GroshLink

The Pitt Christian Faculty Forum recently hosted a lunchtime presentation on The Outrageous Idea of Christian Scholarship by George Marsden, Professor of History at Notre Dame. As you may or may not know, Marsden is one of America's leading historians, who has studied the multiple impacts of religion on American society. His book, The Soul of the American University (1994), traced the transformation of American colleges from religious to secular institutions. The Outrageous Idea of Christian Scholarship (1997) examined interrelationships between religious faith and professional research in the academy. Jonathan Edwards: A Life (2003) has received many awards, including the Bancroft Prize for Distinguished Books in American History and the Merle Curtis Award in intellectual history from the Organization of American Historians. Professor Marsden has also published widely on the history and current state of Christian evangelicalism and fundamentalism in the United States, the topic of his CMU lecture (more in a future post) and of newly revised Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism, 1870-1925

So much for my introduction, onto his presentation. Marsden began by sharing how his interest in Christian higher education arose from his time as a visiting scholar at the former Presbyterian college, UC-Berkley. At the time he was a professor from a currently practicing Presbyterian college of Calvin, he was curious as to why there was such low voltage accompanying American's high profession of religious faith (70% affirm traditional religious doctrine).

If one has embraced the astonishing belief in a Being who can not only create and maintain our universe but also is interested in one as an individual, how can one's life not be completely reshaped? Why do most Americans (even churched) take for granted that higher education should be just the same for everybody? Marsden recommended Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton's Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers , as a resource regarding why kids can’t articulate anything about their religious beliefs and how Americans have come to believe in nothing much more than moralistic therapeutic deism.

He then went onto relate how his The Soul of the American University (1994) chronicles America's cultural adoption of the privatization of religious belief in general and in the area of Higher Education in specific (i.e., should not seriously intersect the public domain/discourse, we have been trained to that it is unprofessional to relate your faith to your learning in any substantial way). In the area of higher education, the public domain was dominated by Christian establishment (i.e., state universities run by clergy). This had resulted in inequity and the dis-establishment of Christianity seems understandable in modern public institutions.

Yet our culture has overcorrected by eliminating all substantial religious discourse in the public domain . . .

Shouldn't religiously informed perspectives have as much place as ideological perspectives, such as, Marxism, neo-conservativism, feminism? Is there something peculiar regarding religious perspectives that make them unacceptable, eg., special revelation.

We may introduce religious beliefs at least in part on revelation, but argue on other grounds, i.e., Mennonite scholar who believes all warfare is wrong shapes her writing on World War I. Discourse shaped by the same publicly assessable constraints as others in her field.

Nicholas Wolterstorff (former Calvin faculty now at Yale) argues that control beliefs are in the background at all times, exerting control other things which one accepts and rejects. Advancing the argument that deeply held beliefs are part of one's social location. This raises the question as to whether that connection should be encouraged or discouraged. At present the culture of academia discourages thinking about the relationship of one’s religious faith and what else one is thinking about, but there is no legitimate reasons to restrict it. Some ways in which one’s religious faith influences one's academic work include:

1. the question of what I think is important enough to study, selection of discipline/subquestions, less impact in technical/mathematical fields
2. what questions do I ask about my discipline, eg., economics and justice for the poor, methodology the same but the questions are different
3. what currently fashionable theories are acceptable/unacceptable with regard to my religious control beliefs
4. how do I evaluate implicitly or explicitly what I'm talking about, eg., moralists in history/sociology, how I narrate my story

Many Christian scholars resist doing the above because they're not well trained in their religious tradition. They have a PhD in their discipline, but a Sunday School knowledge of their religious faith. We must develop resources by which one can educate oneself in the substantial religious traditions that exist . . . faculty reading/discussion groups, summer seminars at places like Calvin College [Note: Marsden has been involved with InterVarsity's Graduate and Faculty Ministry conferencing and our Emerging Scholars Network would also fit his description of a helpful resource].

Marsden left the audience with an important caution: do not claim that one's religious faith will make more difference than it really will, it is one of the things that shapes us . . . academic discipline, family, culture also play roles. Christian scholarship can have a negative effect as it's viewed as imperialistic. We should engage in intentionally faith related scholarship as unintentional faith scholarship is already occurring. We need to raise consciousness and seek to understand/listen to other views with have a helpful demeanor. Therefore, let us be about consciousness raising regarding the legitimacy of a Christian perspective in higher education, he gave the analogy to the gender dimension of scholarship consciousness raising via feminism. If you really do have the belief that there is this God of immense dimensions creating/governing this universe and concerned w/everyday affairs, then it just makes sense that it relates all of life including higher education.

During the question-and-answer time, he dialogued with participants regarding

1. how Americans are unreflective, pragmatic . . . teenagers can't relate anything about anything, McDonaldization of American culture, profit driven, hard to get people to sit down and think, that is the job of those of us in higher education
2. the demands on our time: intellectuals vs. missionaries (note to churches: diversity of gifts in the Body of Christ); specialization takes a high amount of energy but there is a level of broader principles regarding why I'm doing what I'm doing, if offering your vocation in service to God is a priority you’ll begin taking time to do it)
3. Christianity's relationship to pragmatism . . . universities shaped by Protestantism (conservative to liberal Protestantism) which were champions of freedom and democracy . . . anti-authoritarian with the scientific ideal of detached, objective study.

 

Note: I'd just comment that the Presence of God dwells in and through us as His People wherever we go and in whatever we do. As such, Being in Christ and daily offering our vocation to Him is witness/mission, giving demonstration to the Kingdom of God breaking into and illuminating what seems so ordinary but is actually quite extraordinary. This incarnation enables those outside of the Kingdom to see God with flesh on and through which God speaks redemptively. May we continue to draw closer to His Presence by delving into His Word, growing in Wisdom and righteousness, looking at His world through His eyes, walking and acting in prayer, as part of His Body which He drawn together to Be Him on earth. Praise be to His glory!