Is Baylor a faithful Christian university?

[Tim]

Does anyone have any comments on Baylor U in Waco, TX? I am curious of the Christian witness of that university. Is it truly conservative? What about evolution being taught in the biology department? Etc.

 

[Laura]

Just a few comments. Having sat through two religion classes (required) taught by a startlingly liberal professor who was maybe not perfectly representative of the department, but certainly welcome and comfortably established there, higher criticism and mockery of conservative views of Scripture appear to be well accepted among students and professors. The mandatory chapel services (3x a week for 2 semesters) were often nauseating. We had everyone from Tony Campolo to some hip-hop star who described her "faith" as coming by the hearing of Mother Theresa's voice (in a documentary or something); she was motivated to change her attitude from selfish to others-focused. And you should too, etc. Only one person throughout the whole year, Matt Chandler, pastor of this church, seemed to have a grasp on the gospel.

I wasn't in the science department but its animosity to intelligent design is openly admitted and well documented by its opponents.

Emergent nonsense is popular among students and younger faculty/admin. While I was there there was a mini-exodus within the Honors college: professors and philosophically minded students from broadly evangelical backgrounds were "discovering" (or re-discovering in the case of Frank Beckwith; James White commented a lot on that) the Roman Catholic Church, and the most my conservative friends would say was that, well, they had issues with the RCC and could never be such themselves, but no big deal.

There are a few rare exceptions to the liberal rule, whom I could name if it would be helpful to you. There is also an RUF (Reformed Univ. Fellowship) on campus that provides sound teaching, affiliated with this church.

 

[Tim]

Thanks for your comments, Laura. I looked at the link you designated as "well documented". There I found an article entitled "The Rise and Fall of Baylor University’s Michael Polanyi Center". This is really the information I have been looking for. A few years ago, someone mentioned that Baylor had made some movement toward the conservative end of things, but that it was squashed by the leadership. I wanted to know more but didn't search at that time.

The subject of the article seems to be a center for intelligent design studies. While I don't believe that intelligent design goes as far as it needs to, this would have been a welcome and positive resistance to the evolutionary thought that dominates America today.

The reason for my asking is that in a few years I will be looking for a faculty position at some American university. I was wondering if there would be anywhere I could teach (at a research level university) that would be the least bit sympathetic to my creationist/Biblical views. It seems that Baylor is not the place for this.

However, I am almost certain that there is no place whatsoever that would be sympathetic, so there is no sense in worrying about it further (although I hope that I am wrong).

 

[Jimmy the Greek]

What I have heard agrees with Laura's post above. There is a conservative Christian witness on campus via RUF and some local churches, but the school itself (and faculty) has become predominantly liberal.

 

[Marrow Man]

What what little I heard/read (mainly in a World magazine article a few years ago), the fall of Baylor has been mainly to a preoccupation with being taken seriously by secular academia. In other words, they moving away from historic conservative Christian convictions in order to appease the world.

I don't mean that to sound biased, but that's the impression I've gotten. Feel free to correct me.

"Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." ~ 1 John 2:15

"You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." ~ James 4:4

 

[DMcFadden]

Does anyone have any comments on Baylor U in Waco, TX? I am curious of the Christian witness of that university. Is it truly conservative?

Sure, just like Harvard and Princeton.

Baylor is a school with a proud history of connection to a church body. But, like many schools of that ilk, the desire for accademic acceptability has eclipsed the concern for fidelity to the Gospel. Christianity Today had a number of articles on Baylor over the years, including the controversy with William Dembski.