Christian College Risks Accreditation Over Biblical Standards

Current Events, ,

Gordon College in Massachusetts is facing pressure from its accreditation board over the college’s biblical standards concerning sexual activity by students.

Gordon is a Christian college who lists same-sex activity alongside other forms of forbidden student conduct. However, the New England Association of Schools and Colleges is investigating whether Gordon has violated the Association’s standards for accreditation in doing so.

John Stonestreet with the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview writes,

“In late September, the higher education committee of the New England Association of Schools and Colleges, the body that accredits Gordon, met to consider whether Gordon’s inclusion of homosexual acts as a ‘forbidden practice’ ran afoul of the Association’s standards for accreditation. Note that the Gordon statement requires all students to adhere to sexual behavior standards. There’s no singling out of same-sex attracted folks, nor are there any prohibitions against admitting students with same-sex attraction. The stance has to do with sexual behavior, which falls in line with two millennia of Christian teaching.”

According to Stonestreet, Gordon College has one year to prepare a report for the Association defending the college’s policies.

Gordon is, essentially, being accused of discrimination even though all it is doing is proscribing standards of Christian conduct for its students. The implications of this situation are significant. If a college is free to profess a religious basis, but risks its accreditation by insisting its students adhere to some basic tenets of that religion, that’s a problem.

Stonestreet has prepared an excellent commentary on this situation and similar cases. You can listen to it below or read it here.

[audio:http://bit.ly/Zt3Y88|titles=John Stonestreet – The Jealous God of Tolerance]

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The Unseen Pain Behind Same-Sex Marriage

Homosexuality, Marriage, ,

Last week we shared a commentary by John Stonestreet at the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview articulating why Christianity is wedded to traditional marriage. This week, Stonestreet has released a commentary on the painful consequences of same-sex marriage.

Stonestreet writes,

Seven years ago, [Janna] Darnelle’s husband of ten years told her that he was gay and that he wanted a divorce. As she wrote in The Public Discourse, “In an instant, the world that I had known and loved—the life we had built together—was shattered.”

She tried to persuade him to stay, and work through their problems and fight for their marriage. But, as she writes, “my voice, my desires, my needs—and those of our two young children—no longer mattered to him. We had become disposable, because he had embraced one tiny word that had become his entire identity. Being gay trumped commitment, vows, responsibility, faith, fatherhood, marriage, friendships, and community.” …

USA Today, in its cheerleading for same-sex marriage, ran a photo section on her ex-husband, his partner, and her children without her consent or even notice to her. Darnelle wrote, “Commenters exclaimed at how beautiful this gay family was and congratulated my ex-husband and his new partner on the family that they ‘created’ . . .,” even though, she continued, “there is a significant person missing from those pictures: the mother and abandoned wife. That ‘gay family’ could not exist without me.”

Darnelle’s story, sadly, is not unique. Stonestreet discusses the series of cultural shifts that have brought us to this point–and the pain they have left in their wake.

Listen to his full commentary below.

[audio:http://bit.ly/1qVttEY|titles=John Stonestreet – The Unseen Pain Behind Gay Marriage]

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Fayetteville Group Gathering Signatures to Vote on Ordinance

Current Events, , , , , ,

repealflyerA group of concerned citizens are hard at work gathering signatures to bring controversial Fayetteville Chapter 119 (the so-called “nondiscrimination” ordinance) up for a vote of the people.

The group now has a website with information about the effort: www.repeal119.com. There is also a flyer highlighting some of the consequences of Fayetteville’s new ordinance and articulating why it should be repealed.

If the petition drive is successful, voters in Fayetteville will have the opportunity to keep or repeal Chapter 119 at the ballot box later this year.

We have written repeatedly about the unintended consequences of this ordinance, including:

If you would like to know more about the effort to repeal Chapter 119, call (479) 239-5900 or email info@repeal119.com.

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