Posted on 06/04/2007 9:05:23 AM PDT by paltz
The college head thinks 95% of us are going to burn in hell. His new deputy believes it’s wrong for women to teach men. Insiders are complaining about an “openly homophobic” atmosphere. A third of the academic staff have resigned. Others are unwilling to speak openly because they fear disciplinary action. Is this perhaps the notorious Bob Jones University in South Carolina, where rock music and cellphones are banned, where men must have short hair and where women can’t wear trousers to class? No. Welcome to the University of Oxford, United Kingdom.
Strictly speaking Wycliffe Hall is a permanent private hall of the University of Oxford, rather than a full college. But Wycliffe has control over its admissions policy and those who graduate do so with a full Oxford University degree. Which is why the thought that Wycliffe has been taken over by Christian fundamentalists is ruffling senior common room feathers all over the university. For having a cell of religious extremists succeed in claiming one of its precious institutions does little to enhance Oxford’s reputation.
But can disgruntled dons do much about it? After all, Oxford was founded as a Christian institution and, for good or ill, Christianity is built into its DNA. Even forgetting this heritage for a moment, there’s a freedom of academic speech aspect to all of this. Surely Richard Turnbull, the principal of Wycliffe, and his chums must be allowed to say what they like, however foolish or unpleasant.
What sticks in the throat, however, is that this new wave of reactionary evangelicalism is using the name of the university despite the fact that it has no love in its heart for the values of learning. Wycliffe is fast becoming a school for church planting that does little more than peddle the techniques of Christian salesmanship. As such, it is drawing upon a longstanding tradition of evangelical anti-intellectualism that originates in the great American revival of the 18th century.
The theologian Mark A Noll, in his book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, argues that the low esteem in which many evangelicals hold academic inquiry is a function of fear, a lack of confidence that faith can sur-vive rational scrutiny. And so they build walls around their minds and colleges, desperate to keep at bay the dangerous lessons of the Enlightenment. In such a context, theology and doctrine are replaced by training: leadership skills and strategies for church marketing. Places such as Wycliffe once had internationally renowned scholars -- now they cling on to the university for its kudos. It’s all about image.
Which is why it’s all very timely that Oxford is conducting a high-level review of the status of its permanent private halls. As a minimum requirement, it must ensure that places like Wycliffe are made fully compliant with the equal opportunities policy of Oxford University. Would Wycliffe Hall really be a safe place for a gay person to study? I suspect not. It is why Oxford University must be careful with its imprimatur.
Of course, what should really happen is that the bishops of the Church of England stop using colleges like this to train its priests. Places such as Wycliffe are turning Anglicanism into a cult. But it’s a symptom of how bad things are in the Church of England, and how frightened its bishops have become of the financial muscle of conservative evangelicals, that they won’t find the gumption to cut Wycliffe adrift.
But clearly they should. For Anglicanism is fast becoming the nasty party at prayer, with traditionally inclusive theology being submerged by a bargain-basement prejudice that damns to hell all those who disagree. This isn’t faith, it’s fanaticism. And the University of Oxford should not be supporting its work. -- © Guardian News & Media Ltd 2007
Giles Fraser is the vicar of Putney, west London, and a lecturer in philosophy at Oxford University
Zambia. Good one.
.za is South Africa.
Oh. Zouth Africa.
This isn’t faith, it’s fanaticism.In a debate awhile ago, someone asked me to define the difference between the two. Pretty much off the cuff, I said that faith crosses the line to fanaticism when attempts to enforce the rules or apparent practice of one's faith upon others who believe differently. (this applies to militant atheists as well).
This is a private school, indeed only one part of a private school, so it doesn't quite meet the definition.
-Eric
Odd that most of the faculty at Oxford support the Arab “insurgents” with no concern about religious fanaticism, but are shocked at the thought of Evangelicals running a small outfit under the Oxford name.
How many heads are these fanatics cutting off? How many women have they stoned? How many atheist professors have they murdered?
“Would Wycliffe Hall really be a safe place for a gay person to study? I suspect not.”
Perhaps gay persons should choose to attend one of the other Oxford colleges, then. But “uncongenial” would be a more accurate word than “safe.” Do they really expect the Wycliffe authorities would stone a gay person? No, only their friends the imams would do that.
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So one of the schools at Oxford is actually Christian! I seem to remember that a Bible believing Christian that headed up one of the Cambridge schools was Sir Isaac Newton . . . a famous anti-intellectual as well (I’m being tongue in cheek). Good for Oxford! The mythology that Christians are not intellectual is ridiculous, it was Christians that founded Oxford, Cambridge, almost all of the Ivy League, and I will venture to predict that Christians will be the ones to save these great Universities from the grip of the secular relativist swamp that they’ve sunk into.
The knee jerk reaction of the Gaydian against Bible believing Christians is’nt all that surprising.
What is surprising is that some Anglicans are apparently dedicated to following the teachings of the Bible, without trying to overlay the twisted contortions of post-modernist “inclusive” Christianity onto clearly spelled out Biblical requirements and prohibitions.
I did’nt know there were Bible believing Anglicans out there anymore.
He’s vicar?
One would think that before publishing a hatchet-job like this one someone would actually quote the folks at Wycliffe Hall.
Oh, wait, it’s a hatchet-job against Christians, and not just Christians, FUNDAMENTALIST Christians. No rules need apply.
Yez, that’z it.
Anglican ping
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So free speech is OK, just as long as one does not sully the name of such august company by association...
Actually, there are probably over 50 million of us worldwide. The relativistic populations of the Church of England, The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada are a small minority of worldwide Anglicanism
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams.
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Humor: The Anglican Blue
Speak the truth in love. Eph 4:15
What does "Bible believing" mean, exactly?
Some one that actually believes the book as written and properly translated — and is not ashamed of there faith or willing to compromise on it.
A denomination that that would allow active fudge-packers to put on vestments and from a pulpit preach lies from the pit of hell that God accepts degenerate behavior would not qualify as “Bible believing”.
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