Category: Opinions

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Let’s (Not) Talk About Sex

Many have, rightfully, bemoaned the decline of the family and the unquestionably devastating consequences of the so-called ‘sexual liberation’ of the modern world. I want to propose the idea, however, that in the Christian reaction it has become all too tempting to (inadvertently) treat marriage and family as the ultimate end of the Christian life. In this fixation on ‘the family,’ we may think we are being counter-cultural. But the big surprise awaiting us is that in doing so we have not really offered anything much different than the world.

Kyle Johnson
Kyle Johnson

Many of our behaviors imply that we believe that marriage and sexual fulfillment should be one of the primary goals of the Christian life. Abstinence teaching in our churches focuses on telling us that the purpose of our sexuality is for marriage and that we should seek purity for better enjoyment of marital life. Sexual purity is supremely important and a failure to maintain it (especially for women) is a unique sin that marks us in ways other sins do not. We, now as young adults, feel pressure in some corners to get married and make babies quickly.

There are places for many of these discussions and arguments. Yet, we must take care lest we find ourselves falling into the trap of having an obsession with marriage and the nuclear family that borders on idolatry. In doing such, we end up merely repackaging many of the same premises of modernity: finding our ultimate identity in our materiality and personal fulfilment, namely our sexuality.

Please do not misunderstand me: family is absolutely a crucial institution. And I applaud and join with those who speak about the need for strengthening families. I merely want to encourage us to expand our vision, carefully reassess priorities, and catch some things that I wonder if we are leaving out.

Unmarried Christians are often not encouraged enough to be constructive with their singleness, which is more prevalent now that people are tending to marry later. As a result many men and women become ‘angsty,’ desperate, insecure, self-obsessed, and often lazy – and waste their young adult years without a sense of purpose. Churches arguably also don’t know how to deal very well with divorcees, single parents, barren couples, remarried couples, or those who have had sex outside of wedlock. I have seen many times where this has, beautifully, not been the case in practice. But often it seems that we don’t exactly know how to find a place for these people in our churches.

 Walk through a Christian bookstore and find countless books on preserving marriage in our society, parenting, dating, and (my favorite cringe-worthy category), how to have good ‘Christian’ sex. Whatever that means. There are plenty of important topics that need to be talked about within these areas. But the abundance serves as a suggestive contrast in light of the comparatively minimal available selection of books on theology, care for the needy, spiritual discipline, and classic Christian writings. This is not a slight on Christian bookstores. It’s more of a slight on us, the customer they sell to.

 This is admittedly more controversial territory, but I want to suggest the possibility that current conversations about ‘Biblical womanhood’ and ‘manhood’ that focus on ‘recovering’ so-called God-ordained ‘models of masculinity and femininity’ are often part of this same phenomenon. These claims sometimes seem to imply, to me, that our identity should be found in the family roles our sexual differences (supposedly) relegate us to; my identity is found in being a breadwinner, provider, authority in the home, and if I am not at least aspiring for these things, I am not a man. (When these roles are described, by the way, they sound to me more like the 1950s than anything the Bible actually says). This seems like a slippery slope, and runs the risk of putting our identity in Christ in the background to our sexual/gender identity. I wonder if this doesn’t sound a lot like the world’s obsession with sexual identity, just in a different form.

Many early Christians had a different attitude towards sex and marriage. And, sometimes for good reason, we have rejected some of their ideas (such St. Augustine’s teaching that sex itself was ‘the original sin’). But they still have much wisdom for us. Many early Christians put a heavy emphasis on the portions of Scripture that propose sexual asceticism. In their time, cultural pressure to procreate in order to secure wealth, prosper society, and create a legacy, was much greater than it is today. Renouncing (or at least taking a few steps back from) sex, family, and possessions in order to live for the service of others, holiness, and a Kingdom not of this world, became the counter-cultural rallying cry of some early Christians: We don’t need to live for these things anymore.

I think they’re on to something.

By the resurrection of Christ we have the power to live entirely for God and others, and no longer for ourselves. That makes for a counter-cultural life, not 2.5 kids and a white picket fence. Anyone can do that.

No wonder we live with rampant sexual promiscuity, pornography, lust, and are watching our families deteriorate, in the Church as much as in the world. We are creating self-obsessed, short-sighted, individuals not well suited for healthy marriage and healthy sexuality in the first place because we have not taught them to live selflessly, in Christ. Preaching abstinence purely for the sake of marriage is not creating Christians who are much holier than the rest of the world and is, ironically, not making for better marriages.

