I’ve mentioned once or twice before that my employer, Bethel University, is in the middle of developing its next master plan. We’ve seen a couple of scenarios from the consultants, and both anticipate a substantial expansion and renovation of our facilities: new buildings, sprucing up of old ones… It’s all very exciting, especially in this … More College Architecture and Christian Simplicity
11/8/11 – Last month I moderated a discussion about the role of Pietism in the history of Bethel University, asking questions of my Pietist Impulse in Christianity co-editors G.W. Carlson and Christian Collins Winn and sharing a few of my own observations. You can now watch a video recording of that conversation at this link.
The other day Roger Olson asked (rhetorically) whether Christian organizations should adopt a business model. (Hint: the answer isn’t yes.) He was chiefly concerned with the two types of Christian organizations with which he (and I) mostly interact: colleges and churches. I’ll leave alone his comments about churches, not because I disagree with him that … More Christian Colleges as Businesses
My institution, Bethel University, is currently in the early stages of drafting its next master plan, a document meant to guide the development of new facilities and the renovation of old ones (among other things). As part of the planning process, an outside consultant was on campus to meet with different constituent groups and get … More What’s Distinctive about Christian Colleges?
Along with the course-related podcasts I’ve helped to produce, our department also makes use of this technology to communicate with current, former, and prospective students, putting out Historia! twice last year and, hopefully, three times in 2011-2012. In time for Bethel’s Homecoming, the first episode for this year is now available on iTunes U, and … More The Return of Historia!
Today I’m going to wrap up a series of posts on the notion of Christian colleges looking to a “usable past” for guidance as they consider their missions and identities. Thus far, we’ve mostly found that schools founded by denominations originating (at least in part) in Pietism have not found such utility in that tradition. … More The Usable Past: Pietism and Bethel University
9/21/11 – This Friday I’ll have a post about Pietism in the history and identity of Bethel University. On October 1st, I’ll join two of my co-editors from The Pietist Impulse in Christianity in leading a discussion about the same topic as part of Bethel’s Homecoming festivities. You can get details on our Facebook event … More The Pietist Impulse in Bethel History
That collective exhaling you heard this morning came from the chancellors, presidents, provosts, and other leaders of the 1378 colleges and universities that participate in the U.S. News Best Colleges ranking process, results of which were released today. As someone who indirectly participates in this process (by teaching at one of those institutions and so … More On College Rankings
Yesterday I posted a response to the debate over Dominion theology, which holds that Scripture mandates that Christians control secular institutions, including political ones. There have been several sources for the revival of a debate whose roots go back to the late 1970s and early 1980s, but probably the most important was Ryan Lizza’s profile … More Evangelicals and “Dominion” (part 2)
One of the most unlikely hot topics of the past month has been a kind of political theology that, to the extent it achieved any real popularity, peaked in the early 1980s: Dominion theology, or as New Yorker correspondent Ryan Lizza calls it in his now famous profile of Michelle Bachmann, Dominionism. It contends that … More Evangelicals and “Dominion” (part 1)
The Pietist Schoolman 