me that people who flaunt their religiosity "have received their reward in full" (Matthew 6).  But I can't possibly know Tebow's heart and whether or not his motivation is "to be seen of men."  Either way, I admire his faithfulness, work ethic, and apparent humility of spirit.  One of my first dates with my bride, Cara, was a Florida Gators game in 2008, Tebow's junior season.  My brother and sister-in-law saw some of Tebow's (or God's, depending on how you look at it) spectacular performances in Denver late in the 2011 season.

After being hastily and harshly criticized by evangelicals who had for years been his strongest supporters, Tebow now knows how today's evangelical extremists operate.  When you're useful to them, they praise and respect you.  But when you exercise some independent thought that does not follow their theology or politics to the letter, they throw you out like yesterday's trash.

These are not the people we need running our conventions, our churches, or our universities.  For now, we're stuck with too many of them.  But in the truest Baptist spirit, let's remind the world that they do not speak for us as they wreck the reputations of our once-proud institutions.

Things Fall Apart

Cedarville University Series
Part 1 - Cedarville: A Very Brief Introduction
Part 2 - The Worst are Filled with Passionate Intensity
Part 3 - Things Fall Apart

Part 4 - The Center Cannot Hold

After the Cedars controversy, I spent a semester overseas. By the time I returned to campus, I’d started dating the son of a high-ranking staff member. Though not a student, he had free access to campus, and eventually got a short-term job at the university due to his father’s connections. That relationship should have been a mere footnote to my Cedarville story, but like so many college relationships, it became abusive. My ex, a recovering drug and alcohol addict, started drinking again, and I became the target for his anger.

Abusive dating relationships aren’t unique to Cedarville. What sets Cedarville apart is its campus culture, defined by events like the one I criticized in my Cedars article. Women are sexualized, but restricted from sexual behavior. They are the gatekeepers of sexual purity, charged with dressing modestly in order to prevent male lust.

So it’s probably no surprise, then, that when my ex’s abuse escalated to attempted rape, one of my first thoughts (after the humiliation and fear) involved the modesty panel I’d criticized. Specifically, I remembered a male classmate’s assertion that women should not wear pajama pants in public, because that made men think about bed, which made them think about sex.

My boyfriend tried to rape me while I was wearing pajamas. And at the time, I couldn’t shake the deep-seated conviction that I’d brought it upon myself.

This isn’t easy to write. I write it because I believe it’s necessary. I write it because I want you to understand why I, and so many others, have spoken so extensively about Carl Ruby’s compassion. It is because his compassion stands in stark contrast to the treatment many of us received at Cedarville. We speak about the philosophy professors, Dr. Mills and his colleague, Dr. Shawn Graves, because they encouraged students to think critically about ethics and faith. Cedarville needs that, too.

In the days that followed the assault, I became severely depressed, but I told no one about the attack. I feared retribution, and for several months, I found the event too traumatic to revisit. I did go to Dr. Ruby and others about different aspects of the abuse. And though my abuser faced no consequences for his actions, he, Dr. Mills and other faculty members who have since moved on from Cedarville deserve credit for showing me the emotional support that helped me move on and begin to heal.

Cedarville’s refusal to punish my abuser alerted me to the depths of the corruption in Cedarville’s administration. When I received word this past fall that a Bible professor had been fired for his interpretation of Genesis, that the philosophy major could be cut, and that Dr. Ruby could lose his job, I credited these decisions to these same deeply rooted failures in leadership. These failures became evident to many when the university officially announced its plans.

The backlash stumbled to life when the university fired Dr. Michael Pahl. The reason: Pahl, a literalist, proved not quite literalist enough to suit Dr. Tom Cornman, the fundamentalist academic vice president. Dr. Cornman had recently authored a then-secret series of white papers that codified the university’s doctrinal position, beyond the statement publicly available on the university’s website.

Dr. Cornman and the provost, Dr. John Gredy, also a fundamentalist, later led the charge to eliminate Cedarville’s philosophy major. Neither publicly stated an ideological motivation behind their decision, but behind the scenes, bias tainted every administrative move.

Last month, Cedars thoroughly documented the flaws in the review and appeal processes as applied to the philosophy program. The rushed review process and the obscured rationale behind it fuelled student and alumni concerns that this signalled an imminent fundamentalist takeover of the university. When Carl Ruby announced his unexpected resignation on January 10th, those fears seemed to be confirmed. The resignation seemed especially suspicious after Christianity Today revealed that Dr. Ruby had already undergone a hearing in the fall, and that Lorne Scharneberg, chairman of the Board of Trustees, denied the hearing ever occurred. After twenty-five years of service to the university, Dr. Ruby was forced to leave campus five days after his public resignation. Conveniently, a non-disclosure agreement forbade him from revealing the true reasons for his departure. The conditions of Dr. Ruby’s resignation have prompted one trustee, Chris Williamson, to publicly call for his reinstatement.

During a topical Town Hall chaired by Dr. Gredy, he and Dr. Cornman misrepresented the true number of students enrolled in philosophy courses at the university, and generally avoided specific student concerns about the philosophy major and Dr. Ruby’s resignation. In the wake of the university’s decisions, petitions to reinstate Dr. Ruby and revive the philosophy program received 1071 and 1170 signatures respectively. Either petition by itself dwarfs an older petition about Hoffeditz’s termination. Combined, they represent a thriving opposition to fundamentalist encroachment at Cedarville University.

That opposition has been bolstered by the revelation that trustee Michael Loftis had been forced to abandon the presidency of the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism (ABWE) for failures in leadership. The failure? Although victims first informed Loftis about the activities of a pedophile missionary doctor in 2002, Loftis did not launch any sort of investigation into the crimes until 2011. Loftis remains a trustee and the pedophile, though now dead, still posthumously holds an honorary doctorate from Cedarville.

