The Discrimination of Non-Discrimination and Christian Compromise

Vanderbilt University was founded by Methodists in the 1870s. However, things have changed. According to Albert Mohler,

• In more recent months, Vanderbilt’s administration decided to push secularism to the extreme — launching a virtual vendetta against religious organizations on campus. Officials of the university informed religious groups that had been recognized student organizations that they would have to comply with an absolute non-discrimination policy. This means that religious organizations (primarily Christian) must now allow any Vanderbilt student to be a candidate for a leadership office, regardless of religious beliefs or sexual orientation. In other words, a Christian student group would be forced to allow the candidacy of an atheist. A group of Christians who believe in the Bible’s standard of sexual morality would be required to allow the candidacy of a homosexual member. There can be absolutely no discrimination, the university insists, even if that means that Christian organizations are no longer actually Christian.

Ironically, Vanderbilt’s non-discrimination policy is all about discrimination. I haven’t heard how this policy is impacting other campus groups. Is the woman’s support group now required to open their doors to men? Must the Democratic student club now open membership and leadership to Republicans? If Vanderbilt is applying their policy across-the-board, it is strange that none of the non-Christian groups are protesting it. The controversy seems to have started when:

• School administrators started reviewing the constitutions of all student groups after members of Christian fraternity Beta Upsilon Chi removed one of their leaders over his views on homosexuality. (World Magazine, 5/5/12, 53)

Perhaps the campus non-Christian groups have avoided this controversy simply because their constitution didn’t specify requirements for membership or leadership. Or perhaps they had few scruples about discriminating, despite the fact that they are now “required to sign a document affirming the nondiscrimination policy.”

The fact that two of the largest Protestant groups – Reformed University Fellowship (RUF of the PCA) and the Baptist Collegiate Ministry (BCM) – has agreed to sign has deprived the Christian opposition of much muscle. Carol Swain, a Vanderbilt law professor, lamented that RUF and BCM:

• Made a decision that was very self-interested and that does not advance the cause of Christ.

In defense, RUF’s chaplain, Stacey Croft, maintains that the Vanderbilt ruling doesn’t actually restrict religious freedom:

• “I just don’t think [Vanderbilt] is there yet. I don’t think we have to fear that. Let that come when it does…Let’s continue as we are and take that to the university. If we need to leave, we will.” (54)

• RUF does not feel as threatened by the nondiscrimination policy because it doesn’t interpret leadership the way some other groups do, Mays [an RUF coordinator] said. Each RUF chapter is led by an ordained PCA minister…That job does not fall on the students, like it does at some ministries.

Perhaps by having an ordained minister leading their meetings has given RUF some breathing room. Nevertheless, they still regard Vanderbilt’s policy as a violation of religious liberty and are willing to sign the university’s non-discrimination statement, although they insist that they will not compromise the Gospel.

Two issues come to mind. Shouldn’t RUF be standing in solidarity with those Christian groups who do have more to loose? Also, by signing the Vanderbilt policy statement, isn’t RUF playing fast-and-loose with the truth? On the one hand, RUF signs that they will not discriminate. However, they acknowledge that their Christian faith requires that they discriminate!

However, it must be granted that there are occasions when the truth must be bent for the sake of protecting life. There were the midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, who had lied to their Egyptian masters to save Israelite babies (Exodus 1). There was also Rahab the harlot who lied to protect the Israelite spies. However, these examples seem to be rare exceptions - hardly precedents to which RUF could appeal.

Truth doesn’t belong to us. It is not a commodity like clay and bricks, which we can mold to suit ourselves. Truth is not something to manipulate and twist for our own benefit. We do not create it; it is something to which we must conform. It is a sacred endowment, entrusted to us by the Author of all truth.

I pray that RUF and BCM will reconsider. We have a responsibility to expose the works of evil (Eph. 5:11), especially when they threaten something so important.