I think the strongest church will be a community where people at all stations, and in all callings, regardless of their sexual/marital past, know that they are a part of the Kingdom: their identity is in their devotion to Christ, not whether they have two kids and a stable marriage.

Christ gave His body to us. Our body belongs to Him. He is our first love. We are His beloved. Our marriage to Christ should be the narrative upon which our sexual ethics falls.

A life of striving after sexual fulfillment and progeny, even in the bounds of marriage, is not all that God calls us to. There’s so much more.  This path is promised to be a hard one. Assuming the ultimate end of this life is a happy family is wide of the mark, and defeating our ability to actually be a place of prophetic vision, and healing, for the world.

We may enjoy many blessed things along the way, like a family, but He is our only guarantee. And He has made His marriage proposition very clear: be mine only, and know that our path together is the path of the cross. It’s a path right into the pit of hell: for the lifting up of the needy, for the proclamation of new life to the dead.

Some of this material is adapted from postings on the blog I share with my fellow Houghton alumnus, Nathanael Smith (’12) which you can find at www.toomuchlovenathanaelkyle.blogspot.com

S. Kyle Johnson is a Houghton alumnus of 2012, and is currently working on a Master of Divinity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He can still be found at his Houghton email address, spencer.johnson12@houghton.edu

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Twinkies Over the Bread of Life

Too often, what the church communicates to the world is a weak faith. Within our contemporary Christian culture, I see a belief in a weak gospel. This lack of confidence demonstrates itself in the insecurity with which we attempt to make our faith relevant to the world. We dress it in popular culture, hoping that the candy coating will allure people into swallowing the antidote of the gospel.

Courtesy of dealbreaker.com
Courtesy of dealbreaker.com

Consider youth groups, conferences, Sunday school curricula—what are the attractions? The Word of God? The power of the cross? Or is it games, prizes, and music? None of these things is inherently problematic, but I think it worthwhile to ask whether, underneath the fluff, we have lost the substance. And perhaps more disconcerting: do our endeavors to gift-wrap the gospel reveal a doubt in the value of the gift itself? As soon as the church enters the business of trying to sell the gospel, the inherent value of the good news is obscured behind the flashy veneer of popular culture. If it is powerful, then why do we feel the need to dress it in Batman’s utility belt? If it is beautiful, then why do we doll it up? If it is relevant, then why do we try to fabricate relevance through pop culture references?

If we continue to use thin threads to tie Christ’s message to our world, the sad result will be a disregard for the all-sufficient bride of Christ. When we neglect the riches of our inheritance in Christ, all we have left to give are trinkets. What do we communicate when the primary selling point of our Christian community is mere accommodation of secular culture? We communicate that we have nothing more. We suggest that the bread of life leaves us craving Twinkies. Why should that attract anyone? The world doesn’t need the rhetoric of the day wrapped in WWJD paraphernalia. It needs Christ.

We face a world aching with injustice. What hope do we bring to citizens of war-torn countries suffering from PTSD? Do we believe that Christ might have something to say to them? Do we have enough confidence in Christ’s message of forgiveness to see its role in empowering ethnic and racial reconciliation?

Why do we rely more heavily on human strategies than on the strength of the gospel itself? The effort to meet spiritual needs is considered invasive and ethnocentric – an imposition of our religious preferences; meanwhile, responses to physical and emotional needs are applauded. Why, if the gospel is relevant, powerful, and life-giving, do we hesitate to share it?

What we, as the church, believe about the gospel, we profess is critical. It determines what we communicate to the world about this gospel and, in turn, how the world perceives our biblical truth-claims. So what is the gospel? Is it relevant?  Is it hope-inspiring?  Is it powerful?  Is it a message worth sharing?

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To Infinity and Beyond; Religious Plurality and Dialogue

We live in a religiously pluralistic society. We see it in manifested in our own faith tradition with tens of thousands of Christian denominations, and also outside in the realm of world religions, spanning Hinduism and Buddhism in the East, to Islam, Judaism, and beyond. Even in the evangelical Christian milieu of Houghton there is still a reasonably large spectrum of beliefs and experience. For Houghton, as a Christian institution, does this plurality merely represent our extensive mission field? Or does it perhaps provide us with the opportunity to understand our faith—as individuals and a community—more deeply?

monstersPractically speaking, it is necessary that we come to terms with our religious differences, both across the spectrum of Christianity (which we experience on campus) and across the spectrum of religions we see as “others”. Though our respective traditions may be directly opposing one another, faith remains essentially a human trait, something solid to provide a basis for successful interfaith dialogue. But how are we to go about this dialogue?