Loftis is not the only trustee charged with covering up child molestation. Trustee Bill Williams resigned from his position as the superintendent of Worthington Christian Schools in 2008 after it was revealed that he had a hired a known child molester to teach at the school.

To our further dismay, an open letter by Dr. David Olsen, Cedarville graduate and co-founder of Cedarville Out, described the sexual harassment of male students by now retired Professor Ed Spencer, and the sexual harassment and abuse of other male students by former professor, Dr. David Robey. The incidents span decades.

The male victims of Dr. Spencer and Dr. Robey encountered the same cultural obstacles that I did, complicated by the school’s strident homophobia. We had few allies, and reporting the full scale of the abuse seemed impossible. We each found ourselves marginalized by the university’s culture of silence. That culture of silence protects Michael Loftis and Bill Williams. It is responsible for the tactics used to remove Carl Ruby, Michael Pahl, David Mills and Shawn Graves from their positions. It benefits only the fundamentalists who enforce it in order to protect their vision of Cedarville University. Their vision leaves no space for debate or for compassion shown to the marginalized. It does not include justice for gay and lesbian students, or, it seems, for feminist student journalists.

I am 25 years old. I hold a master’s degree from Goldsmiths, University of London, and last month I went public about my assault. My abuser, who also attacked another female student, is currently under investigation by the university. At the moment, there are no investigations into the claims regarding Dr. Spencer and Dr. Robey.

On Thursday evening, we received word that Lorne Scharneberg has confirmed to an alumnus that he intends to return Cedarville to its fundamentalist roots. According to Scharneberg, Carl Ruby and others wanted Cedarville to “become like Wheaton (College)” and that he does not care if this return to fundamentalism results in a drop in enrolment. It is clear that the financial arguments employed by the university to defend its decision to eliminate the philosophy major are entirely facetious, that Carl Ruby’s resignation was forced, and that this fundamentalist faction remains bent on destroying any remaining semblance of academic freedom at the university.

Tomorrow, the board will meet to discuss the elimination of the philosophy major and Carl Ruby’s resignation for the final time. If Scharneberg and his allies succeed, Cedarville University will go the way of Bob Jones University and each of us can forget about our individual campaigns for justice. Please keep the entire Cedarville community in your thoughts and prayers this weekend. On Monday, I’ll report here on the board’s decisions.

Editor's Note: Increasingly, groups from the evangelical and fundamentalist communities are raising awareness about how fundamentalist culture protects abusers and mistreats victims.  I have elsewhere asked where the CCCU is on fundamentalist encroachment at member institutions.  Given the pervasive sexual scandals (and cover-ups), that question seems even more pertinent.  I also want to acknowledge the unkind anonymous comments on Sarah's previous posts.  For obvious reasons, I am disabling comments.

Where is the CCCU!?

Before I begin, let me extend a warm welcome to our hundreds of new readers this week.  Please look around the site and get to know us a bit.  Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.  And please excuse this hastily composed stream-of-consciousness post.

I hate to interrupt guest contributor Sarah Jones's excellent series on Cedarville University.  But as fundamentalist encroachment proceeds apace at a number of evangelical colleges with no sign of letting up, I have to ask, Where is the CCCU?

For the uninitiated, the Council for Conservative Christian Colleges & Universities is a Washington, D.C.-based lobby for a very small subset of Christian colleges.  We've written about the CCCU here before.  Last March, we quoted Gordon College Professor Karl Giberson, who rightly said that some CCCU schools' "lingering attachment to some of the more dubious certainties and habits derived from Fundamentalism" badly hurt their credibility as legitimate academic institutions.  In April, Save OBU Contributing Editor Veronica Risinger  wrote a series on women at OBU.  She prefaced it by looking at women in CCCU schools, which the CCCU strongly implies are the only schools that are "intentionally Christ-centered."  On this score, Veronica noted that only 6% of CCCU institutions have female presidents: "For women who want to lead, the odds are a lot better if your school isn't intentionally Christian."  Finally, in July, I congratulated outgoing CCCU President Paul Corts and welcomed the newly-elected president, Ed Blews.

My interest in academic freedom and ethical administration in Christian higher education began when I heard about failings in those areas at my alma mater (Oklahoma Baptist University) from 2009 to 2011.  But I have been saddened (though not surprised) to learn that the situation is worse -- much worse -- at peer institutions like Shorter, Cedarville, and Louisiana College.  This is without even mentioning other Baptist schools who have apparently made their peace with the new, fundamentalist direction of the post-Takeover SBC such as Union University, Southwest Baptist, and North Greenville University.  And we constituents of institutions related to Baptist state conventions are just beginning to learn about goings-on at colleges related to other, smaller evangelical and pentecostal denominations that comprise a majority of the CCCU's membership.

Now, I suppose the CCCU does not want to meddle in its member institutions' internal affairs.  But unlike accrediting bodies, which must verify colleges' independent governance, the CCCU seems either unconcerned about or uninterested in stopping problematic threats to academic freedom and lapses in ethical administration that occur when fundamentalists take control.

Thank God moderates at OBU still had enough clout to prevent, or at least delay, the new administration from turning it into a fundamentalist Bible academy.  But if we OBU constituents are losing the battle slowly, constituents of Louisiana College, Cedarville, and Shorter are losing the battle swiftly and forcefully.  Will no one in the CCCU stand up for them?

