Since I blogged a couple times over the last week or so about the Wheaton situation, I thought I needed to highlight this statement by Phil Ryken. I thought it was a good statement, and I was glad to see it. However, there are some additional caveats about the whole situation that I would like to add, and maybe I will to get to it soon.
Does this mean that several dozen personal narratives are about to include an expulsion chapter?
Dr. Ryken’s response seems appropriate to the situation.
After a less than stellar year as a freshman at a notable Christian college, I wasn’t exactly expelled but I was dis-invited to return for my sophomore year. Â It did no lasting harm; Â the college recognized a bad attitude and rid themselves of it. Â I moved on.
It is encouraging to see that Wheaton’s Community Covenant addresses homosexual behavior directly, however, I wonder if this covenant has suffered the same fate as the U.S. Constitution.                                                                                                                                                                                                      Are active homosexual students ever held to the covenant oath they made? If they are, could that be legitimately decried as persecution, bullying, homophobia, and marginalization, as the protestors imply? If so, then Wheaton needs to remove the offending section from their covenant (and from Scripture?). If not, then Wheaton staff needs to have a conversation with specific student protestors named in the article, rather than wink at the defiance of… Read more »
katecho: I read the last part as “there are things going on in this regard, and we’d like you to understand that there are, but it would be highly inappropriate for us to talk about the specifics in public”. I suspect this is both because discipline should generally be a private matter (and can still be even if the act was very public), and because doing it in public will simply reinforce any persecution narrative which is being spun.
We should not desire or expect front-row seats for any consequences there may be for the students involved.
How is this a good response?Â
I refer again to my own Christian college experience from the 1970’s. At that time, there were numerous students engaging in inappropriate sexual conduct on campus with full knowledge of administration and as I recall, no one was asked to leave, despite those students having signed a behavioral contract. Drinking and other forbidden activities occurred as well without consequence. So why is anyone surprised at what is happening today?
Sean: How is it a bad one?
Gervase Markham wrote: “I suspect this is both because discipline should generally be a private matter (and can still be even if the act was very public), and because doing it in public will simply reinforce any persecution narrative which is being spun. We should not desire or expect front-row seats for any consequences there may be for the students involved. ” Agreed. We don’t need a front-row seat on the proceedings. However, the resulting accountability needs to be public enough that the (prospective) student body knows that the Community Covenant actually means something, as opposed to becoming a running… Read more »
This is better as a do-over than what the Chaplain said in the previous article. However, it’s still a wee bit short of ideal, given that they may be in a bit of a corner: 1.) On the one hand they have a chaplain seeming to accept the premise that everyone telling their story is a great thing, even if that story includes rebellion against a handbook the students were expected to (honestly) affirm. It sounded like his heart was in the right place, but I think his head is in the sand in terms of the nature of the… Read more »