REVERSALS
Meeting the Challenges of
Christian Higher Education
Prof. Stephen Palmquist,
D.Phil. (Oxon)
Department of Religion and Philosophy
Hong Kong Baptist University
What does it mean to have a "Christian Higher Education"? Does
it mean "getting a degree from a college which calls itself
'Christian'"? I think not. For many graduates of so-called
"Christian colleges" come away with an education which, in many respects,
is less authentically Christian than the education they would get at some
secular institutions!
On the contrary, when I refer here to "Christian Higher
Education", I am thinking of a way of approaching the challenges of
higher education which follows the Way demonstrated by the life and death of
Jesus Christ. That means that a truly Christian education is one
that teaches the student to live by the Way of the Cross. How can this be
done in three short years, filled as they are with the
pressures of readings, papers, tests and grades?
Perhaps it cannot be done. But at least a beginning can be made.
For a few short years of college education (whether or not they end up being
"Christian") is enough to point most of us in the direction we will
be headed for the rest of our life. Far more important than the facts
we learn in college is the attitude we learn towards learning
itself. The attitude we take with us when we graduate will determine
whether we view the hardships of life as new adventures worth exploring, or
as a drudgeries to be endured.
When our studies or our personal relationships begin to present us with new challenges,
what is the attitude which characterizes the beginning of a truly Christian
education? One way of describing this attitude is as "openness to
change". Some Christians are reluctant to give young people the freedom
to have an open and inquisitive attitude towards their education, because they
are afraid the "wrong" kind of influences
might cause some students to stray away from their
Christian beliefs.
Education does indeed often have this effect on Christians. Why?
Why do some Christians lose their faith, or give up their commitment to live a
Christian life, as a result of their advanced learning? I want to
suggest that the root of this common problem is a wrong attitude towards
change.
Some Christians are taught that God has certain clear-cut ways of doing things,
and that if we learn those basic rules and regulations (e.g., the ones set out
in the Bible and enforced by the Church), we will know
the "mind of Christ". Anyone who believes that God can only
speak in one way, or that truth can only be expressed in one form, is unlikely
to be able to endure the weight of contrary evidence that is provided by a
good higher education.
Education that is worth the name specializes in teaching us that we are in fact
largely ignorant, even about those things we thought we knew. Yes,
surprisingly enough, it is ignorance much more than knowledge which
paves the way to a fruitful education. Yet the willingness to recognize
our ignorance seems to go directly against many people's understanding of what
it means to be religious, for all too often churches are filled with people who
believe they already know all the answers.
In my experience, the extent to which a Christian student remains faithful to
his or her religious commitments after graduating from college is usually
inversely proportional to the extent to which that student believes that God
must always speak and act in ways that will seem consistent to us. In
other words, students who cannot hold in their
mind apparently contradictory beliefs about God (such as "God loves me and
has a wonderful plan for my life" and "I don't even know for sure if
God exists, to say nothing of what He is like!") are very unlikely
to graduate with a Christian education. They will either be educated
into giving up their faith, or they will hold on to their faith so tightly that
their "education" will never really make a difference in their life.
By contrast, students who are able to live with a paradox are far more likely
to succeed in receiving a Christian education. This kind of success has
nothing whatsoever to do with grades (indeed, too much attention
to grades is often a way of protecting oneself from being effected by the challenges
of what one is supposed to be learning). Rather, it is the success of
learning to live by the Way of the Cross, because the cross is one of
the most profound symbols of paradox. The paradox of the cross requires
us to be open to what I call the principle of "reversal".
Let me illustrate this principle with a story from my own life. When I finished
secondary school, I had no clear idea of what I wanted to do with my
life. As I went off to college, I assumed I would be studying maths or one of the sciences (probably physics), since I
was quite good in these subjects. Being a Christian, I decided to attend
a four-year, Christian liberal arts college in Santa
Barbara, California, called Westmont.
In some ways Westmont was like Baptist College. But there was one big difference,
for which I will always be thankful: the college respected students
enough to allow them to make many of their own choices in designing their
education. For example, we could choose our classes from a wide range of
alternatives, for both major and non-major subjects. Moreover, we were
not required to make our final decision as to which major we would choose until
the end of the second of four years (i.e., half way through our entire
college education!). Without that freedom, I may never have been able to
hear God calling me to be a teacher of philosophy. Let me explain why.
In my first year of college the most common question we would ask our classmates
was: What are you planning to choose as your major? I would always
answer such a question by saying I was undecided: "All I know is
that I won't major in Music, PE, or Religious Studies." Well, to
make a long story short, I ended up four years later graduating with a
Religious Studies major and a Music minor. And
in my final year I was even a coach for a girls' football team!
This is a simple example of a reversal, but it made a big impression on
me. This was one of many reversals which together have taught me not to
be too confident in my own understanding of who I am or why I believe the
things I do. More importantly, these reversals have taught me to allow
God to say one thing to me this year, but something quite different next year.
Unfortunately, the kind of reversal I just described is nearly impossible for
students in colleges where the administration makes most of the choices for the
students. I am deeply disturbed whenever Baptist College students tell me that,
although they now realize they chose the wrong major, there is simply nothing
they can do about it at this point. Fortunately, though, there are many
other ways in which the principle of reversal can show itself in the
educational process, even for those who feel they are forced to study things
they never would have chosen for themselves.
Among the many other reversals that took place during my college years was the
following. I found myself giving up much of the childhood religion my
parents had worked so hard to teach me. In its place came a succession of
"better" ideas. Soon I realized that some of my own ideas themselves
needed to be "reversed". Although it often hurts while we are
experiencing it--we feel as if we have been a fool--it is a sign of true
Christian education when we can allow such reversals to happen, because they
require us to trust God more than we trust ourself.
I spent a long time studying "love" and "spirituality",
only to discover later that my natural interest in these subjects was due more
to my own weakness in these areas, than to the vast store of wisdom I
once thought I had. I have noticed, in fact, that in many cases scholars
unknowingly choose their topics of study as a way of compensating for what
they lack in their own personal life. (As an example we need only think
of Socrates, who spent years studying wisdom, only to discover he was himself a
fool.) This can be an unhealthy tendency, until we realize it is
happening. Then we can rejoice in anticipation of the reversals which our
studies will be bringing about in our own life situation.
When a Christian attitude towards education really becomes rooted in
our hearts, we can allow God to "fool" us (i.e., to make us aware of
the foolishness of our former ways of thinking and acting), without
losing our desire to learn more. I can testify that with each new
reversal, painful as it often is, the fire of scholarship burns brighter and
brighter in my heart: with the reversals come new insights,
and I long to share with others what I have seen.
Christian education means learning to
recognize and honour God as the God of reversals.
If our God is a God of reversals, then Christian "conversion" (which
itself means "turning around") must be viewed not just as a
momentary, life-changing experience, but also as a life-long process.
Each time our inquisitiveness causes us to overturn one of our most
cherished beliefs, we can rejoice in the conviction that God is in the process
of manifesting Himself to us. The darkest point can itself then be a witness to the presence of the Light which is to come.
In spite of our ignorance of how it is to happen, we can trust that this Light
will bring with it a new insight into how we can conform
our own life to the model set by Christ himself. The life of Jesus is the
model of openness to God's reversals, for Jesus was willing to believe that
death itself can be reversed. In so doing he demonstrated that the Way of
the Cross is the true beginning of the higher education of mankind.
Following this example, we who call ourselves Christians must learn that being
open to such reversals plays an essential role in the process of becoming
truly Christian.
This etext is based on a prepublication draft of the published
version of this essay.
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