UGA Prof Advises Christians on Hostile Campuses to Pick Their Battles
by Jim Brown
April 4, 2005
(AgapePress) - A Christian professor at the University of Georgia (UGA) says believers should not be overly concerned about the outcome of the culture wars being fought on U.S. college campuses.Tenured UGA English professor Jonathan Evans says students often report to him that biblical faith is the one position that is most liable to be ridiculed in their classes. However, Evans says while defending their faith, Christians should be cautious not to engage in battles that might not be worth fighting.
Evans believes Christians at times lose their audience on campus by not thinking carefully about their positions on hot-button political and social issues. "Sometimes we can become distracted by fights that really aren't important," he says, "and then we lose the ones we really ought to fight. I think it's easy to get drawn into endless controversies on various cultural issues that are not really very fruitful in the final analysis."
The UGA instructor says it is important for born-again believers to pick their battles wisely on campus while remaining prayerful, faithful, and committed as well as honest. One reason, he notes, is that people in the academic community are loath to be apprehended in any case of overt prejudice or anti-religious pressure.
"In the background there may be feelings of suspicion, maybe discomfort," Evans says, or for some people, "not quite knowing what to do with a person who is an intellectual, is an academic, but who at the same time seems to hold what must be regarded as irrational beliefs about the world, about human beings, about how to act and what to do."
Evans believes the problems he himself faced during the promotion and tenure process 12 years ago were directly related to the fact that his Christian faith was known in the academic community. He says most administrators and faculty are extremely uncomfortable with the presence of Christians and their viewpoints in the college or university setting.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