Last fall in my Judaism class, I read an article by the rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, (known popularly as “The Rav”) which I found to provide solid guidelines for interfaith dialogue. He stipulates that a confrontation (dialogue) between two faith communities is only possible if it is accompanied by a “clear assurance that both parties will enjoy equal rights and full religious freedom.” Additionally, both parties must have an assurance that they will be upheld in high respect, and not dragged through the mud, so to speak, when difficult issues or severe disagreements arise. In other words, if we neglect to provide a safe environment for these discussions, it is inevitable that neither party will come away with anything constructive, rather both sides will probably emerge somewhat insulted or discouraged.

Granted for the majority of us on campus it will be far easier to approach different denominations rather than entirely different religions; engaging a Catholic is quite different than engaging a Hindu, whose vocabulary, beliefs, and traditions are completely foreign for most of us. That being said, it is vitally important that we as a Christian institution strive to engage these very “other” communities. If we continue to avoid interacting with these other faiths, we risk allowing “monsters to grow in the silence,” as Dr. Case said, one of our world religions professors. I would define these “monsters” as our tendency to demonize or vilify any religion that opposes Christianity. This mindset only serves to further the disparity between our respective faith traditions, burning bridges rather than building them.

Thus these conversations should not be taken as opportunities to merely target non-Christians for conversion (or even to convert those outside the perimeters of our preferred denomination). In other words, our mission should not be to proselytize, but to establish relationships. These dialogues and relationships would help to destroy our unwarranted prejudices and misconceptions about other faiths, and aid us in being effective in a world that preaches tolerance. Constructive interfaith dialogue should force both sides to be open minded without requiring either side to sacrifice their beliefs to the other, helping foster conversations and relationships as opposed to mission fields.

This being said, we do have a “missionary mandate” as a Christian institution and church, and when all is said and done, even in these honest dialogues there remains an element of persuasion on each side. While conversion should not be our only aim, it is legitimate, but perhaps it is best pursued in the context of these relationships we establish through dialogue. After all, is our goal merely to increase numbers for the church or is it to welcome new members into the body of Christ? It’s at least my experience that the most successful evangelism is done within the context of real relationships, and when it comes to people of other faiths, we cannot hope for true relationships unless we are willing to engage in open dialogue.

Houghton appears to be heading toward becoming a more welcoming campus when it comes to interfaith matters. Dean Michael Jordan has said that the administration is on-board with increasing the diversity of speakers both in and outside of chapel. He mentioned that the Franciscan friars will be back, along with a couple speakers representing the Catholic and Presbyterian churches in the coming spring semester. This is a step in the right direction, providing the campus an opportunity to learn from and engage faiths that may be foreign to our own. Jordan also said that he is open to, and hopes to welcome, speakers outside of the Christian tradition on campus for panel events and discussions in later semesters. Presented with these opportunities, we have the potential to become a community of believers who are open and willing to engage in dialogue with the religious diversity in our own community and outside it.

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The Passion of Miley Cyrus

Miley

I am very sure that you are tired of hearing people talk about Miley Cyrus.  In the aftermath of the VMAs (the MTV Video Music Awards, a live performance in which Miley twerked on Robin Thicke (for the definition of twerking, please resort to your local Google machine (or not)), there was an outpouring of public response, both Christian and non-Christian.  The Christian responses were comprised mainly of tender claims of tears on Miley’s behalf, praying that she find her true self and cast off her sinful ways.  Her “true self,” they claim, can only be found in her eventual salvation. Blogger Rihanna Teixeira penned “A Letter to Miley Cyrus” that went viral soon after the VMAs.  Teixeira felt “sad” for Miley, expressing concern for her continuing rebellion and encouraging her, “I know that there is something deeper in that little heart of yours and that’s what the world wants to see.”  The prevailing sentiment in Christian reactions has been the poor Miley clearly has no idea what she is doing, she is not being true to herself, and some kind of dark outside force is pressuring her to do the things that she is doing.

But, according to Miley, she has never been more herself than she is now.  In interviews surrounding the release of her upcoming album, Miley has stated numerous times that she finally feels able to express herself artistically.  She told Billboard Magazine, “I want to start as a new artist… I actually found out more about who I am by making this music.”  Like it or not, Miley is not being anything but herself.  It is surprisingly hard news to conceptualize for many.  Miley used to be so innocent and no one can believe that she really turned out this way.  Christians in particular want to believe that if she came to follow Jesus, she would become a different person.

