Tag: Liberty University

An Evangelical Battle of the Generations: To Embrace Trump or Not?

Politico logo

As Liberty University plots its post-Falwell future, young people want to steer clear of politics. The trustees aren’t buying it.

For years, there was an adage around Liberty University that if God split Jerry Falwell in half, you would have his sons Jerry and Jonathan.

Jerry Jr. inherited his father’s desire to be a force in American politics, and his post as Liberty University president, while Jonathan inherited his father’s gift for evangelical uplift and became pastor of his church.

Now, 14 years after Jerry Falwell Sr. died and nine months after Jerry Jr. was ousted in a scandal, Liberty is enmeshed in a debate that could have profound implications for the nation’s religious right: Whether it should keep nurturing Jerry Jr.’s focus on politics and maintain its high-flying role in the Republican Party, or begin to change its culture and back away from politics, an approach increasingly favored by younger evangelicals. Continue reading.

Jerry Falwell Jr.’s coronavirus response shows his staggering level of ignorance

Washington Post logoAfter learning of Jerry Falwell Jr.’s decision to partially reopen Liberty University, my thoughts turned to the biblical account of Balaam’s ass.

According to the Hebrew scriptures, the children of Israel were on the verge of engulfing another Bronze Age tribe. Lacking recourse to the United Nations, the Moabites turned to a diviner named Balaam to curse the Israelis. But on the way to the cursing, Balaam’s conveyance, an ass, saw an angel blocking the path ahead, turned hard into a wall and crushed Balaam’s foot. Unable to see the celestial creature himself, a frustrated Balaam beat his ass. But God permitted the wounded animal to speak, mock her rider and explain the divine roadblock. The eyes of a chastened Balaam were finally opened and he took the Israeli side. And the rest is Middle East history.

Students at Liberty University are more likely than most to understand the specialness of this biblical lesson. It is one of the few stories in which Falwell should not be assigned the part of an ass. For that matter, he does not even deserve the role of Balaam, who at least was open to instruction. Instead, Falwell has charged the angel straight on and — in defiance of nearly all public health experts — reopened the Liberty dorms in the middle of a pandemic. Now, according to the New York Times, at least one student has tested positive and several more have shown coronavirus-like symptoms. Continue reading.

‘Someone’s Gotta Tell the Freakin’ Truth’: Jerry Falwell’s Aides Break Their Silence

More than two dozen current and former Liberty University officials describe a culture of fear and self-dealing at the largest Christian college in the world.

At Liberty University, all anyone can talk about is Jerry Falwell Jr. Just not in public.

“When he does stupid stuff, people will mention it to others they consider confidants and not keep it totally secret,” a trusted adviser to Falwell, the school’s president and chancellor, told me. “But they won’t rat him out.”

That’s beginning to change.

View the complete September 9 article by Brandon Ambrosino on the Politico website here.

Inside Liberty University’s ‘culture of fear’

Washington Post logoHow Jerry Falwell Jr. silences students and professors who reject his pro-Trump politics.

In my first week as editor in chief of the Champion, Liberty University’s student-run weekly, our faculty adviser, Deborah Huff, ordered me to apologize. I’d noticed that our evangelical school’s police department didn’t publish its daily crime log online, as many other private university forces did, so I searched elsewhere for crime information I might use in an article. I called the Virginia Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators to find out what the law required Liberty to disclose. But the public affairs worker there told the Liberty University Police Department, which complained to Huff. She called to upbraid me: Apparently, I had endangered our newspaper’s relationship with the LUPD. Huff and Chief Richard Hinkley convened a meeting inside a police department conference room, and Huff sat next to me while I proffered the forced apology to Hinkley — for asking questions. Huff, too, was contrite, assuring the police chief that it wouldn’t happen again, because she’d keep a better eye on me.

This wasn’t exactly a rude awakening. I’d spent the previous three years watching the university administration, led by President Jerry Falwell Jr. (who took a very micromanaging interest), meddle in our coverage, revise controversial op-eds and protect its image by stripping damning facts from our stories. Still, I stuck around. I thought that if I wrote with discretion and kept my head down, I could one day win enough trust from the university to protect the integrity of our journalism. I even dreamed we could eventually persuade the administration to let the Champion go independent from its supervision. I was naive. Continue reading “Inside Liberty University’s ‘culture of fear’”

Prepare to be ‘shunned or ridiculed for defending the teachings of the Bible’

Vice President Pence had a message for Liberty University’s graduating class of 2019: “Be ready.”

But as Pence looked out over the sea of people dressed in navy graduation caps and matching gowns on the breezy, overcast Saturday, the focus of his commencement address wasn’t on preparing graduates for the difficulties they may face landing jobs or paying off student loans.

Those with degrees from the private evangelical Christian university in Lynchburg, Va., may likely face a unique obstacle in their post-grad lives, Pence said — being “shunned or ridiculed for defending the teachings of the Bible.”

View the complete May 13 article by Allyson Chiu on The Washington Post website here.

“In Trump We Trust”

The following article by Tracy Downey was posted on the Medium.com website May 15, 2017:

Hubris is the devil’s greatest aphrodisiac, and the ruin of an imprudent soul. It is of great mystery how an adulterating, thrice-married, bankrupted former casino owner, living inside of a tower made of gold became the savior of America’s Christian values. Our newly elected president swore to turn D.C. upside down with an acidic tongue, and a bombastic, mind numbing philosophy that whatever he believes is the Gospel according to Donald Trump. That includes Christianity.

Let that sink in. Continue reading ““In Trump We Trust””