Here We Go 'Round in Circles

My mother teaches writing at a small sectarian college near Boston (it happens to be my parents' alma mater). It is one of a number of institutions of higher learning that her denomination has scattered throughout the US. From time to time my mother notes that her school is "one of the most liberal of the (denomination's) colleges." Today we happened to be discussing one of my cousins' children who just began attending community college after being schooled at their church's elementary and high schools. He is barely literate. The conversation came around to how she believes the state should have educational standards that apply to all schools, and that people who home school beyond elementary school should have college degrees. I pointed out that someone we know received a degree from one of her denominations' colleges homeschooled her children, despite an inability to spell, punctuate, or use correct grammar. "Well, (our college) is the best, academically, of all the (denomination's) schools." "And yet, you frequently complain of many of your colleagues' 'liberal' political opionions. Might there be a connection between that and the superior academics?" "Some of these professors teach Evolution!" "Is teaching science a bad thing?" "But the don't teach Intelligent Design alongside it. And then they don't believe in Jonah and the whale or Noah... You can't just pick and choose what you want to believe from the Bible."

The point of all this is that compromising academics in the service of ideology and faith is not without risk. The logical conclusion of which is being played out not only in the middle of America, but also Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Egypt (among too many other countries).

So it goes.