When Saul became Paul, he was in the midst of a Christian-slaying rampage.  He was angry, passionate, and stubborn.  Christians everywhere had heard of his rage and spoke the name Saul with fear.  He was a dangerous person and I am sure they all wished that his craze would cease.  He was quite literally on the warpath when he was stopped in his tracks and spoken to by Jesus, and came to follow Christ.  Thus he became the Paul that we know: prolific, articulate, confident, and, yes, angry, passionate, and stubborn.  Paul, in essence, did not change.  He stopped killing Christians.  But he himself did not change.

Miley Cyrus does not need to be saved.  That is, no more than anyone else.  Her actions may be grandiose, but her motives are no more so than any other average human being.  Saul did not need to be saved any more than anyone else either.  Saul was and Miley is on the same level of metaphysical priority as every other soul.  And I think it is safe to say that if Miley were to start following Jesus tomorrow, she would not change.  She would stop twerking, and posing nude, and singing about drugs, but she herself would not change.  Her personality would remain very much the same.

We were created with unique personalities.  The same characteristics that made Saul a great persecutor also made Paul a great evangelizer.  He believed in himself.  He had strong convictions.  He was convincing and powerful and a hard worker.  Those character traits were an intrinsic part of his self and his personality, and after he began following Jesus, those same traits that caused him to voraciously hunt Christians then caused him to be one of the greatest Christians in history, and the writer of a hefty chunk of the texts on which we base our faith.

Miley’s empire spreads far and wide.  Starting with Hannah Montana and continuing on through Party in the USA, her haircut, twerking, the VMAs, and Wrecking Ball, she has been one of the most talked-about celebrities in history.  Her personality is a large part of what has made that possible.  She is a workaholic; she told Sunday People, “I work so much, I’m always on the road so I eat healthily. I have to give my body what it needs to keep going.”  She’s passionate about what she does.  “I have just put this music first,” she told Billboard Magazine, and to MTV News, “I have had to fight for what I want on this record.”  Hard working, passionate, ambitious, prolific—Miley’s personality is something to be valued and not overlooked.   It is thoughtless to assume that everything Miley has strived for and thrown her energy into is but a façade and some kind of leftover scrap of teenage rebellion.  Yes, her actions are irresponsible and often in poor taste.  Saul’s actions could have been described as irresponsible (if slaughtering human beings can be described so lightly), but no one would ever doubt that he was doing them intentionally and of his own volition.

It is a fine distinction between thinking of being saved as a transformation and thinking of it as a repurposing, but it is an important distinction.  Talking about coming to Christ as being completely changed devalues the strengths and passions that we were born with and probably sounds, to those who are hearing the message of salvation for the first time, as if we must give up being ourselves in order to know Christ.  Salvation is not an erasure of the self.  Salvation is an acknowledgement of self-worth, and a strengthening of the natural personalities and gifts that God blessed us with in a way that brings glory to God.

 

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Statement of Purpose

Two main criticisms are usually leveled at the Star: number one, that we are too pro-Houghton and, number two, that we are too anti-Houghton.

The people who normally complain the first seem to view the Star as a branch of Houghton’s public relations department – as if the Star provides a ringing endorsement of the changes, policies, and events that go on at Houghton within the stories that it covers. The point of view of these people is that the Star often paints too rosy a view of the institution while neglecting the very obvious problems that it faces. Meanwhile, the second group often view us similarly to saboteurs – those who will spitefully publish negative pieces about the college either to relieve personal frustration, to start drama, or else to hinder the positive growth of the institution.

It should not be too surprising that both of these criticisms are very much misplaced and often have much more to do with the self-identification of the reader (in either the group that negatively identifies with Houghton or the group that positively identifies with Houghton) than they have to do with the content of the Star itself. When one positively associates with the institution, one is prone to feel that any story that portrays the college in a negative light is an outright condemnation or an attempt to sabotage the college by the newspaper staff. When one negatively associates with the

institution, one will look at multiple positive articles as an indicator that the newspaper is tightly tied to the institution.

With this in mind, let me take this moment to refresh readers on what the Star actually is and what it intends to be.

Our mission statement, printed in every copy of the newspaper, “is to preserve and promote the values of dialogue, transparency, and integrity that have characterized Houghton College since its inception. This will be done by serving as a medium for the expression of student thought and as a quality publication of significant campus news, Houghton area news, and events.”

