Science
in Christian PerspectiveScience
in Christian Perspective
Books and Bread:
The Christian Academy and the Christian Lifestyle
M. HOWARD RIENSTRA
From: JASA 28
(March 1976): 27-32.
Introduction
Throughout this conference we have been discussing what our calling in Christ
requires of us in our present world situation. We have been examining the moral
requirements of our religious commitment. Furthermore, I am confident that we
have been serious about all of this and that we will not be content
with the temporary
guilt-relieving catharsis of our own rhetoric. We must sincerely hope
that whatever
understanding of the issues addressed at this conference may have
been achieved,
will now he communicated to the broader community of Christians as they and we
engage in the day to day struggle to be obedient and responsible. But who are
"we"? Although Calvin College is the host institution for
this conference,
"we" obviously and properly are not all from Calvin. "We"
aren't all from Christian institutions for higher education, nor are
"we"
all either students or teachers. Who then are "we"?
The Christian Academy
I should like to submit that "we" are all members of the
Christian Academy.
This is not to be confused with my secondary school alma mater in New Jersey,
Eastern Academy, nor with any national academy in this country or in any other.
The Christian Academy is not an institution. It does not have a campus. It is
not an academy of higher or lower anything. The Christian Academy is
not Reformed,
Catholic or Evangelical. The Christian Academy is not just another name for the
Christian church universal. Rather the Christian Academy is but a fragment of
that Christian church universal. The Christian Academy is an idea and an ideal
seeking fuller embodiment and realization.
The distinguishing characteristic of that fragment of the Christian
church universal
which we are calling the Christian Academy is its calling. The vocation of the
Christian Academy is to study the unchanging gospel of Jesus Christ
and to apply
that study to the ever changing circumstances of the secular. "We",
the memhers of the Christian Academy, have that vocation. "We" are
that fragment
of the total community of Christians who are called to use our
reading, our research,
our training, and our experience to instruct the total community.
"We"
are called to speak prophetically on the Christian's personal and
communal responsibility
to today's world. "We" may be theologians, housewives, philosophers,
poets, politicians, doctors, artists, astronauts, and yes, even historians. But
none of these kinds of specific callings is essential to our being part of the
Christian Academy. Rather what is essential is devotion to Christ and a total
commitment to integrate our faith with our learning and experience.
The Christian
Academy exists whenever and wherever such a vocation is manifest.
Obviously, not all Christians have such a calling. The Church of
Christ consists
of many who are legitimately and honestly serving God in factories,
fields, homes
and offices who have neither the inclination nor the opportunity to
read or study
extensively on the intellectual and moral dilemmas of our times. They properly
hope, or piously expect, that their fellow Christians who have the talents and
the time to spend with books and in study and writing will do so to
the advantage
of the total community. All Christians are responsible to discover God's will
for their lives and to apply that discovery to their everyday
circumstances. But
there are special responsibilities that arise out of the talents and
the opportunities
to fulfill those talents that God gives only to some. Those who have
these special
responsibilities within the Christian community, who have the vocation of study
and the like, are members of the Christian Academy regardless of
their occupation.
Thus "we" at this conference are members of the Christian
Academy regardless
of how we make our bread.
I have chosen to speak of the Christian Academy for several reasons. First, the
term academy is now virtually devoid of specific meaning. The idea of
an academy
is now evoked only vaguely in the variant forms of the
Colleges and universities and institutes are all limited by their peculiar historical origin and situation. None of them, therefore, is adequate to express the universal and timeless vocation of the Christian Academy.
term such as academic-to refer to an attitude, or academics-to refer to persons
professionally engaged in research or scholarship and occasionally
even teaching.
But the academy as such no longer exists. In its place we have such things as
universities, colleges, and institutes. These are institutional forms of what
among the Greeks was referred to as an academy. This is my second reason. The
term academy can yet express an idea and an ideal without being identified with
institutional limitations. Colleges and universities and institutes
are all limited
by their peculiar historical origin and situation. None of them, therefore, is
adequate to express the universal and timeless vocatio of the
Christian Academy.
The third reason arises out of the first two. Since the academy does not exist
and is, therefore, not limited by any set of institutional characteristics, it
is free directly to influence lifestyle. Colleges, universities, and institutes
are themselves products of lifestyles, and they tend to serve the lifestyles of
their historical situation. The academy is free to transcend
prevailing lifestyles
because it is not a product of them. Thus it is, conceptually at least, free to
be faithful to its vocation in Christ.