I would think the tide of embarrassing press (Cedarville, Shorter), threats to accreditation (Shorter, Louisiana College) and dramatic declines in national rankings (OBU, maybe others) would get the CCCU's attention.  But I know of no evidence that this is the case.  CCCU President Ed Blews wants to focus on protecting scholarship and loan programs (which is good, I guess, though the wisdom of borrowing heavily to finance a private undergraduate education is debatable).  Blews also wants to protect "religious freedom" (i.e., challenge the so-called HHS Mandate, which is a little strange since the CCCU excludes all Catholic universities as insufficiently Christ-centered).  Of course it's vital for the CCCU to advocate on issues relevant to all its member institutions and I am as confident as anyone that under Blews's leadership, the council will continue to do so very effectively.

But the CCCU needs to realize something.  All is not well.  Sure, there are a handful of mainline-affiliated (literally no more than 15) and a few unaffiliated CCCU schools where academic freedom is secure and denominational politics cannot or will not interfere.  But at many member institutions, faithful Christian scholars and students are suffering.

I know it's a fine line for the CCCU to walk.  After all, the CCCU is a big tent considering its rather precise definition of what constitutes "intentionally Christ-centered."  Its membership includes some very reputable, academically rigorous institutions and some pretty wacky, nominally accredited, and avowedly fundamentalist degree mills.  But at this point, the CCCU's silence is deafening.  One prominent evangelical blogger, noting problems at several institutions (CCCU and otherwise) more eloquently characterized the current collective problem as an "Evangelical Inquisition."

It's well and good that Ed Blews was smiling and joking around with Messiah College President and CCCU Board Chair Kim Phipps at his inauguration last month in Washington.  But it's time to get serious about fundamentalist encroachment and oppose this inquisition.  It recently hit close to home for Dr. Phipps (incidentally one of the handful of female CCCU college presidents), as one of Messiah's professors is under fire for a blog post that challenged unthinking, literal interpretations of Scripture.  The CCCU requires its members to "be supportive of other Christian colleges."  Well, we at OBU, Cedarville, Shorter, Louisiana College and a host of other member institutions need to feel that support.

We need it now more than ever.

P.S. I live in Washington, so I am willing to meet with senior CCCU staff to strategize about how we can all work together to protect academic freedom and ensure ethical administration at our beloved Christian colleges.

P.P.S. The hymn "Forward Through the Ages" was sung at Mr. Blews's inauguration service.  It's one of his favorites and it's one of mine, too.  I hope it calls to mind the unity and determination we need to protect and preserve the traditions and values we hold dear.

1. Forward through the ages, in unbroken line, 
 move the faithful spirits at the call divine; 
 gifts in differing measure, hearts of one accord, 
 manifold the service, one the sure reward. 

Refrain:
 Forward through the ages, in unbroken line, 
 move the faithful spirits at the call divine. 

2. Wider grows the kingdom, reign of love and light; 
 for it we must labor, till our faith is sight. 
 Prophets have proclaimed it, martyrs testified, 
 poets sung its glory, heroes for it died.
 (Refrain) 

3. Not alone we conquer, not alone we fall; 
 in each loss or triumph lose or triumph all. 
 Bound by God's far purpose in one living whole,
 move we on together to the shining goal. 
 (Refrain) 

The Worst are Filled with Passionate Intensity

Cedarville University Series
Part 1 - Cedarville: A Very Brief Introduction
Part 2 - The Worst are Filled with Passionate Intensity
Part 3 - Things Fall Apart
Part 4 - The Center Cannot Hold


In my last post, I explained that a fundamentalist faction of Cedarville’s support base objected to the university’s decision to welcome GLBT activists onto campus as evidence of its turn toward liberalism. Their objections may have been overruled, but they did not fade into obscurity. Instead, they continued to organize themselves around the belief that Dr. Carl Ruby and certain faculty members posed an active threat to Cedarville’s historical identity as a conservative Baptist institution. Their campaign received a boost when the General Association of Regular Baptists (GARBC) decided to end its affiliation with Cedarville in 2006, due to the university’s alleged failure to adhere to its doctrinal standards. According to GARBC, Cedarville had become too liberal, and for fundamentalist alumni, this was evidence enough to begin a more aggressive campaign to ‘reclaim’ the university.

As a student, I had little awareness of the machinations behind the events I witnessed on campus. My parents, former Plymouth Brethren who attended Baptist churches when no local Brethren congregation could be found, had little regard for denominational politics, and so did I. But at Cedarville, the internal political conflicts that plague American Christianity proved inescapable. They disrupted my studies and threatened the careers of my favorite professors. Even the existence of my church, a small urban congregation founded by the same faculty members targeted by the fundamentalists, seemed to be at risk.

The fight, which endures in my memory as one of the most vicious episodes of social conflict that I’ve ever witnessed, focused on Dr. David Mills and Dr. Tim Gombis. By my sophomore year, Dr. David Hoffeditz emerged as one of the most prominent fundamentalist voices on campus. Hoffeditz, a Bible professor, used class time to accuse Dr. Gombis and Dr. Mills (professors of Biblical studies and philosophy respectively) of heresy. The worst sort of heresy, by fundamentalist standards: he accused them of being post-modernists.

I write this article as a recent graduate of Goldsmiths, University of London. My graduate career is focused on political theory, and if I must be called anything at all, I prefer to be called a post-structuralist because I believe the label of ‘post-modernist’ is so commonly misused that it’s now practically meaningless. But according to popular fundamentalist discourse, post-modernism is the philosophical nemesis of orthodox Christianity. According to these fundamentalists, post-modernism denies the possibility of absolute truth and certainty of belief and it is therefore incompatible with Christian faith.

