Saturday, February 4, 2012

What is the point?

Today it is reported that SUNY Buffalo, like Vanderbilt, is demanding that student Christian organizations must not only allow any student to join, regardless of their convictions, but also permit them to run for leadership, and in these groups leaders teach. One wonders if similar requirements apply to groups organized around ideology, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. In any event the report of the Vanderbilt controversy includes something that may particularly interest Packer fans:
...[O]n January 31, the university called a town hall meeting to discuss the issue. Administrators clarified that the policy for student organizations is “all comers”—that is, any student may join and also may run for office. There’s no obligation, they say, for religious organizations to elect nonbelievers to leadership positions, but in the interest of nondiscrimination, no one may be barred from running for office for religious reasons.

It was Jordan Rodgers, the Commodores’ quarterback and an active member of the Fellowship for Christian Athletes (and the younger brother of Green Bay Packers star Aaron Rodgers), who articulated the obvious. “If someone that doesn’t share the faith is teaching [in a leadership role], then what’s the point of even having these organizations?” Rodgers asked at the meeting. “The fact that we are not going to change the fact that you have to affirm your faith in Jesus Christ to be a teacher, to be a leader, to teach new people of any faith that come through our doors...we don’t feel that’s a problem.” ....
The Weekly Standard, February 13, 2012, pp. 2-3.

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