The service such a non-institutional form as the Christian Academy
would he able
to render is significant. It would serve the entire Christian
community by helping
it to transcend the usual self-serving shortsightedness of that community's own
historical particularity. More importantly for our present purposes,
the Christian
Academy would serve Christian institutions of learning by helping
them to transcend
the usual defects of elitism, professionalism, specialization, and
provincialism
or parochialism that otherwise limit their vocation in Christ. But
there is a paradox
lurking behind these observations to which we must be sensitive. I
will be suggesting
in what follows that the Christian Academy become more of a reality
than it presently
is; but it must never be institutionalized. The moment the Christian
Academy becomes
institutionalized would be the very moment that it would become a
university with
all its defects and limitations.
The University
The study of history, Livy has told us, is the best remedy for sick minds. In
the late 1960's there was a radical re-awakening of some historical
commonplaces
about the university (read schools, colleges, or institutes as appropriate to
the context). A medieval European innovation, the university was
designed to serve
the interests of the community which supported it whether that was the Church
or the secular state. A reciprocal relationship of service and dependence has
always existed between the university and society. That students at
Columbia and
elsewhere made this historical discovery in 1968 is testimony to the
deterioration
of historical studies and to the deceptive power of traditional rhetoric about
the university. The university has always been a mirror in which the prevailing values of society have
been reflected,
although with widely varying degrees of clarity. When these prevailing values
of society are in crisis, so too is the university which reflects
them. The hysteria
about the "politicization" of the university, which came about as a
consequence of a crisis in the prevailing value system of European
and North American
society in the late 1960's, has now subsided. However, this means little more
than that the university is again perpetuating the dominant value system, and
lifestyle, of European and North American society. To use the
prevailing jargon,
it has again been co-opted.
The instrument through which the university attempts to perform its service to
society is the curriculum. Some universities, typically American,
supplement the
curriculum with opportunities for counseling, recreation,
entertainment, housing,
eating, and worship; but the curriculum is still central. What is a curriculum?
It is a set of discrete and disparate, hopefully intellectual, experiences to
which the student is subjected during the period of his or her
enrollment. There
may or or may not be an organizing principle to these experiences. The case in
which an organizing principle can be seen most clearly is in those
technical studies
which are cumulative and lead to a problem-solving competence or skill such as
engineering or medicine. For the rest it seems most appropriate to invoke some
sort of "invisible hand" theory. It is piously hoped, even
if not confidently
expected, that when each professor and each discipline has done its
thing, there
will be some integrated positive product realized within the student. Even in
the best of cases, where there is a conceptually integrated curriculum based on
disciplines, no one would claim that graduates are better persons.
Probably less
than-10 percent of Calvin College's graduates do any serious and
systematic wrestling
with the kinds of moral dilemmas addressed in this conference, and the stimulus
for about half of that ten percent is probably extra-curricular. What possible
influence, then, does the university have on the lifestyles of its
members, both
faculty and students?
Purposes of Learning
An approach to answering this question may be to examine two alternative ideas
about the nature and purpose of learning. The one is the contemplative and the
other the active. In the Middle Ages and the Renaissance these were
simultaneously
lifestyles and philosophies of education.
The contemplative ideal is the disinterested pursuit of learning.
Goodness, truth
and beauty are sought for their own sake; not because they have some extrinsic
value or use. To be fully human is to desire them. The ideal sage or scholar is
one who subordinates everything in life to the acquiring of wisdom. Knowledge
and wisdom are intrinsically good. There is no specialization or
professionalism
that is compatible with the detached pursuit of truth, goodness, and
beauty. The
tradition of the liberal arts is part of this ideal. The study of
grammar, poetry,
history and moral philosophy are central to the realization of every person's
human potential. They are liberating even if they have no extrinsic
use or value
in the market place.
The active ideal, on the other hand, holds that there properly is a use for all
studies quite apart from their intrinsic merits or interest. The test
of the validity
of
M. Howard Rienstra is Professor of History at Calvin College. A graduate of Calvin College and the University of Michigan, Dr. Rienstra has studied in Italy on three occasions and published several articles relating to the Academy of the Lynxes (Rome), the world's first scientific society. On the faculty of Calvin College since 1957, he has also held elected office as a Grand Rapids City Commisioner since 1970. Among many civil rights involvements, he is currently secretary of the Michigan Advisory Commission to the United States Civil Rights Commission.
learning is the use to which it can be put in society, or, to put it
more crudely,
its market value. The test for grammar and rhetoric, for example, is in their
application to the end of some political or social good. All learning must be
interested, practical, and useful, and experience is the final
criterion of whether
it has worked. The emphasis falls on practice rather than theory.