Even by this dubious standard, Dr. Mills and Dr. Gombis are not post-modernists. They were not post-modernists in 2006, when fundamentalist professors incited a group of students to write a letter of concern to the administration. And they were not post-modernists in 2007, when the university finally fired David Hoffeditz and another fundamentalist professor. The accusation seemed absurd to me in my undergraduate days and it’s even more absurd to me now. Both professors certainly questioned traditional conservative positions on economic policy and to an extent, gender roles. But there is nothing reflected in their academic work that supports the claim that either encourages spiritual doubts.

a 2004 paper written by Dr. Mills in response to a lecture on the Emerging Church Movement became a primary point of contention. The Emerging Church has long been a cause of concern for fundamentalists, who view it as a departure from orthodoxy. Though Mills never claimed to belong to the movement, he did not issue a blanket condemnation of it and its adherents, and corrected, briefly, popular misconceptions about post-modernism.

At any other academic institution, this paper would have passed without controversy. At Cedarville, it helped instigate a campaign against Dr. Mills and his colleague, Dr. Gombis, who had also been accused of deviations from orthodoxy. Led by David Hoffeditz, and other fundamentalist faculty members, students, and alumni, the ‘Coalition of the Concerned’ deliberately attacked these ‘liberal’ professors, and cited their employment as evidence of the university’s drift toward theological liberalism.

I was already something of a spiritual exile when I entered Cedarville. Dissatisfied by conservative Christianity’s rigid gender roles and the politicization of the faith, I’d hoped for a different environment at Cedarville. The tactics employed by David Hoffeditz and the students who supported him ravaged that hope. I felt like I no longer had a safe haven. Dr. Mills and Dr. Gombis modelled a faith defined by compassion and intellectual rigor. For many of us, that model had been missing from our experience with Christianity, but we aspired to emulate it once we witnessed it.

Amidst this chaos, the university fired David Hoffeditz and David Mappes, also a fundamentalist, though one less vocal than Hoffeditz. Their supporters claimed that the terminations were ideologically motivated; according to the university, the terminations were merited by Hoffeditz’s personal attacks on other professors. To date, neither side has convinced the other of the rightness of their position. Hoffeditz sued the university for wrongful termination and settled out of court. The American Association of University Professors officially censured the university for failing to adhere to professional standards expected for the severance of a tenured professor.

The current controversies at the university are directly related to this series of events. The university’s reaction to the Coalition of the Concerned and their passionate defense of fundamentalist Christianity seemed, to many, to be proof positive of its liberal drift. Over the next several years, additional controversies over the political views of proposed campus speakers like Shane Claiborne and the perceived liberalism of the student newspaper created a chaotic politically charged campus atmosphere that effectively divided the Cedarville community into liberal and conservative camps.

In the interest of transparency: I wrote for the student newspaper. I’m quite proud of this. I’m equally proud of the fact that my article criticizing a campus event on female modesty goaded the Board of Trustees into demanding that the paper never publish such an opinion again. The fatal criticism? I dared to suggest that a panel of male students, faculty and staff did not have the right to comment on female dress. Perhaps that was a bit too post-modern.

By the time my opinion piece attracted the attention of the Board of Trustees, I was a junior, and the appointments of two fundamentalists to the positions of  provost and academic vice president meant that the university’s administration had become dominated by the fundamentalist faction that controls it now. The Soulforce visit and Hoffeditz’s termination created significant animosity toward Dr. Carl Ruby, Dr. David Mills, and other moderate voices. That animosity, plus  and set the stage for the university’s current farce.

Editor's Note: While the specifics differ, OBU students/faculty/alumni and constituents of other Baptist colleges will no doubt recognize common themes in Sarah's telling of Cedarville's story: Exposure to legal and financial damages for wrongful separation of tenured faculty; exposure to censure from professional organizations and even accrediting bodies; fear (if not outright suppression) of legitimate student journalism; a general and pervasive threat that fundamentalist elements within a Christian university pose to academic freedom and ethical trustee and administrative leadership. Save OBU is committed to building solidarity among people courageously standing against fundamentalist encroachment in Baptist and evangelical higher education.  Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.  Sarah's Cedarville series continues Friday. -j-

Why the Long Silence? A Brief Explanation

Many of you have reached out to me and asked why the Save OBU movement has been so quietly lately.  The "Welcome to 2013" post a few weeks ago was vague about when we would start blogging regularly again.  I thought I'd offer a few reasons why we've been so quiet, both strategically and of necessity.

• After being on Bison Hill for Homecoming in November, I saw firsthand that >95% of what is happening at OBU is absolutely fantastic.  Enrollment is up, new programs are launching, and faculty, staff, and students' commitment to excellence is everywhere apparent.  We hit pretty hard at times over the past year.  No one likes an incessant critic.  We've made our points -- and will continue to do so.  But we are not naysayers.
• Web traffic is down when classes are not in session.  Last January, fewer people were paying attention to Save OBU during J-Term.  So it seemed like a natural time to take a break.
• I was traveling for 3 weeks around the holidays, and have also moved to a new (rented) basement apartment in Silver Spring, MD.  I had a series of pressing professional responsibilities.  I'm the father of a 9-month old.  And frankly, I needed a break.
• But the most important reason we took a breather is that we could.  Whether or not we had a hand in it, the pace of OBU's fundamentalist encroachment slowed considerably in 2012, except for one instance where the new administration hand-picked a literalist, Calvinist, young earth creationist from Southwestern Seminary to teach in OBU's religion department without even bothering with the usual faculty search process (faculty input, etc).  That was unfortunate, and indicates that we will continue to see OBU's religion, philosophy, and ministry departments abandon their historic rigor and excellence and devolve into a fundamentalist preacher boy camp.  But overall, we saw more signs of progress than signs for concern.  Provost Stan Norman seems almost completely neutralized.  President Whitlock is learning that in order to rebuild trust with the faculty, he cannot sit idly by while over-zealous administrators remake OBU.  Perhaps most importantly, there is now broad awareness among faculty, students, and alumni across the generations that all who care about academic freedom and ethical administration must be on high alert, given the troubling changes at OBU since Whitlock's inauguration.

