dueling letters

Those of you uninterested in Wheaton College or in Christian higher education more generally — which is to say, most of you — should feel free to skip this one.

UPDATE 2025-02-27: And if you are interested but want a more recent and intimate account than my own, please read this wonderful reflection by a 2024 graduate of Wheaton, Anna Catherine McGraw.

So the open letter by Wheaton College alumni denouncing the school for capitulation to wokeness, which as I write has 1277 signatories, has been countered by an open letter by Wheaton College alumni denouncing the school for failing to repudiate Project 2025, which has 1653 signatories.

I therefore declare the lefties the winners of this referendum!

Just kidding. I do, however, have some thoughts.

I notice that while the first letter (“For Wheaton,” hereafter FW) denounces Wheaton for allowing “unbiblical” practices to occur on campus, it does not actually cite the Bible. The other letter (“Open Letter,” or OL), by contrast, cites thirty-six passages from Scripture. Hey FW, you seriously need to raise your game in this regard.

FW is pretty explicit in what it wants, most notably “an audit of every single faculty and staff member’s commitment to the Statement of Faith and Community Covenant” — an interesting idea, since it directly copies Ibram X. Kendi’s old plan for every university to have an “antiracism task force” appointed by university administrators and unaccountable to standard procedures of governance. I wonder how such an audit would work. Would the task force decide in advance what is and is not biblical and seek to dismiss those who disagree? Could those whose views are deemed unbiblical defend themselves by citing relevant scriptures? What happens to people who fail their audit?

OL is less programmatic, but it says that Project 2025 is “antithetical to Christian charity” and that “Silence in the face of such an anti-Christian vision is complicity.” So presumably (?) this means that Wheaton should denounce Project 2025 rather than be “complicit” in it. But what is “Wheaton” in this scenario? The President? The administrative cabinet? The Board of Trustees? And what to do with faculty or staff who think that Project 2025 is perfectly consistent with Christian orthodoxy?

Five years ago I wrote that there are two political parties in America today: the Manichaeans and the Humanists. It seems to me that FW and OL alike belong to the Manichaean Party; they just represent two mutually-hostile wings thereof.

More specifically, it seems to me that both sides here — but FW more belligerently, in “tough negotiator” mode — are demanding the same thing of Wheaton: Tell me that God endorses my politics. But I don’t think Wheaton will do that, because it’s foundationally built on the idea that people who affirm its Statement of Faith and Community Covenant will not agree about everything in the political and social and personal and even the theological realm but will be able to argue charitably and constructively on the basis of their shared commitments — which are substantial indeed, but not without controversy.

If people at Wheaton can disagree about when Christians should be baptized, about the proper form of church governance, about predestination and election, about the role of the Holy Spirit in the Christian life, you’re going to tell me that there’s no room to disagree about DEI initiatives and immigration policy? If so, then you’re placing political unanimity above theological conviction, and — I have to consider this possibility — that just may say something about what your actual core commitments are. And if your political commitments are non-negotiable, then maybe — probably — almost certainly — Wheaton isn’t the place for you and you should devote yourself to some other institution. Wheaton is a place where faith seeks understanding; those of you who have already solved all the problems that beset the political realm and don’t want to face disagreement likely would be happier at a more seeker-unfriendly institution.

If Wheaton ceases to orient itself to controversy and disagreement in the way it historically has, then I don’t know what its raison d’être would be. To settle this mess by taking one side or the other would be to yield a great victory to the Manichaean Party at a great cost to Christian charity. That may be tempting to the people who run Wheaton simply because Manichaeanism is increasingly dominant on our political scene, but, for one thing, I don’t think that it will always be so dominant, and, for another, I don’t think Wheaton’s survival at that price would be worth it. What does it profit a college to achieve political unanimity but lose its soul?

FINAL WORD ON THIS, 2025-02-27: One of the leading critics of Wheaton from the Right, Eric Teetsel, says:

“The problem is people who intentionally undermine orthodox Christian teachings as affirmed in Wheaton College’s Statement of Faith, which every faculty member, staff member and student is required to sign … Those are guerrilla warriors for a progressive agenda. They are knowingly and intentionally and willfully undermining the Statement of Faith in their classrooms, and they tend to close the door just before they do it, because they know they’re doing it.”

My response is: Name names. Name the people who are “intentionally and willfully undermining the Statement of Faith,” and tell us which items in the Statement of Faith they are undermining. To say that you know that such people exist without naming them is the classic McCarthyite tactic: Ol’ Tail Gunner Joe liked to wave around his papers listing the “known Communists” in the U. S. State Department … but wouldn’t actually show anyone the papers. That’s what Teetsel is doing, to the letter. Name names, or else you’re just wantonly imperiling the careers of totally innocent people. You’re not a Christian critic of institutional drift, you’re an irresponsibly malicious gossip.