However, neither of these ideals as they have been realized in the
modern university
have enabled that institution to be either truly detached or truly useful. It
is neither. The university remains a subservient institution of
society, contributing
its specialized and technical competencies to that society which maintains it.
Even the active ideal is distorted into a superficial pragmatism or
mindless busy-ness.
To the degree that the university orients it's curriculum toward
"careers" the
new in-term which means little more than getting jobs for its
graduates that pay
more than the jobs of non-graduates--it abandons detachment in favor of service
and subservience. To the degree that it seeks detachment it confronts both the
criticism of those who wish it to be politically and morally engaged, and the
criticism of those who wish it to guarantee jobs for it's graduates. There is,
therefore, little more that the modern university does than serve the cultural
and social expectations of the society which maintains it. Not even
the occasional
riots and the allegations that universities are seedbeds of
revolution are convincing
evidence to the contrary. In both developed and underdeveloped countries these
phenomena arise more out of the anxieties of late adolescence of some students
and faculty members than out of a truly revolutionary commitment. They are more
romantic than revolutionary.
We must now ask what possible influence the university may have on
the lifestyle
of its graduates? A satisfactory answer to this question will be hard to find
because all possible answers have been the subject of controversy for
centuries.
We might begin by gaining unanimous consent to the proposition that it would be
the ultimate in naiveté to assume that words of truth are automatically
translated into acts of truth. To assume that persons act
consistently with what
they know to be right or just is to fly in the face of reality.
Surely no Calvinist
would make such a mistake. But what about other kinds or degrees of
possible influence
of the university on lifestyles? I must confess that I am not acquainted with
the research that has been done on this question. I would be immodest enough to
guess, however, that the impact of the university as such, apart from
the specific
impact of one course or of one faculty member, is either neutral or negative.
There are so many other influences on a person in the building of his lifestyle that the university must be seen to have only a
fragmentary
and limited role. One hardly need be a cynic to suspect that the philandering
and alcoholic lifestyles of some faculty and administrators may have a greater,
although negative, impact on students than all their books and
exhortations. The
scant ability of the university to have a positive impact on values
and life styles
is due primarily to the simple fact that it does not represent or
embody a unified
idea, ideal or commitment. There is no moral commitment apart from a
vague academic
one or the personal moral commitments of the members who compose it. Nor does
it have a positive religious commitment unless it be a vague secular humanism.
But even this would be contradicted by the individual commitments of particular
faculty members in the direction either of absolute libertarianism or
of sectarianism.
But in neither case is there a unified commitment which would be
expected to influence
lifestyles positively.
The Christian University
We have been using the generic term 'university' to refer to all
colleges, universities,
and institutes. We must now consider the Christian university, and to do so we
will examine Calvin College specifically. Does Calvin College as an example of
the Christian university have a positive influence on the value
systems and lifestyles
of its graduates? Is Calvin College an exception to what is true
about the modern
university? The answer, unsurprisingly, is yes and no.
The curriculum of Calvin does have a conceptual unity at its base. The student
is exposed to the several kinds of intellectual disciplines so that he or she
may emerge, regardless of vocational interest, reasonably well
informed and equipped
to understand life in all its complexity. This is a good starting
point for possibly
influencing students' lifestyles through curriculum.
Long before the design of this recent curriculum was the basic
religious commitment
that led to the establishment of Calvin College. That commitment,
which has permeated
the teaching of all the disciplines from the inception of the
college, has often
been referred to as the Calvinist life and world view. The Christian's calling
in life is one of total obedience and total service to Christ within
the context
of the historical. All learning was to be brought into conformity
with the revealed
truth of God in Scripture and in Creation. Although variously
formulated in different
periods of the history of the college, the basic commitment has been
to God-centered
learning and living. The life and world view is a total commitment in
the classroom
and out.
Honesty and historical fairness require, however, the admission that
the faculty
has not always fulfilled this commitment with equal thoroughness,
equal theoretical consistency, nor with equal competence. Some members of the
faculty were
and are mere professional technicians, some were and are unexcited by
the vision,
and some were and are doggedly holding on to their salaries while
devoting their
primary energies to other activities. Similarly, we must acknowledge
that Calvin's
students have not all been equally receptive to this religious starting point
for their studies. Some impatiently have wanted to attain their
professional goal
or job; others have hated grammar whether it was to God's glory or
not; and still
others found the greatest issues of life coming to expression on a weekend date
or on the basketball court. But given these frailties of both faculty
and students,
the religious distinctiveness of Calvin has still with remarkable consistency
come through in the classroom, studio, and laboratory. Although
sometimes dimmed
by the press of everyday reality, a religious commitment has been evident, and
a life arid world view has been articulated and expressed.
Note, however, that the college did not invent this commitment or this life and
world view. Rather Calvin was given the responsibility within the
historical context
of a denomination to develop and communicate that commitment. There
was a broader
community of Christians who created the institution and asked that institution
to serve them by being faithful to the religious commitment and by creatively
applying that commitment to the complex world of learning. This was a practical
responsibility. That community of Christians wanted pastors, teachers, doctors,
and the like. The college was to provide the technical studies appropriate to
these callings in life, but more than the technical studies. The
community wanted
pastors, teachers, doctors, and the like who were committed to the
life and world
view. The religious commitment of the college was to be integrated
with its practical
service. Neither without the other would be Calvin College, or any
Christian college
for that matter.
The faculty too was to embody these dual qualities that for brevity we may call
competence and commitment. Excellence was sought in both, but in
crisis commitment
took priority. While there have been variations in the quality of
both commitment
and competence, there was clearly more variation in the latter than
in the former.
There have been many instances in which highly qualified scholars have either
not been considered for appointment, or after consideration have been rejected
because their religious commitment was not adequate to or compatible with the
demands of the college. On the other hand, the demands of commitment together
with denominational loyalty have been strengths helping the college
achieve academic
excellence. Many have come to teach and to study at Calvin, precisely because
of the centrality of commitment, who otherwise would have been
attracted to more
prestigious and better paying institutions.
We have, therefore, a college that expresses a particular religious commitment
not only in the curriculum, but also in the approach to each of the disciplines
and in the conduct of every classroom. From the perspective of the
modern university
this is not merely different, but probably a disaster. Merely to mention that
we really are still a denominational college is to evoke laughter or cynicism.
The picture typically conjured in the viewpoint of the modern
university is that
we must be an authoritarian, narrow-minded, un-American, sectarian,
middle-class, racist
and bigoted throwback to the Middle Ages. To have an institution of
higher learning
subservient to a denomination and to a specific religious commitment is simply
stupid.
There is an interesting and important element to this point of view whether it
is politely or crudely expressed. Calvin College is what its support community
both demands and permits it to be. If Calvin were not such a reflection of the
religious commitment that gave it birth, and of the denomination that supports
it, it would then be a classical example of deception and hypocrisy.
Just as the
university reflects the character of the community that supports it,
so too does
a Christian college such as Calvin.
What is Calvin College? Descriptively, it is a denominational liberal
arts college
known for the rigor of its academic program and for theological conservatism.
It has a suburban campus which generally exudes an atmosphere of
White, Protestant,
Middle Class morality and respectability. In all these respects the
college mirrors
either the character or the expectations of the denomination that maintains it.
Calvin thus reflects and expresses the prevailing commitment and the prevailing
lifestyle of the broader community. Calvin builds on the commitment
and the lifestyle
already established in the Christian homes, schools, and churches
that have previously
been a part of the lives of its students and faculty. How could it do
otherwise?
How could it change or create positive alternatives to these original and prior
expressions of the commitment? Calvin's role is to strengthen, enrich, deepen,
clarify, and expand the commitment, not to change it. Calvin, just as the modem
university, is limited by its historical situation. We might almost say that it
is compromised by that situation. The very commitment that is central to it-the
very life and world view of Calvinism-is an historically contingent expression
of the Christian faith.