As outlined in our mission statement, our job as the student news organization on this campus is not

to promote the college. Neither is it denigrate it. Instead, our job is to make sure that the stories we publish are fact-based, accurate, and relevant in coverage of events and news of the college. We have no aims in a larger agenda, either positive or negative, other than to serve as a professional medium for dialogue and the exchange of factual information. Above all, we aim to serve.

I would like to extend invitations to all readers to get involved with the newspaper this year. There are many avenues to do this. If you are a student, the first suggestion would be to become a writer for the Star. If that seems like it would be a good fit for you, please send us an email indicating your

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interest at editor@houghtonstar.com. We would also encourage students to help with editing

articles on Tuesday evenings in our office in the campus center basement. This latter opportunity is the easiest way to get involved with the Star and, along with writing articles, is an excellent opportunity to improve editing and writing skills.

The last avenue that is open to the public as a whole (not just students) is writing letters to the editor, and we would strongly encourage you to do so either to help provide insightful information about a given subject or else to correct any error that we make here at the newspaper. Letters to the editor should be 250 words or less and you can send them to the email listed above.

Houghton is undergoing a turbulent season. We at the Star hope to serve the campus well. Here’s to the new year!

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Different Schools for Different Fools

Quote templateCollege has become a rite of passage in our society.  The Common Core Learning Standards, supported by the U.S. Department of Education and adopted by 45 states, places a strong emphasis on college readiness.  Middle school and high school teachers and career counselors feel obligated to convince young adults to attend postsecondary institutions by highlighting our crumbling economy. “No one gets a job these days without a college degree.”  We have all been forced to watch power points of the statistics that showcase the benefits of the academy.  Higher percentages of people with some sort of college degree get jobs.  The more advanced your degree, the higher your salary.  I would not be surprised by any recent graduate who felt slightly entitled to the jobs and salaries promised to them by these statistics.  (However, the fact that these statistics show up when I am considering paying more money to further my education makes me wonder about how the numbers are interpreted.)  College is becoming more and more necessary to an individual’s place in society.

Some blatantly suggest that the academy is the only option and that a postsecondary liberal arts education is the very best of that option.  I honestly have been told that choosing Houghton College was the best thing I could do for myself and for the world.  Can anyone truly come to know who they are and how they relate to the world without the reflective attitudes fostered at such an institution?  Others wonder whether the academy is worth the time and money that so many people commit to it.  Does academia really convince people to look and act outside of scholarly work and into real life and practice?  Or do most scholars eventually turn back to the books to solve the problems in which they have little to no actual experience?  Those who ask these questions consider the academy self-indulgent and irrelevant.

Some days, I appreciate my education here more than others and might be inclined to agree with the most committed scholars of the academy.  Other days, I cannot remember why I have submitted myself to the possibly meaningless endeavors of postsecondary studies.  Most days, I do not feel strongly in either direction.  Why question it at all at this point in my education?

Personally, academia has helped me to discover the kind of person I want to be.  It has been partly through my post-secondary studies that I have come to understand more fully what humanity, faith, and society are, and what they mean to me. This, I believe, affirms the merits of the academy.  However, I would never suggest that someone like my sister, who discovers every day through dance what it means to be human and relate to others, join the same academy I enjoy.  Or that my friend, who uses his natural mathematics abilities to create stage sets and build houses, should use his hands instead to write a scholarly article.  Perhaps there are majors and programs at post-secondary institutions that simply give people the degree they need to follow the work at which they will truly excel, the action that brings them life.  In such cases, colleges and universities become small stepping-stones rather than a way of scholarly life.  To some people, maybe more even than will admit it to themselves, academia simply fails to give life meaning the way our culture claims it will.

It is not my intent to depreciate the benefits or significance of the academy.  After all, I have continued my studies here at Houghton and have enjoyed much of it.  It is simply to challenge the pedestal upon which the academy rests in our society.  Are postsecondary studies intrinsically and universally good?  I think not.  The academy is not inherently good or evil; I have found few things in this world that are.  The goodness, usefulness, and purpose of anything will most often depend upon the personality and style of the one that chooses to invest in it.

