A Possible Toolkit for Christian Universities

Pedagogy in a Fearless Christian University

This is the third newsletter in which I’m trying to workshop the ideas in chapter three of my current book project. Back in December, I suggested that the historic focus of Christian Universities on Christian Worldview doesn’t work very well. I part this is because students aren’t seeing the world in such a bifurcated way as to need to defend a Christian Worldview. In that newsletter, I argued that

because the Christian Worldview is not integrated into the student’s self-understanding, it’s hard to see what happens after they graduate and leave the supportive surrounds of the Christian University. Once outside (based upon interactions I’ve had with former students) they are no longer thinking in these terms.

In January, I followed that newsletter with an argument that far too many Christian University graduates from prior decades have found themselves struggling with “deconstruction” as they get into their thirties and forties. I suggested that the Christian University should prepare students for that coming struggle so that it wasn’t debilitating when it arrived. I called this “anticipatory deconstruction”. Toward the close of that piece, I wrote the following:

What if, rather than seeing questioning of the Christian Worldview as an institutional challenge that must be controlled, we see it as an inevitable part of the student’s growth? If that were the case, the struggles faced by those in their 30s or 40s or later might be addressed sooner but within the context of a supportive community?

If we instead saw Deconstruction as a natural part of subjective faith development, we could prepare students for the questions that will arise. Not because we fed them predetermined answers, but because we provided them with the requisite intellectual and spiritual tools.

Several people who read this newsletter commented that they were looking forward to seeing what those “intellectual and spiritual tools” might look like. And so, even though these ideas are woefully underdeveloped, here is my suggested toolkit.

I’ll begin with what is familiar territory for Christian Universities: the relationship between faith and learning. It is common to see CCCU institutions make reference to “the integration of faith and learning”. I’ve never been a fan of this phrase. Maybe its my sociological background, but I always see this as suggesting two entirely separate ideas that must somehow be brought together (like the old Reese’s commercials).¹

So we need a better way to think about the connection. Neither of these ideas are great, but my current working options include “faith-infused learning” or “academically informed spiritual development”. I prefer the latter but I’m the first to admit that it’s very clunky. But it will do for now.

Both of my phrases recognize that students will, in the process of their learning and living, run into things that don’t match the epistemological structures of their home church or family. That will naturally cause a form of cognitive dissonance where they are discomforted² by the gaps between what they “knew” and what they are exposed to in readings, lectures, or dinner conversations.

A Fearless Christian University legitimizes these questions and struggles as a natural component of the learning experience. The institution, rather than minimizing the struggles, will create a safe environment where the struggles can be worked through without shame or dismissal.

Students, in my model, would be encouraged to articulate their dissonance as part of finding their way to resolution. As Festinger and his colleagues argued decades ago, the resolution to cognitive dissonance comes from a third, reconciling piece of information that allows the prior dissonance to turn toward harmony. The articulation required is not a one-time resolution that “all it well with the world”. It is more like “here’s what I understand at the moment”.

That articulation isn’t something that is just for students. Instead it should be an institutional characteristic. I’m reminded of the work of James K. A. Smith (and others) arguing that we need liturgies that form our practices around the good.³ Such liturgies would develop as faculty members articulate their own journeys. They would require chapel speakers not to simply preach a nice sermon but interrogate their own struggles over time. Admissions ambassadors wouldn't be happy students we love the community but those who could best explain the ways in which their faith (and learning) had been shaped at the Christian University. Presidents and trustees should be the best at articulating the faith and learning process they have navigated over the course of their career.⁴

For years, Christian Universities have fallen back on the phrase “All Truth is God’s Truth”. I affirm that. I also recognize that scripture tells us that the Holy Spirit will lead us into all Truth. It’s an unsettled process where what we thought was small-t truth might be replaced by big-T truth. That requires faith that God is leading and that the Holy Spirit is speaking. Not just in the still small voice (which is important) but also in the “cloud of witnesses” within the Christian University accompanying the student on her educational journey.

1. I wrote a paper in the 90s arguing that what we really believed in was “the desegregation of faith and learning”.

2. I will point out that the Anti-Woke crazies arguing that students shouldn’t be made to feel bad don’t understand how education works. The cognitive dissonance isn’t forced from outside but develops from inside the student.

3. He also argues that a Worldview focus might train the head but doesn’t do a lot about the heart (or character).

4. Which, of course, would require them to admit when they really don’t know how to address issues of race or LGBTQ accommodation.