Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

University Administrators Refuse to Allow Christians to Speak Their Peace
Townhall.com ^ | April 24, 2011 | Alan Sears

Posted on 04/24/2011 8:39:09 AM PDT by Kaslin

It’s hard to understand what, exactly, public university officials across the country have against the Christians on their campus.

Christian students don’t often lead riots. Those who are serious and sincere about their faith don’t cheat on their exams, traffic in drugs, get drunk and disorderly, indulge in sexual hijinks in the dorm, or otherwise undermine the general campus esprit de corps.

Christian students put a particular premium on learning truth (a time-honored practice in academic realms). They value life and the worth of every individual and have deeper incentives than most of their peers for treating those around them – even those with whom they disagree most fervently – with dignity, compassion, and respect.

Many are driven by the nature of their beliefs to share their faith with others, but most do so in appropriate and respectful ways. And proselytizing is not exactly a rarity on college campuses, where the urge is to make converts runs at least as strong among political theorists, sexual hedonists, and vegans as it does among Christians.

So, what’s not to like? Or, more to the point…what’s to despise, so aggressively?

Something, apparently – for the antipathy is intensifying, as more and more public universities coast to coast are creating and enforcing regulations clearly designed to silence, humiliate, and dispel Christian students. In recent years, the Alliance Defense Fund alone has taken on 70 colleges and universities across the country where administrators have bullied, marginalized, and in many cases, violated the most basic constitutionally protected rights of students who openly profess faith or identify themselves with Christian beliefs.

ADF has won the 61 of those cases decided – a most recent one being against the University of Wisconsin, a perennial base for anti-Christian sentiment and one that’s spurred several lawsuits in the last decade. Just last month, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear UW’s appeal of an appellate court ruling in favor of a student ministry at the university’s Madison campus.

The case, Badger Catholic v. Walsh, stemmed from the refusal of UW officials to allow the ministry the same kinds of student activity fee funding that the university makes available to other registered student groups on campus. Their reason for withholding the money: the Badger Catholics’ events include prayer, worship, and sharing their faith.

The university’s policy marked such a blatant attack on the students’ rights as protected by the First Amendment that a string of courts – culminating in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit – ruled flatly against them. And this is only the latest in a slew of clear-cut, ADF-backed cases dating back to 1995, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of University of Virginia that a school couldn’t provide funding for every campus student publication except the Christian one.

But the universities’ bigotry isn’t limited to mere budgetary considerations.

At Missouri State University, Emily Brooker was threatened with expulsion for declining to violate her Christian principles by completing a class assignment that required her to write a letter to the state legislature endorsing adoption for same-sex couples.

At California’s Yuba College, Ryan Dozier stood just off a campus walkway, holding an evangelical sign and politely offering Gospel tracts to students who asked for them. A security officer charged him with conducting an unauthorized “assembly” (of one). Later, administrators informed him that free speech was only permitted at Yuba on Tuesdays and Thursdays between noon and 1.

The Commissioned II Love club at Savannah State University was banned from campus when officials characterized a student re-enactment of Jesus humbly washing His disciples’ feet as “hazing.”

At Georgia Tech, Ruth Malhotra objected to speech codes that severely curtailed any student conversation, publications, events, or activities administrators deemed “intolerant.” She drew the full fury of those campus officials, who cut off funds for organizations involved in religious activities, banished free speech in all but the most remote areas of campus, and even instituted a program to demonize anyone who considered homosexual behavior immoral. When Ruth’s public stand brought threats of rape and murder, the university offered no protection or support.

Full disclosure: ADF represented the plaintiffs in each of these cases, which all have two more things in common: (1) the schools involved lost their case – expensively – in court. (Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer, how do you suppose they made back the money?) And (2), they are all the tip of the iceberg in an academic Cold War against Christians.

Across America, an estimated 274 public universities currently have speech codes that can be used to shut down points of view that a student, professor, or administrator might find “offensive.” (At Penn State, officials even went so far as to say that “intolerance will not be tolerated.”) And nothing offends the academic Left faster than a Bible, a prayer, or a Christian with a conscience.

Of course, ultimately, it’s not the people of faith that the Left objects to – it’s the faith itself. Their hatred is really aimed at a Truth that galls them to the deep, deep places of their souls…in the place where sins, and the need for a God bigger than themselves, can’t be denied.

They won’t go there. They can’t shut Him up. So they’re bent on removing some of the best students and most thoughtful professors they have. If that means destroying not just good people, but the holiest freedoms endowed by that Creator and ever cherished by mankind – well, surely that’s not too high a price to pay, for delusion?


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS:

1 posted on 04/24/2011 8:39:12 AM PDT by Kaslin
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Where I live, the campus of UWF held a sunrise Easter service. Not every campus is bent on denying the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.


2 posted on 04/24/2011 8:44:01 AM PDT by NWFLConservative (Game On.......Fight Like a Girl!!...............Saracuda in 2012)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
What we need after a new President is an amendment to the Civil Rights Laws. Any entity/person or persons who denies the rights of U.S. Citizens under the U.S. Constitution(specifically the Bill of Rights) can be charged.

Individuals who are government employees( including Public education officials of Schools, Colleges, etc. can be fined and/or imprisoned( in GITMO).

This would also apply to all of the rights(including those defined in the Second and Fourth amendments). That should settle this crap once and for all.

3 posted on 04/24/2011 8:57:19 AM PDT by wmileo
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
There is no ultimate use for a group of people who's credo is pacifism, self sacrifice, and do unto others as you would have them do to you.

An entirely useless bunch of slugs if you are a manipulating activist who needs lethality and promptness when texting for a flash mob to support the government cause de'jour.