In recent days, I've begun summoning the energy to re-engage the Save OBU project.  I had a great discussion with a Carson-Newman University (TN) alum who reports that C-N is resisting pressure from the Tennessee Baptist Convention to become more fundamentalist.  On a sadder note, I'm learning that the almost unanimous consensus of moderate evangelicals in Baptist higher education is that Tennessee's other Baptist school, Union University in Jackson, is much worse off than I feared.  Behind the facade of impressive fundraising and enrollment numbers, Union and its president, David Dockery, has pretty much allowed the new guard of SBC and TBC fundamentalists dictate what goes on there.

But the real impetus to get back to work is the ongoing fundamentalist encroachment at Cedarville University, an institution of the State Convention of Baptists in Ohio.  Christianity Today has a summary of the issue here.  In the days to come, I'll be reporting on Cedarville's problems to the OBU community.  In addition, I'll be inviting the Cedarville community to learn about what has happened at OBU and at other schools like Shorter University.

I still hope to do a 2012 year-in-review post, hopefully before the end of January.

I hope all is well with each of you.

New Trustee Leadership at OBU Seems Promising

As we mentioned earlier in the week, OBU's Board of Trustees had its fall meeting last Friday.  Among other vital business, the board elected officers for the year:

Board officers for the 2012-13 year were elected at the close of the meeting. They are David Lawrence, Weatherford, Okla., chair; Jarrod Frie, Tulsa, Okla., vice chair; Todd Fisher, Shawnee, Okla. secretary, and Nadine McPherson, Oklahoma City, Okla., treasurer.

We will definitely miss the very fine leadership of Dr. Reagan Bradford, who rotates off the board this year.  He served two years as chair.  During his tenure, longtime Edmond pastor and board vice chair Rev. Dr. Alan Day tragically died.  Bradford also had to contend with the uproar caused by the administration's botched dismissals of two well-respected professors in the College of Theology and Ministry.  With vociferous faculty protests, last fall's alumni petition, and the emergence and growth of Save OBU, Dr. Bradford has certainly contended with many challenges as he guided the trustees.

I frankly don't know a lot about OBU trustee politics.  When I began the Save OBU project, I thought the first order of business would be finding out how the BGCO uses the board to control OBU.  But much to my pleasant surprise, that isn't how things work at all.  In fact, OBU has great trustees who care about the university's growth, success, independence, and continued flourishing.  Unlike the seminaries, whose boards reek of insider SBC politics, and many state convention-run colleges, whose trustees actively abet fundamentalist takeovers of once-proud institutions, OBU's trustees are quite outstanding.

But make no mistake.  The trustee board is the linchpin.  As the architects of the original SBC Takeover well knew, if you control the trustees, you control the institution.  Fortunately, that hasn't happened at OBU yet.

We welcome to the chair Rev. Dr. David Lawrence, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Weatherford.  The vice chair, Jarrod Frie, is a layperson.  I don't know if this means Frie will acede to the chair.  But while we definitely have some great non-fundamentalist clergy, I tend to think we're definitely safer with a layperson.  For one thing, laypeople don't have as much to lose from not engaging in BGCO politics.

We dodged a bullet in that Rev. Dr. Todd Fisher will not chair the board (unless the BGCO elects him to another 4-year term sometime in the future).  The main reason I say this is that he is an officer on the board of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.  Southern is thoroughly fundamentalist, and it is likely that Fisher sees many of the things SBTS does as normal.  For instance, the seminary tolerates no moderates (let alone liberals), and has a fundamentalist ethos on everything from the Bible to politics to gender roles.  The last thing we need is someone who might be tempted to think it's God's will to make OBU more like a monolithic, extremely homogeneous post-Takeover SBC seminary.  Dr. Fisher, pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Shawnee, states on his blog that you can't be a Christian if you don't believe in a literal Adam and Eve.  Nothing against the man personally, but I'm glad he's too busy with SBTS's board to be an officer on OBU's.

We're lucky to have people who actually believe in God and science chair OBU's board.  Dr. Bradford, a M.D. research physician and Dr. Lawrence is a Ph.D. mathematician who entered the ministry as  a second career.  I can't imagine that either of them are happy about Provost Norman's and Dean McClellen's antics.  In fact, last winter some faculty were hopeful that a group of trustees might try to help President Whitlock realize that Provost Norman should move on.  Our sources never found out whether such a meeting took place.

Let's hope and pray that OBU's trustees stand strong against any further fundamentalist encroachment!

A Disaster for the Hobbs College and for OBU

I really did not want to write this post.  We've known since May that a fundamentalist professor from Southwestern Seminary was coming to teach at OBU this fall.  We discussed the matter briefly this summer when the new professor, Rev. Dr. Ishwaran Mudliar, contributed to a series of essays in the Oklahoma Baptist Messenger (which we critiqued).  Prof. Mudliar implied that believing in a literal six-day creation is integral to and requisite of a "Christian worldview."  More alarmingly, he approvingly cited a website called Answers in Genesis, which attempts to discredit every branch of human science, achievement, and knowledge that points to the fact that the earth is more than 6,000-10,000 years old.

In our recent discussion of new hires at OBU, we were quite positive.  Every indication is that the deans filled the vacancies with the candidates the departments wanted, without undue influence from Provost Stan Norman.  But we did not discuss the Mudliar hire in that post.  I had been inclined to give Prof. Mudliar the benefit of the doubt.  Maybe his Messenger essay was just an attempt to appease the fundamentalists in the Baptist Building and around the state.

But a recent profile in The Bison (page 9) makes it crystal clear that this is an absolute disaster for OBU.  It confirms many of our worst fears about the administration of the Hobbs College and the university in general.  Dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of OBU students will receive a sub-par (to put it kindly) education in Old Testament studies, all because the Hobbs College does not even bother pretending that it has a fair, ethical, or normal search and hire process.

