Campus Ministry

I'm spending the day at my undergraduate institution today, doing some work. I walked past the street where some of the churches and religious foundations are at. The one that I belonged to, which was run by American Baptists, is going through some difficult times but in any case is doing well. They have a mission to proclaim the Gospel to the campus, and they're doing that in all of its dimensions. They have a housing ministry where young men and women are growing together in community to learn what it means to follow Christ.

The Presbyterian religious foundation is not doing so well. Their numbers are down in church attendance, and they had to take down their house and now are putting up what amounts to an apartment complex, for anyone to stay in for university housing. There's nothing wrong with that, but they can't have a spiritually-focused house because no one wants to live in one.

Well, except for the fact that plenty of people want to live in the Baptist ones down the street.

I'm not going to suggest that what I'm about to say is the simple explanation for what's happened here. It must be a very complicated situation with lots of factors. However, the following point deserves some attention.

Much of mainline Protestant Christianity in America has given up on orthodox Christianity, and this particular Presbyterian church is a good example (nothing against Presbyterians, this particular group on that campus is in fact going against its own history in this case). This campus church decided a long time ago that orthodox Christianity simply wasn't for them. The New Testament says all of those unpleasant things about not getting to leave your spouse for whatever reason you want, not getting to have intercourse with whoever you want, that belief in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord is essential, and of course we shouldn't forget all those embarrassing references to casting out demons and healing the sick and raising the dead, because we learned a long time ago that such things were unscientific and therefore unworthy of our consideration.

Sure, they like the New Testament a lot nevertheless, because it asks us to take care of the poor, the widowed, the foreigner, and the destitute. It teaches us that mercy triumphs over judgment. That peace is desirable and war isn't. That restorative justice is possible. They claim that this is what Jesus found really important.

Sure, Jesus found it important. He faults us whenever we don't. However, for Jesus this was part and parcel of his restorative program for the world, to which his historical, bodily resurrection is essential. All of that stuff about what he did here on earth was part of his bringing the Kingdom of God. And, yes, Jesus calls us to that personal holiness that so often gets in the way of what we want for ourselves (myself included).

So what's the point of this rant? The point is that once you drain Christianity of most of its distinctive content, you end up with something that essentially makes Jesus look like any so-called enlightened 21st century Westerner. The problem with this, for those that promote it, is that I can go to any bookstore and pick up books on this, or watch it on TV, or join some other group or cause that has no explicit religious association. It seems rather pointless to go join up with a spiritual group to hear what I can hear about just about everywhere else. Not only that, but these people are asking college students to get up on Sunday morning early and go off and hear what they can hear every day in class. If that's all church was for, I wouldn't go, because I have better things to do on the weekend.

The American Baptists on that campus are concerned about both the evangelical gospel and social justice. In fact, they've linked them together in Jesus' resurrection. It's a message that ties one in with the restoration of the world to its Creator. That's something worth getting out of bed for on a Sunday.