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Dichotomy in Discourse

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Few things are as important to Christians as language.  Our faith and our characters are revealed in and defined by our choice of language.  We judge based on the use of foul language.  We approve

based on the use of “Christian” language littered with references to how blessed we are and what is “on our hearts.”  Christian language norms inform the way we pray; do we start with Father-God

or Dear Jesus?  Do we end with ‘in Jesus’ name’ or ‘all God’s children said’?  Words are important to us.  One word can either offend or define us.  To be a Christian is to use a certain set of phrases and terms, because what we say to one another is influenced by a belief system in common with other Christians and different from non-Christians.  Our entire religion is based on the text of a book.  Pastors and speakers are constantly analyzing and re-analyzing paragraphs, sentences, words.  If something is unclear, we look to the original Greek or Hebrew, and suddenly we understand; tiny reinterpretations make all the difference.  Language matters.

Equality also matters.  From the moment Jesus said “What you did for the least of these,” Christians have been rooting for the underdog.  We feed the hungry.  We house the homeless.  We smuggle Bibles into places where Bibles are banned.  Wesleyans in particular have been known to work towards equality on multiple levels, by opposing slavery and ordaining women.  In these areas as well, Christians use certain language.  When we go into missions it is because God called us to do so.  When we encounter a situation we cannot control, we leave it in God’s hands.  We care about the well-being of all, because all are God’s children.

There is nothing wrong with this way of speaking.  Our belief system is different from others, so we talk differently than others.  No matter if some of these phrases have become overused or spoken only out of habit, when they were first said, they were said because they were believed.  However, Christians are not the only group of people who care about equality and justice.  Obviously; just as much activism is carried out by secular organizations as is by Christian organizations.  We’re nothing special, really.  We are all working towards the same end.  But there remains a disconnect between being a Christian who values equality, and being a secular person who values equality.  This is due in large part to language.  We both fight for justice, but we come from two completely different places, and therefore sometimes support opposing sides.  For example, when the world says “It’s my body,” the Christian hears “I don’t care how my actions impact the lives of my child and those around me,” and when the Christian says “All are created in the image of God,” the world hears “God is a narcissist who doesn’t care about the long-term well-being of His children.”  We speak different languages.

Christian language is an important part of our life and faith.  It is also important to connect with others who share our same values and goals.  With more people working together towards improving the world, more can be accomplished.  Perhaps we need to address where our words are helpful to our faith, and where they only add confusion to those we might hope to reach.

 

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Goodbye, International Students

Unbeknownst to most of us, the Student Financial Services Office (SFSO) and the Office of Admission have decided to slash financial aid for incoming international students. This decision is appalling, and deserves reconsideration.

            “We are giving more financial aid to international students than to our own,” one administrator crassly put it. Last time I checked, “our own” is the body of Christian believers, not the citizens of a given country. (Not even the US Army War College or West Point is that parochial.)

Inti Martinez-Aleman '07
Inti Martinez-Aleman ’07

This is a matter of equity and justice. Let’s look at a real example, a Honduran prospective student. What used to be a $15-20,000 financial aid package is now meagerly $8,000. That means this Honduran would have to shell out at least $28,000 every year—upfront cash!—which is enough to make a 50% down payment for a comfy house; in a four-year’s worth, one can get a decent 30-year retirement.

US citizens can get federal aid for their education, yet that concept is limited or nonexistent in countries like Honduras. Consider this country’s situation: the exchange rate is 20 Lempiras to 1 US dollar; the minimum wage is $2 per hour; you can buy a small home with $36,000—the Houghton annual price tag.

If we want Houghton to increase enrollment and diversity, cutting aid to foreigners is not the brightest idea. Currently, Houghton students are 96 percent US/Canadian and 94 percent White. This is virtually off the charts amongst American colleges and universities. With the misguided (at best) or jingoistic (at worst) “our own” parlance, these percentages might reach 100. Hooray.

What would our Founder think of this? Some suggest he’d send the Administration and Board of Trustees packing. Frieda Gillette and Kay Lindley put it differently in And You Shall Remember: the Houghton Charter expressed the goal of establishing and maintaining “…a seminary for the purpose of conferring a thorough education without regard to sex or nationality.” (emphasis added)

The Administration’s focus now is to enroll fifteen foreign students who are able to pay at least 80 percent of college tuition and fees; this is labeled as “full paying.” The goal is admirable and achievable, for which I have personally volunteered to try to get more Hondurans of this caliber for Houghton. The reality, however, is that most Christians from the Global South are not affluent.