Given that the Hobbs College still has a number of professors who take the Bible seriously, not literally, it's inconceivable that any of them could have been party to selecting someone who so blatantly disdains their lives' work -- integrating serious, honest biblical and theological scholarship into the framework of a searching, fearless Christian faith.

Indeed, Mudliar makes it clear that he was sought specifically for his fundamentalist views:

"'Dr. McClellan,' whom he had never met, "Contacted me, and told me about the changes that have been going on the past couple of years, and that there was an opening in the area of Old Testament.'"

Rather than advertising the position through the normal channels in order to hopefully get the best possible applicants, McClellan went fishing for his next fundamentalist darling.  He obviously bypassed the vital process of involving faculty colleagues in the process.

You don't have to be very imaginative to know what "changes" McClellan discussed with Mudliar.  We got rid of two moderates, and are waiting for the rest to retire or move on.  We are only hiring fundamentalists now.  The university is focused on a capital campaign and expanding athletic and graduate programs.  So we're flying under the radar and putting literalism in the religion curriculum.  We're finally free to fill vacancies with avowed fundamentalists.  We just bypass the normal search process now.  We have clearance from my old buddy Anthony Jordan, from the provost, and from the president to do this.

It didn't have to be this way.  Prof. Mudliar, as a Ph.D. student at Johns Hopkins University, had access to an absolutely first-rate education.  Hopkins has for many decades had an outstanding reputation for excellence in Hebrew Bible, the Ancient Near East, and biblical archaeology.  He says in the Bison profile he's grateful for the language study he did there.  I'm not sure how he was there for years without any of the rest sinking in.  An OBU alum who is a Hebrew Bible scholar at the University of Wisconsin aptly pointed out recently that "You can't contribute to the project of biblical criticism if you reject its principles."  And so it has been with Mudliar.  His publication record is shockingly thin considering how many promising teacher-scholars we could have considered for the position if only we'd tried.

Another question concerns his tenure status.  He left Southwestern as an assistant professor but comes to OBU as an associate professor.  Does this mean he already has "Senior Faculty Status" at OBU?  More importantly, could this suggest that he was denied tenure at Southwestern?  One could hardly imagine anyone has to do anything other than believe the right things to be tenured at SWBTS.  We'll know (and report) these facts soon enough.  But we remain concerned that the tenure process at OBU is changing.  It was and should be a way to protect faculty members who have demonstrated excellence in teaching and scholarship.  But it seems to be devolving into a weapon and, maybe in years to come, a rubber stamp for fundamentalists who would be unemployable elsewhere in legitimate academia.

All this to say: Nothing against Prof. Mudliar personally.  He's just a man who was offered a better job than the one he had and took it.  I'm sure I disagree with his interpretation of the Hebrew Bible, but that, of course, does not disqualify him.  What disqualifies him is that his commitment to an ideology (fundamentalism) causes him to completely discount facts, science, reason, and learning.  He is completely antithetical to the entire project of higher education.  There are places for people like Ishwaran Mudliar, but Oklahoma Baptist University, until David Whitlock came along, has not been one of them.

I regret any discomfort that results from our bringing wider attention to the administration's radical redefinition of what passes for "Christian scholarship" in the Hobbs College of Theology and Ministry. But this story needs to be told.  Though we believe OBU students would be better served by a professor who was actually committed to responsible biblical interpretation, it's true that Mudliar may be the biggest loser of all.  Unlike another Hobbs College colleague who found out later that he was the search committee's second choice, Mudliar knows that he owes his position to his ideology and not to his accomplishments.  He wasn't selected because he was the best candidate or the best fit, but rather because he believed the right things and had connections to the right fundamentalist SBC elites.  I imagine that's not a good feeling for a new professor, particularly one of the few ethnic minorities among a lily white faculty.

The real culprit here is Dean Mark McClellan.  His administration of the Hobbs College, especially with respect to personnel, has been a disaster for OBU.  By ignoring the norms of search-and-hire processes, he is essentially spitting in the faces of colleagues who have collectively devoted many decades to authentic, serious Christian higher education at OBU.  That era is over.  And Anthony Jordan, Stan Norman, and David Whitlock are patting him on the back.

2012 Convocation: Raley, Jr. Receives Honorary Doctorate

I really enjoyed the video of Wednesday's convocation service.  The hymns, the prayers, and the words spoken were all very beautiful and inspiring.  It was wonderful to see John Wesley Raley, Jr. receive an honorary degree from the institution his parents devoted their lives to building.

Some people think I've been too hard on OBU in my writing here.  Others think I've been too soft.  At the moment, I just want to say that yesterday's convocation reminded me of all that is great, even exceptional (to borrow Mr. Raley's term), about OBU.

This time last year, many people legitimately feared that OBU was on the verge of an all-out assault by fundamentalists.  The faculty seriously considered taking a no-confidence vote in the president.  Yet today, many of us feel at least somewhat reassured that the worst of our fears have not been realized.  Sure, OBU administrators continue their troubling pattern of cozying up to fundamentalist SBC elites.  Sure, it will take time for the faculty's wounds to heal to the point that they can begin to trust President Whitlock and Provost Norman again.  Sure, the religion department bypassed the usual, ethical hiring process and installed a fundamentalist Bible teacher who is also an avowed flat-earther young earther.  OBU continues to be without a legitimate university bookstore that sells mainstream books in history, literature, the arts, and the natural and social sciences.

But given the severity of our fears and the path taken by some other state convention-run Baptist colleges, I think it's safe to say that things are not nearly as bad as they could be.

What has happened to keep OBU from going over the cliff?  What good fortune and grace has come our way to enable even OBU's loving critics to find this week's service not only palatable, but also inspiring?  Let's review a few facts:

• This honoree is actually deserving.  Whitlock wisely chose to honor someone who actually has a deep and meaningful connection to the university, and who might actually be inclined to support it financially.  Raley, a semi-retired partner in a Ponca City law firm and former mayor of that town, served as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Oklahoma in the 1990s, having been appointed by President George H. W. Bush.  Contrast Mr. Raley to SBC President Rev. Fred Luter (the last honoree), who has absolutely no connection to OBU and would never give OBU a dime.  The Luter move, done off-site and in the summer, was nothing more than an ill-advised power play.
• OBU has brought in a number of very promising new faculty members, rather than reflexively replacing retiring moderates with fundamentalists.
• Unlike a growing number of other Baptist schools, OBU does not force its faculty to sign creedal statements.  Doing so would be the end of academic freedom.  OBU's convocation explicitly asked students to open their minds, not to close them (as is the case at the fundamentalist SBC seminaries and colleges like Truett-McConnell and Brewton-Parker in Georgia).
• Provost Stan Norman, the force behind all the recent problems at OBU, appears to have been completely reigned in.  When he came to OBU, he saw faculty vacancies as his best chance to remake OBU in the mold of SBC fundamentalism.  Either he's had a change of heart, or has been directed to lay low.  Hopefully installing a young earth creationist in the Hobbs College of Theology and Ministry will keep him happy for a while and he won't try to wreck any other departments.

In spite of a few pretty serious disappointments, we're looking forward to OBU having a better year than it's had lately.

Welcome Week 2012: The Idea of a Christian College

Welcome Week continues for more than 500 incoming OBU students who moved in Saturday.  Our thoughts are with them, and with all the students, faculty, staff, and administrators preparing to begin a new academic year.

If you've been on Bison Hill during August the past 8 or 10 years, you probably know about a little book by Arthur F. Holmes called The Idea of a Christian College.  I know the faculty has held the book in high esteem for some time -- perhaps since its publication in 1975.  I don't know when it became required reading for Welcome Week.  But for some number of years, a small-group faculty-led discussion of the book has been a critical component of the Welcome Week experience.

Such is the case again this year.  Eleven faculty and staff from across the university are leading new students in a discussion of The Idea of a Christian College.  From every indication we have, these professors are all outstanding.  Given the composition of the list, I'd say there was absolutely no way Provost Norman or any of the new fundamentalist deans had anything to do with putting Welcome Week together -- and that can only be a good thing.  No need for the indoctrination to begin before the first day.  Let's at least wait til the freshmen get to "Apologetics" 101.

Actually, Holmes makes a compelling argument that the Christian college is not the church and thus does not have a role to play in "defending the faith."  The emphasis is on how to integrate faith with learning.  Holmes thus allows for not only empirical knowledge, but also revelatory knowledge.  Christian professors should model and strive to help form a faith that can withstand the most rigorous intellectual scrutiny.

Considering his thoroughly conservative outlook, Holmes offers a strong defense of academic freedom.  With freedom comes responsibility, of course, but it occurs to me that the new sheriffs at OBU would probably have preferred to use a book with a watered-down definition of academic freedom that the new SBC elites could approve to give the illusion of legitimacy to the SBC's "academic" functions and institutions.

Faculty are discussing Holmes's book this week and emphasizing three key concepts: the integration of faith and learning, academic freedom, and Christian worldview.  We've already pointed out how the concept of "Christian worldview" can be easily manipulated into a naive fundamentalism.  But given the extremely high quality and integrity of the people involved and the apparent fact that the faculty and student life staff are still steering the ship (at least as far as Welcome Week is concerned), we're encouraged.

As Welcome Week gives way to the first semester of college for the Class of 2016, our hope is that "all truth is God's truth" is more than a slogan at OBU.  We know that against vocal opposition, the new administration has imported trappings of the overly dogmatic post-Takeover faux-academic fundamentalism to Bison Hill.  But as long as OBU can remain the kind of college Art Holmes envisioned, that fundamentalism will not take root.  If we're lucky, those who propagate it will soon realize that they are unwelcome.  Let's help them realize it sooner rather than later so that the early Whitlock years will be remembered as a sad but short chapter rather than a decisive turn toward ignorance and irrelevance.

And let's hope that President Whitlock cares more about his legacy in the eyes of OBU students and faculty than SBC elites.  But make no mistake: he can't have it both ways.  The new fundamentalists have made that impossible.  Whitlock will have to choose.

The Next Two Weeks

Happy Saturday, everyone!

I'm in the middle of teaching a monthlong summer school course on Comparative Political Systems at Georgetown.  Veronica will be squeezing in another condensed, weeklong seminary course at TCU later this month as well.  Even if the pace of our blog posting has slowed somewhat, a lot is going on behind the scenes.  We're continuing to build collaborations with other teetering Baptist institutions and learning from their experiences.  (Take a moment to read Save Our Shorter's description of its trustees' negligence.  Then say a prayer of thanksgiving that OBU still has good trustees!)

Recent Posts
This week, we noted that OBU conferred an honorary doctorate upon Rev. Fred Luter, the New Orleans pastor who will be elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention next week.  I still don't have a straight answer on whether a committee decides who should get honorary degrees or whether it's based on the president's unitary executive authority.  But we were fairly alarmed to learn that OBU has given doctorates to two post-Takeover SBC presidents in the past year alone.  Until now, we hadn't typically used the honorary degree as a way to cozy up to fundamentalist SBC elites, especially one without any OBU or Oklahoma connections besides being Stan Norman's friend.  If you look at the list of post-Takeover SBC presidents, OBU has only honored Luter and the Rev. Dr. Tom Elliff.  Though Elliff did enough damage on his own, it would be horrendous for OBU to go back and start giving honorary doctorates to Takeover-era SBC presidents, since many of them shamefully abided the destruction/fundamentalization of once-proud Baptist institutions.

