Christians and Higher Education

This seems to be my week for opining on Christians and higher education.

This article, published as a column in Canada’s leading journal for evangelicals, Faith Today, complements a theme issue on evangelicals and higher education. I offer the  opinion—controversial, alas, for many—that both secular and Christian institutions of higher education are problematic, yes, but yet also Good Things, both of them deserving Christian support.

I switch journals and audiences and theses as I write in University Affairs, Canada’s leading journal for professors and academic staff. I address the knotty question of academic freedom and argue that both Christian and secular higher education have their flaws and limitations, but also offer distinctive and worthwhile opportunities plus genuine academic freedom. Thus both forms of education deserve both public and general academic support. (The occasion is a recent Canadian Association of University Teachers investigation whose investigators recorded that they were shocked—shocked—to find out there were theological constraints on what professors could profess at a Christian school.)