The Intolerance of “Tolerance”

Vanderbilt University was founded by Methodists in the 1870s. However, things have changed. According to AlbertMohler,

• In more recent months, Vanderbilt’s administration decided to push secularism to the extreme — launching a virtual vendetta against religious organizations on campus. Officials of the university informed religious groups that had been recognized student organizations that they would have to comply with an absolute non-discrimination policy. This means that religious organizations (primarily Christian) must now allow any Vanderbilt student to be a candidate for a leadership office, regardless of religious beliefs or sexual orientation. In other words, a Christian student group would be forced to allow the candidacy of an atheist. A group of Christians who believe in the Bible’s standard of sexual morality would be required to allow the candidacy of a homosexual member. There can be absolutely no discrimination, the university insists, even if that means that Christian organizations are no longer actually Christian.

Vanderbilt’s position represents the intolerance that secretly piggy-backs on “tolerance.” In their “tolerance,” they are intolerant of Christian groups. It also reflects a hypocritical double-standard – a policy that is not enforced across the board, as David French of The National Review has observed:

• The reality, of course, is that Vanderbilt is trying to force the orthodox Christian viewpoint off campus. The ‘nondiscrimination’ rhetoric is mere subterfuge. How can we know this? Because even as it works mightily to make sure that atheists can run Christian organizations, it is working just as mightily to protect the place and prerogatives of Vanderbilt’s powerful fraternities and sororities — organizations that explicitly discriminate, have never been open to ‘all comers,’ and cause more real heartache each semester for rejected students than any religious organization has ever inflicted in its entire history on campus. Vanderbilt’s embattled religious organizations welcome all students with open arms; Vanderbilt’s fraternities and sororities routinely reject their fellow students based on little more than appearance, family heritage, or personality quirks.

If French is right, Vanderbilt is a case study in intolerance – a growing trend within secular society – not tolerance. If the fraternities are allowed to discriminate according to their petty criteria, why is Vanderbilt intolerant of Christian criteria – the very standards that built almost all of our Ivy League schools?

My Wish List

We live in a convoluted world where “nondiscrimination” has become a clandestine way to discriminate:

• The InterVarsity Christian Fellowship chapter at the State University of New York at Buffalo [SUNY] has three weeks to come into compliance with the school's nondiscrimination policy or risk losing its status as an official campus group.

According to the university:

• InterVarsity's constitution, which includes a clause requiring leaders to agree with a statement of faith, violates school policy.

Discrimination dressed up as “non-discrimination!” I don’t know much about SUNY Buffalo, but I would imagine that they are not yelling “discrimination” at their woman’s group, which requires female leadership or their Young Democrats, while only allows a Democrat to head the group. I would also be surprised if SUNY was going after the Muslim group, which of course insists on Muslim leadership. In fact, I can’t think of a group that wouldn’t discriminate in some way in their selection of leadership.

If I’m wrong about this, I wish that someone would correct me. However, I’ve seen too many instances of this kind of anti-Christian bias in our institutions of “higher learning” to think that SUNY is acting even-handedly out of an impartial concern for justice. Also, SUNY isn’t alone in this matter:

• The University at Buffalo is the second college in the last two weeks to tell an InterVarsity chapter to revise its constitution or lose the right to operate on campus. Last week, Vanderbilt University Chancellor Nicholas Zeppos reiterated his intention to enforce the school's revised nondiscrimination policy, which no longer grants religious groups the right to require elected leaders to share their beliefs. Four campus Christian organizations, including InterVarsity's Graduate Christian Fellowship, have until mid April to submit new constitutions that comply with Vanderbilt's policy.

From my understanding of the law, private institutions, like Vanderbilt, have a right to exercise their biases. However, I just wish that they would lay aside their hypocrisy - that they are merely pursuing a policy of “nondiscrimination.” At least, they should admit that they have a bias, and that they are discriminating according to their bias. Let them put their deceptive cards on the table!

I also wish that New York City would reconsider their hypocritical ruling that churches can no longer rent space in their NYC schools on Sundays. Although they base their ruling on the “separation of church and state,” their high principles don’t prevent them from renting space from churches when their own schools require the additional space. I wish they would come-clean and fess-up that they are using a double-standard.

I also wish that if the law is going to allow Vanderbilt and many other institutions to practice stealth discrimination, they would also allow church organizations to discriminate according to their faith and conscience. However, many recent rulings have denied them this constitutionally guaranteed prerogative – the free exercise of religion.

Why this hypocrisy? My final wish is that our underlying motives will be exposed for the world to see them – the very thing that our Lord has promised to do!