On Thursday, I took at pass at blaming the SBC's membership decline on fundamentalism.  It took some restraint.

The Next Two Weeks
Next week, the SBC Pastor's Conference and Annual Meeting take place in New Orleans.  We'll be providing updates through our Facebook and Twitter feeds, but here on the blog we'll be taking a holistic look at the history of fundamentalism in the SBC.  Clayton Mauritzen ('06) who has written here before, will be leading us through a six-part series that seeks to understand and explain the causes and consequences of the convention's institutionalization of fundamentalism.

The following week, past contributor Caitlin Dacus ('11) will lead us through a four-part examination of the Takeover's effect on Baptist missionaries.  This is a tragic story that not many people know, and Caitlin's interests and experiences make her the ideal person to tell it.  I definitely look forward to welcoming Clayton and Caitlin back to the blog!

We also have some exciting guest posts planned for later in the summer.  Of course, we'll also be releasing the results of our BGCO pastor/church staff survey.  And we have some interesting facts to present that will highlight Oklahoma Baptists' need to beef up their BCM funding, even if it comes at the expense of subsidizing OBU.

Save OBU Connections Continue to Build
Now that our movement is more than six months old, we're starting to see the positive, snowballing effects of connecting geographically- and temporally-dispersed faculty (current and former), alumni, retirees, students, and concerned Baptists.  I'm hearing reports of Save OBU helping people connections, sharing stories, and building friendships at conferences, churches, and educational institutions.  This is so wonderful to hear!  Please keep the stories coming!  (jlupfer [at] gmail [dot] com).

We didn't act in time to get a booth at the CBF General Assembly (June 20-23 in Ft. Worth), but please don't let that stop you from talking up OBU at an event where many concerned constituents will be present!  We'll try to have a formal presence at next year's CBF assembly.  And since next year's SBC is in Baltimore, I may just go myself.  Until I get kicked out along with all the other barnacles and parasites :-)

Finally, if any of you are going to be in the Washington, D.C. area this summer, let me know!  I'd love to compare notes and get to know you better.

-Jacob

Will the Real Christian Worldview Please Stand Up?

Oftentimes I feel like we talk about the dangers of fundamentalism at our school, but it feels a little like railing against an amoeba. It's hard to find definite things which point to the very real dangers. That's why we try to highlight schools like Shorter University, where no one could say anything until it was much too late.

That's part of the problem! We would like to get our school through the perilous waters of post-Takeover Baptist education unscathed and definitely still accredited. We can't afford to wait until 50+ faculty are stomping away indignantly, and watch as the rest of the school inevitably burns to the ground.

So we continue to try and give this amorphous blob a shape, and continue to proclaim its danger.

But finally, here is a solid glimpse.

Last week, there was an incredibly interesting series in the Baptist Messenger which, for us, was lucky in many ways. There are a few things about this particular Baptist Messenger series I would like to highlight.

This series was a series on Christian worldview, written by 6 guest writers -- 5 of whom are recent additions to the OBU College of Theology and Ministry. It is interesting to me that the ones who are writing essays about Christian worldview are all people who've made it through the new litmus test of hiring questions which has been instituted since the new administration has come to OBU.

Please find the entire series of Baptist Messenger "worldview" essays here.

In the days to come, we will go through these articles and show our readership exactly what kind of education OBU will give in our new post-Takeover fundamentalist world.

But why bother with an obscure series in a statewide Baptist newspaper?

First, it is interesting to me that this series is coming out after Save OBU has recently made more and more contacts with Oklahoma Baptist clergy. What better way to counter anything we've said to them than to show them that the REAL OBU is teaching this fundamentalist diatribe. Coincidence? Probably. But as always, we will continue to show that fundamentalism is not the only version of Christianity, and certainly not the version which makes for a good university.

Second, I have always had a particular problem with the idea of worldview.

I have already mentioned that the descent into fundamentalism is moving OBU further and further out of the realm of relevance and into a smaller and smaller echo-chamber where the only voices all mirror each other. This obsession with worldview is the perfect demonstration of that point. I have only ever heard conservative, evangelical Christians use the language of "worldview." I avoid saying fundamentalists, because I don't know if that is a fair assessment. But it is definitely my experience that the concept is only talked about in circles with extreme familiarity with fundamentalism. It's not a real thing worthy of an academic classroom.

Further, worldview is a sneaky word which allows for the obsession with doctrinal purity to be enforced. Talking about a Christian worldview is to say that there is some normative model for the way that every Christian should think. It means taking non-essentials of the faith and then making them essentials. By saying that it is part of a Christian worldview, one can now take any doctrine, highlight and treasure it, and suddenly those who do not affirm it are not Christians-- or at least do not "view the world" as a good Christian should.

The prevalence of talk about worldview at OBU did not arise until the new administration came. Honestly, I'm not sure I had ever heard the word until they instituted a new Christian worldview class into the curriculum. Granted, I was too old for the changes to affect me, so I don't remember everything perfectly. Long story short, J-term became required for freshmen again my senior year. There were a few classes which were offered for free -- and one of them was a new Christian Worldview course, team taught by the new dean of the (then) School of Christian Service and an outside apologist.

So that's probably a good way to get a ton of students to take that class.

Granted, I didn't take the class. So I can't tell you with any sort of certainty what happened there. I can make a few guesses.

But why guess? Now, the newest members who shape the doctrines of OBU have published a 6-part series which will show me exactly what a Christian Worldview is.

So, what is a Christian Worldview? What are we teaching our students is necessary to believe in order to be a Christian? As we go through this series and reveal what those who are taking OBU in a new direction say, you might be surprised.