Shining Forth the Light

James T. Burtchaell has recently published a major treatise on the historical decline of Christian higher education in North America titled The Dying of the Light: The Disengagement of Colleges and University from their Christian Churches (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998). Readers will decide for themselves regarding the particulars of his study, but the overarching thesis is certain: Keeping higher education distinctively Christian requires great and consistent focus on our purpose. Without such a focus, Burtchaell shows that an institution’s Christian identity initially becomes uncomfortable, withers over time, and eventually becomes expendable.

Alumni, friends, students, staff, faculty, administrators and trustees of Union University must jointly commit to maintaining the Christian distinctives of this great institution. At Union we cannot be passive and allow the dying of the light. Instead, we must all be involved to help keep the light shining.

This will entail a commitment to Christ-centered excellence in all that we do. A thoroughgoing Christian world and lifeview will undergird this commitment. A Union education must be shaped by a dedication to the integration of faith and learning throughout the curriculum and to the integration of faith and living in all aspects of our community life.

As we do so we move forward toward our stated goals of living out the Great Commandment in this place: loving God with all our minds and our hearts while loving our neighbor as ourselves. The result will be distinctive education focused on shining forth the light in a way that is rigorously academic and unapologetically Christian.

As Burtchaell points out, these commitments begin to erode as institutions separate themselves from their supporting churches. Higher education institutions can increase the influence of the Gospel as they work as partners together to advance the work of the Kingdom. Higher education institutions are not churches. Christian colleges and universities, like Union, which are committed to a liberal arts based education are not Bible colleges or seminaries either, though both of those types of schools have important roles in Christian education. But a school like Union does not exist solely for the preparation of ministers.

We seek to prepare students to think Christianly, to think critically, to think imaginatively and integratively across the curriculum with a commitment to revealed truth. This liberal arts based education extends to professional preparation in education, business, health care and other areas as well.

Union is a Christian liberal arts based institution preparing students to be leaders and to live out the "salt and light" implications of Christian truth.   Union has not yet arrived in this regard.  Faculty and staff, like students, are on a pilgrimage toward these ends, but with the prayers and help of our friends, alumni and supportive churches, Union can be and will be faithful to her calling to be a distinctive, Christ-centered institution and to shine forth the light into our world.