Higher education institutions that take diversity and inclusion seriously have various endowed scholarships for international students, who collectively get hundreds of thousands of dollars to study in the US, paying close to nothing out of pocket. With the same vehemence and extent Houghton will raise millions for the Kerr-Pegula Athletic Complex and renovating the Paine Science Building, it can also raise money to fund international student education. But it doesn’t.

Thom Kettelkamp and I were briefed on this matter by SFSO and Admission officials. They believe this policy will be temporary; once enrollment increases, it will be gone. Permanent or temporary, this policy runs diametrically opposite to our Mission, Philosophy, Charter, history and every other good thing Houghton is known for.

Say Houghton decided to slash financial aid for non-Wesleyan students, because they are not “our own,” they don’t pay enough, and there’s a limited budget. Wouldn’t we all be irate? Wouldn’t enrollment decrease dramatically? Of course, even if the cuts were temporary. For some reason, however, a similar red flag wasn’t raised when this anti-foreign decision was made.

For me, “our own” are Christian believers, regardless of nationality, denomination, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, bodily ability, socioeconomic class, etc. As a Christian college, we attract students of all denominations, but the fastest growing Christian population in the US or in the rest of the world is not middle-class, rural, Evangelical America. To increase enrollment from domestic and international Christian circles, which are the most numerically promising sources of students, Houghton needs to cater to them. If we are going to pretend to care about diversity and inclusion, let’s do the job right. And cutting aid to foreigners won’t help.

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What’s Orthodox to Someone is Heresy to Another

As I come to the end of my undergraduate career at a private faith-based liberal arts college, I think it is appropriate that I reflect on my journey.

I am not sure what sort of Christian I am. I only hope I’m not a heretic. Where amongst the thirty thousand denominations do I fall? I agree with the declaration of the Nicene Creed, so I must be ok.

Courtesy of fotogalerias.universia.c
Courtesy of fotogalerias.universia.c

Throughout my life, I have been dragged through a slew of different denominations. My parents, coming from Gideon and Baptist backgrounds, joined the inter-denominational mission organization Wycliffe Bible Translators. The first four years of my life were spent in a non-denominational Congolese Church. This was quite the Charismatic experience, as I’m sure you can imagine. I recall a story of a woman, supposedly practicing sorcery and possessed by a demon, who barged into the Church hollering in a man’s voice. They say it took seven men to drag her out and beat the demon out of her.

After this, we moved to France, where I was put in a private Catholic school for the following 11 years. I attended Catechism. I was taught that the Saints would intercede for me. I went to confession. I partook in the Holy Communion.

Also in France I attended an Assemblies of God church with my family. Within the first few months I could mimic word for word the “bidi-bidi” sounds that they claimed were Tongues and could also give the interpretations that would always follow.

Around this time, my parents became intrigued by what was happening in Toronto. John Arnott prayed his famous prayer “come Holy Spirit, come;” And thus began the infamous Toronto Blessing. After this, my family joined the Vineyard movement, a neo-charismatic movement stemming out of the Calvary Chapel.

After I moved back to the States, some close friends of the family invited me to attend the International House of Prayer in Kansas City. This is a charismatic non-denominational mission organization that emphasizes post-tribulational premillenialism. Led by a former Kansas City Prophet, Mike Bickle, the movement focuses on the end times.

I am no theologian; however, I’d hazard a guess that I have come across quite a few views that stray in some ways from orthodox Christianity, yet in each of these everyone maintains that their views are most in line with that of the early Church. I find myself distraught. I can’t help but to wonder what heretical views I uphold. Are gays Christian? When does human life begin? Is paedobaptism wrong? Is credobaptism necessary? Do demons exist? Are revivals psychological? Does God carry on personal relationships with everyone? Does God have a plan for my life?

Spiritual people always try to point to scripture. They tell us to base our beliefs on the word of God. Unfortunately, there are verses for and against each one of these questions. I don’t have any answers. I don’t know whether demons exist. I don’t know whether I should be re-baptized, or what happens when I take communion. I don’t know why God has been silent.  I find comfort in Thomas’s doubt. But I recognize that for some people, these questions, when unanswered, put Biblical faith at risk.

Rather than continue preaching these ambiguities—that is, all the doctrines that cause division amongst Christians—for which two thousand years have taught us that there are no conceivable resolutions, let us, as Wolterstorff writes, “endure holding on to God… join with God in keeping alive the protest against early death and unredemptive suffering… own our own suffering… and join with the divine battle against all that goes awry with reference to God’s intent.”