4 posted on 04/24/2011 9:05:34 AM PDT by blackdog (The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
The case, Badger Catholic v. Walsh, stemmed from the refusal of UW officials to allow the ministry the same kinds of student activity fee funding that the university makes available to other registered student groups on campus. Their reason for withholding the money: the Badger Catholics’ events include prayer, worship, and sharing their faith.

In regards to religion, the First Amendment mandates adherence to the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause.

The First Amendment does not mandate a shunning of all religious activity. That violates not only the Free Exercise Clause but also violates the Establishment Clause by the establishment of atheism as the officially sanctioned religious position.

What the First Amendment requires is a level playing field.

Are funds given out to the Basket Weaving Club because their student activity is basket weaving?

If so, then funds cannot be denied to the Catholic Club because their student activity is praying.

Are funds given out to the Catholic Club?

If so, then funds cannot be denied to the Jewish Club or the Baptist Club or the Hindu Club or the Buddhist Club or the Jehovah Witness Club or the Atheist Club or the Agnostic Club.

5 posted on 04/24/2011 9:07:29 AM PDT by Polybius
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NWFLConservative

Amen, the Lord Jesus has risen. Praise be to God.


6 posted on 04/24/2011 9:08:47 AM PDT by gakrak ( A man should know his limitations and act accordingly.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
I think the reason for their enmity has to do with the position of Christians in opposition to two of liberalism's central counter-pieties: homosexuality and abortion.

Put simply, many university administrators are either homosexuals or have had abortions. The presence of Christian students intensifies within these individuals unpleasant feelings of self-doubt and even self-loathing that are (in many cases) already present -- due to the functioning of their consciences, which, ironically, come from G-d -- and they blame these discomforts not on themselves but on the Christians.

7 posted on 04/24/2011 9:11:38 AM PDT by Steely Tom (Obama goes on long after the thrill of Obama is gone)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
"Of course, ultimately, it’s not the people of faith that the Left objects to – it’s the faith itself."

Quite simple, really. The presence of faith is like a mirror held up before those who oppose it. They fear and loathe their own shortcomings, as revealed when confronted by the reflected image of the man in the mirror. Ever present, it cannot be denied or set apart anymore than a man can outrun his own shadow.
8 posted on 04/24/2011 9:15:36 AM PDT by PowderMonkey (WILL WORK FOR AMMO)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin
administrators informed him that free speech was only permitted ... Tuesdays and Thursdays between noon and 1.

I guess I will have to get an updated version of the Constitution as I missed that Amendment.

9 posted on 04/24/2011 9:17:43 AM PDT by Michael.SF. (Going to Charlotte for the barbecue is like going to Minneapolis for the gumbo - John Reed)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: wmileo
Absolutely not!

Think of the ramifications of such a law.

I own a private business and catch my employee telling customers not shop at my store but to shop at my competitors store. I fire him and thanks to your amendment to the Civil Rights laws, I get charged for violating his free speech rights.

I own a private business that prepares pork products. I have an employee that just converted to Islam or Judaism and refuses to touch the pork food stuffs. I fire them because they are no longer able to or simply refuse to do the job for which they were hired. I get charged for infringing on their exercise of religion.

I refuse to allow an employee to carry a weapon on my private property. I get charged.

I dock a workers pay without a jury trial. I get charged.

The possibility of abuse is limitless.

10 posted on 04/24/2011 9:18:46 AM PDT by dpa5923 (Small minds talk about people, normal minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Michael.SF.

We all must have missed the “updated” amendment


11 posted on 04/24/2011 9:21:37 AM PDT by Kaslin (Acronym for OBAMA: One Big Ass Mistake America)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: dpa5923
The key work is ‘public’. Private businesses, like yours can do whatever they want. But a publicly funded entity, like a Public School or University can't.
12 posted on 04/24/2011 9:23:18 AM PDT by wmileo
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: PowderMonkey

The Great Equalizer is coming very soon. The valleys will be raised up and the mountains brought low. The Spirit and the bride say “COME.”


13 posted on 04/24/2011 9:41:30 AM PDT by PrepareToLeave (Arrows of the Almighty @ Amazon.com)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

Christianity is a threat to people who want to take over. I think a few areas that are particularly threatening are the following:
1. God is our provider, not the government.
2. We answer to God first, then to the government.
3. Our lives and work are for God, not the government.
4. Our children belong to the Lord, not to the government.
I could go on, but it’s not just Christian ideas that threaten wickedness - it’s this person Jesus. People who commit their lives to Him really change! Cultures can be transformed! No wonder academia, which is becoming little more than a propaganda mill, is trying to silence these people.


14 posted on 04/24/2011 9:53:58 AM PDT by Flying right
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kaslin

“It’s hard to understand what, exactly, public university officials across the country have against the Christians on their campus. ... “


Why?? Most Universities are being run and manned by Communist and/or Marxist Leninist!
There first target is always Christianity!
Why? Because the fundamental precepts of Christianity reveal Communism to be the Satanic fraud that it is!


15 posted on 04/24/2011 11:19:12 AM PDT by J Edgar
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: wmileo
Okay, I misread your post but I would still disagree.

Look at this scenario: As a public employee I have 5 people working under me. One of the 5 is telling the other 4 different ways someone could avoid work and cheat the system. Mind you, he is not telling them to do this, just telling them how it could be done. Under such a new amendment, if he were fired, I could be charged for violating his right to free speech.

Absolutes (usually) make bad law.

16 posted on 04/24/2011 3:05:39 PM PDT by dpa5923 (Small minds talk about people, normal minds talk about events, great minds talk about ideas.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: dpa5923
If he were a public employee, by definition he would be a slacker who is only looking out for his fellow slackers. You would be interfering with his right to promote slacking and therefore be guilty of a hate crime,

Shame on you!!!

17 posted on 04/25/2011 6:13:33 AM PDT by wmileo
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson