A further look back

I wanted to say a few quick words about our stop in Birmingham because it has had quite a profound impact on me, and I haven’t had the time to write about it yet. Being in a city with so much history where nonviolence blossomed and was successful really meant a lot to me. Perhaps it was my own doing, but I felt something in the air in Birmingham—a spirit of reconciliation, of turmoil, of triumph.

We visited the Civil Rights Institute and the 16th street Baptist Church, where a bombing killed four young girls. Upon arriving at the Civil Rights Institute, we were ushered into a small theater where we watched a movie about the city of Birmingham and the role of Blacks in creating and sustaining the city. The movie ended talking about segregation and a picture was shown of segregated water fountains. Then, the screen rose, and the very same water fountains that were in the picture were present before us. And this was the entrance into the museum. It was a really weird/surreal moment.

Everything in the museum was donated and is a real artifact of the Civil Rights era. The pictures/advertisements of Blacks were particularly disturbing to me. There was one especially disturbing—a handbill from Hot Springs, Arkansas—advertising a Black man giving a white man a bath. His features were exaggerated. His skin was really, really dark. And, he was saying something unintelligent. I teared up at the pictures of the lynchings, and with each new artifact I saw and each new piece of information I read, my lip began to quiver, and my whole being was just genuinely sorrowful.

I kept waiting to come to the Freedom Ride section of the museum. With every step I took, I got more anxious. And I finally made it and my breath was taken away. There was a large piece of the bus that was bombed in Anniston there. It was burnt and damaged. You could actually look inside and see the burnt seats and the smoke-damaged ceiling. I began to think back to the readings about the bombing that I have read. I pictured them—black and white—sitting there. Scared. Unsure. I saw the bus filling up with smoke. I saw them rushing out of the bus in a frenzy. I became overwhelmed, and before I knew it, the tension that had been building found a release. I was bawling. My entire body was convulsing in fits of sadness and disgust. I remember whispering to myself, “How could they?”

How could they do this to someone based on a benign characteristic like skin color? How could they?

I pulled it together after a hug from a friend and finished the museum. I was disappointed to see that the Human Rights section of the museum at the end failed to include LGBTQ issues…

and then I remembered why my presence on the ride was so vital. So necessary.

So that one day, the world will see Queer oppression as just that—an oppression that must be targeted and eradicated, just like all other systematic forms of violence and discrimination.

letter from the president of patrick henry college

sent to parents of students:

To Parents of PHC Students:

Greetings in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me take this opportunity to alert you to an event that will occur at Patrick Henry College on April 12—an event that, as you may have heard, is being thrust upon all of us at the College against our will.

As background, in mid-January I received a letter from the co-director of Soulforce Equality Ride, a traveling band of homosexual activists professing to emulate the civil rights crusades of the 1950s and 1960s. The group’s real mission, however, is much less virtuous. Using sophisticated methods of political theater (i.e. civil rights imagery, symbolism, and language), Soulforce travels the country in buses, hoping to insinuate its activist message and membership into the fabric of Christian campuses. There they attempt to engage students in inappropriate dialogue about sex, sexual orientation and gender. Their aim is nothing less than to confuse and indoctrinate young Christians to the notion that God’s Word supports the “gay” lifestyle, or that it remains morally mute on a subject about which the Bible actually has much to say -- on behaviors it explicitly and indisputably labels sin.

The group has informed me that on April 12, Soulforce intends to include PHC on its cross-country bus tour, adding us to their list of Christian colleges deemed to hold policies and doctrines that refuse to affirm the validity of homosexual practices. Since this is the third year of the Soulforce Equality Ride, there is ample documentation of the tactics used by this group to infiltrate colleges like Notre Dame, Liberty University, Regent University, Oklahoma Baptist University, and many others. Depending on the school’s response (which varies from college to college), the staged protests take many forms, all geared toward an overriding objective of “exposing” intolerant, “bigoted hostility” by these institutions. Their tactics can involve infiltrating the campus, staging protests and waving signs (such as “We support the gay and lesbian students at Liberty University,”) and holding impromptu “worship services,” with activists quoting Scripture and singing Christian songs to portray themselves as “fellow Christians.” Their dialogue with students can include statements like, “Many people don’t fully realize that they are gay,” or “We can help you uncover the deeper truth about yourself,” or, “You may not think there are gay and lesbian students at PHC, but....” If allowed, they would disrupt classes and lunchrooms and chapel services, and, in a growing number of cases, provoke police intervention and arrests.

I have been in communication with the organization about their visit and informed them that, since I do not believe that appropriate dialogue can occur under the conditions of Soulforce’s uninvited visit, we can neither welcome nor allow them on the PHC campus.

I did propose, as an alternative, that they establish a neutral venue for a more organized, intellectually responsible debate. In lieu of their visit to our campus, I said that we would be willing to send PHC students to undertake a formal debate on the merits of the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. As you might imagine, they rejected my invitation on grounds that formal debate is not “authentic dialogue.” I chock it up to an undeniable fact: as evidenced by their intrusive tactics and internal literature, Soulforce can claim no authentic desire to embrace intellectually responsible dialogue. Rather, it wants to entangle its targets in a manipulative form of political theater. I believe their approach is contrary to intellectually substantive dialogue, and have therefore asked them not to come to PHC on April 12, emphasizing that they will not be allowed on our campus.

Do I expect that to stop them from showing up at our entrance come April 12? No, I do not. But if they do, I want you to know that I have spent a good deal of time in prayer and consultation with our faculty, staff, and many of our students to determine the best course of action. My overriding concern is to protect our students (and your children) from a rude and offensive disruption to PHC’s educational goals and spiritual objectives. To this end, I have decided to take the following steps.

Experience teaches us that these events can, at times, best be defused by simply refusing to engage. In our case, this may be achieved by posting police at the campus entrance and refusing to interact with Soulforce on any level. While I have not forbidden our students from dialoguing with the protesters out on the roadside, I have requested and strongly urged them not to. Students who walked out to the roadside for conversations would be rewarding the group’s rudeness, and would expose themselves to carefully scripted manipulative techniques. If you concur, I would appreciate your reinforcing my request on this point as you have opportunity to talk with your son or daughter.

We expect that Soulforce will arrive, as expected, on April 12, that they will protest in front of our campus for an hour or two and, at a predetermined time, send their designated representatives to cross our property line. In that event, local police have been instructed to make arrests quickly, hopefully ending the event without further incident. This has already occurred on several campuses, including at the University of Notre Dame earlier this month.

As one might imagine, our decision to close the campus to this group grates against the natural desire of some of our students for intense engagement and rigorous debate on all issues. Many are quite good at it and would, I have no doubt, not merely withstand but powerfully counter and dismantle the most sophisticated deception. Understandably, such students question my decision. Moreover, even Christianity Today has editorially praised campuses that threw out the welcome mat to Soulforce, applauding them for practicing “the power of hospitality.”

I understand and share the desire to engage; yet, as I have prayed and studied, I have found that the Bible indicates otherwise in a case like this. The scriptural basis for our approach is, I believe, well-founded. Those who would urge our College to practice open-armed hospitality toward Soulforce and its members overlook a critical biblical exhortation.

In several places in the New Testament (Acts 20; 1 Cor. 5; 2 Tim. 3, to name a few), the Apostle Paul charges believers to have nothing to do with self-described Christians (note: not ordinary unbelievers) who have willfully rejected the truth. In 1 Cor. 5: 9-11, Paul writes: “I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people – not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral... In that case you have to leave this world: But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer... With such a man do not even eat.” In 2 Tim. 3:5, Paul warns against those “having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.”

The Apostle John describes the person who once held, but then actively taught against gospel truth. Of such a person he says, “do not take him into your house or welcome him. Anyone who welcomes him shares in his wicked work.” (2 John 10-11)

In these and other passages, the Biblical message is stern but explicit: have nothing to do with them. I take this charge seriously. Soulforce as an organization presents itself as religiously-motivated and ecumenical in character. The organization’s founders, its key leaders and many of its activist members do not present themselves as being somehow non-Christian; rather, they present themselves as being emphatically Christian. In their literature and throughout their website, they portray themselves as being more deeply committed to the Bible and the Spirit of God than others.

I believe that God wants us to express love to all persons. But sometimes love requires us, according to St. Paul, not to associate, not to invite them in. If, on April 12th, we are engaged against our will by people forcibly entering the campus, I have instructed our students to treat all persons with respect, kindness, and restraint. But I am committed to protecting our campus from being duped by a tactic that is manipulative rhetorically, politically and, ultimately, spiritually. To invite such a group, in the full panoply of their political theatrics, in amongst us, would be the wrong way to expose our students to bad ideas. More importantly, it would subject them unnecessarily to the wrong kind of spiritual influence. I will not do it.

This event will come and go, and soon be forgotten. Still, it is a reminder that we face a concerted battle of ideas in our day, where many are attempting to blur all the markers of truth and moral clarity. But it is not only a battle of ideas. Because of the beauty of our mission and calling, PHC is inevitably a focus of conflict in the spiritual realm. The Apostle Paul warns us that “we wrestle not against flesh and blood.” (Eph. 6:12) This reminds us that human beings are never our ultimate enemies. We need to stay close to Jesus first and foremost—not the Jesus of our imagination but the Jesus of the Bible—in order to be equipped with true wisdom for this and all other challenges that we are privileged to face.

I trust you understand and can support this decision. I ask that you hold up in earnest prayer everyone at Patrick Henry College as April 12th approaches. We love our students, treasuring all that God is doing for them in our midst, and we appreciate your partnership with us in God’s work.

In His Name,
Graham Walker
President
Patrick Henry College