At the last supper, Jesus commanded his disciples to love one another. This was nothing new. He had instructed his followers to do this time and time again. Yet a few hours before his death, he tells his followers that they will be recognized for how they treat others.

Ultimately I am no longer afraid of being a heretic because, as one wise blogger once wrote, “what is orthodox to someone is going to be heresy to another.”

Throughout my time at Houghton I have heard, on at least three different occasions, individuals make reference to being Catholic and “converting” to Christianity. This makes me cringe. Was it their Catholicism that made them unchristian? What if I stated that I used to be Evangelical but then I became a Christian? I used to be Charismatic, but then I got saved. The fact is that Catholics are heretics, and so are the Eastern Orthodox, Baptists, Wesleyans, Mennonites, and the 30 thousand other denominations. We are all heretics to someone else. None of us hold the keys to the mystery of the universe. But we can choose how we are going to treat our fellow heretics: with Love.

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Welfare Recipients, American Stereotyping, and the Inactive, Loud Church

Courtesy of www.eirigi.org
Courtesy of www.eirigi.org

Are you living off of welfare? The answer is not as obvious as you might think. Presently, Houghton College and the federal government are two of the greatest welfare distributors in Houghton, N.Y. Welfare according to our friends at Webster’s Dictionary is “aid to people in need: financial aid and other benefits for people who are unemployed, below a specific income level, or otherwise requiring assistance, especially when provided by a government agency or program.” We in Houghton are not like ‘those people’ who are unemployed. We have jobs. Well, we have jobs subsidized through the federally mandated work-study program which is not a natural byproduct of our free-enterprise capitalist society. My income is subsidized every time I work and if you work somewhere other than Subway or China Star then you receive a welfare benefit through the federal work study program too.

        But perhaps you don’t work on campus but instead you receive a weekly or monthly stipend from your parents. I will not argue that you are lazy because you do not work. This benefit is not earned; rather it is inherited because you fit into a special class of people: “mom’s and dad’s child.” Your mother and/or father are very gracious with the welfare they impart on you. Few people would say that it is wrong for parents to impart benefits to their children simply because their children are their children. What about those of us who receive federal grants or federally-backed loans to cover the cost of tuition at Houghton? Aren’t these forms of aid welfare also? Perhaps you are beginning to realize that many if not most of us are here because we depend on the goodness of another person, a government, or an institution. When you start that small business and you receive your ‘subsidy’ that too is welfare. A select group or person receiving a benefit that only that group or person is ‘entitled’ to is a basic qualification for all welfare recipients. Houghton college students are largely living on welfare.

        Unfortunately here at Houghton College when we visualize a stereotypical welfare recipient we see a lazy, black, unmarried mother of 8 not a white college student. Even so we make an exemption because to us the federal government can ‘subsidize’ wealthy fortune 500 businesses, oil companies, coal companies, banks, and colleges but if it gives any money to a woman raising three children on her own then it acts unethically. Would we continue to advocate the destruction of the modern American welfare state even if it meant that people would die? I am not being melodramatic. For some children the only meal they receive each day is given to them through the federally mandated free or reduced lunch program. The food stamp program was established to provide for children who had lost their fathers in warfare. The federal government asserted that children face many disadvantages when growing up without a father. Regardless of the choice their mother made or whether a child’s father left or died should a child suffer for the ‘sins’ of his or her mother or father? Furthermore, it is historical fact that the institution of marriage was forbidden for black slaves in the South. Should we wonder why it is an uncommon institution in the poor inner city communities which grew when southern agricultural industrialization forced former slave-sharecroppers north?

        Don’t get me wrong, the modern American welfare state is a flawed system which does perpetuate some levels of dependency. However, as my grandmother always says, “don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.” I would wager that you might be in favor of dismantling the entire welfare state. Perhaps you believe that private institutions would take the place of the welfare state and do a better job as well; our nation’s history shows that just isn’t the case. The failure of Elizabethan Poor Laws in the late 18 and early 19th centuries encouraged the federal government and founding generation to leave the issue of provision for the poor to the state and local communities. For over 150 years local communities handled the issue as best as they could. Then the 1930s came and we realized that our economy is based on more than just a few isolated communities.

If tomorrow the Christian church stepped up to the plate and knocked the issue of poverty out of the park then I would say “Amen!” If tomorrow lines of suburban families stood near abortion clinics and offered to women headed inside to raise the unborn children of those considering aborting them I would say “Amen!” However, presently many communities have more rhetoric than they action. A lukewarm church gets spit out every time. What is your temperature today?