The vocatio of the Academy
Since it is conceivable, at least, that total obedience to Christ may
demand something
other than the comfortable pew and the middle class conformity of our present
situation, we should return to our definition of the Christian Academy. Central
to the Christian Academy is the vocatio to serve Christ in the midst
of the ever
changing circumstances of our secular condition. That vocatio is to work for a
specifically Christian understanding of the whole creation, and to
give leadership
to other Christians on what such understanding entails for the
Christian's service
to God in his daily life. Everyone participating in this conference
has expressed
this vocatio in some way. The next question is how can Calvin College
more fully
realize, or even embody, the vocatio of the Christian Academy? Will such fuller
realization produce a more positive faithfulness of Christians in
their lifestyles?
Are either of these even desirable?
There are three grounds for an affirmative response to these questions. First,
Calvin's faculty has attained a level of scholarly activity within
their respective
disciplines that is quite simply impressive. The college has consistently, in
recent years at least, encouraged faculty members to develop their specialized
research potentials. There may be heard a grumble or two that the policies promoting professional development have been too
cautious, but such
comments are much less commonly heard these days. But there is another kind of
scholarly activity of the faculty also consistently encouraged, and
that is scholarly
work in the integrating of commitment with competence, faith with
learning. Here
too some impressive things have been produced. Both kinds of scholarly activity
are essential to meeting the institutional goals of the college, and to perform
its service. But there is a weakness.
The weakness may best be explained by reference to what on all
accounts is a dramatic
demonstration of the competence and the commitment of the faculty.
I'm referring
to the work of Nick Woltersdorff in the Philosophy department. Other examples
could be chosen from members in that or other departments in the college, but
Nick's work is most recent and best known among us. His exciting work
on the relationship
of religious commitment to all theory building activities has been a positive
stimulus on this campus and on the campuses of several other
Christian colleges,
and most recently at the conference of Reformed institutions of
higher education
held at Potschefstrom. In preparing this theory of theories Nick has
enjoyed the
stimulus and the critical encouragement of his colleagues in the
Philosophy department.
The operation of that department in giving critical encouragement to each other
is unique with the college. But despite all of that, the theory is
still Nick's.
It is his idea and before it can become a part of all our thinking, it demands
further criticism, elaboration, and application to other disciplines.
Our enthusiastic
applause when he had done speaking about it is not enough. There must
be a continuing
forum in which an individual's contribution can become a part of our communal
understanding and commitment. Here is our weakness. Even on scholarly projects
which specifically relate faith to learning we have been too individualistic.
A beginning of a communal activity in this regard has been made with
Nick's contribution,
but that beginning must he encouraged, expanded, and applied to other
areas. Calvin
merely does what universities do when it supports and encourages
individual scholarship.
Calvin must encourage communal study of problems relating commitment
to competence
and lifestyle if it will he true to its Christian vocatio and potential.
My second ground for answering in the affirmative that Calvin should seek more
fully to realize the Christian Academy comes from a totally different
direction.
Orlando Fals Borda is a Protestant sociologist from Columbia who is best known
in scholarly circles for his work on peasant life in his native country. He has
an international reputation, but I wish to speak about him because he
has expressed
with such clarity the tensions that his scholarship and his Christian
faith have
produced in his life. His view of the university is devastating. In both North
and South America he sees the university as devoted to justifying the
social order
of a given historical moment. (See a summary of his ideas in Denis
Goulet, A New
Moral Order. New York: Orbis, 1974. Chap. III) The same is true of professional
scholarship. Thus he found his Christian commitment to social justice
to he incompatible
with his aspirations to scholarship and university teaching. He had to choose
between being a detached scholar or an active revolutionary
intellectual. He could
not be
The articulation of a Christian vision and of Christian answers to the moral dilemmas of our age is the responsibility of the total Christian Academy - both Protestant and Catholic.
both. He had to choose between being an institutionally successful professional
or a marginalized outcast. Why did he have to make such choices? Why don't we?
The answer lies in his situation as a Third World Christian. But the
painful tensions
he has faced may also be instructive to us in our apparently more comfortable
accommodation to scholarship, professionalism, and the like.
Orlando Fals Borda is one of many Latin American scholars, both Protestant and
Catholic, who have developed what is being called Liberation Theology
and Development
Ethics. For several years now I have been reading in this literature and having
fragments of conversations with colleagues and students about it. I am troubled
by it. I am uncomfortable with some of their exegetical and
theological studies.
I am conscience-stricken by the totality of the demands of their
ethics. I am attracted
to their goals of social justice. They seem to he reading the Bible
out of a totally
different historical perspective than mine. Is this an authentic orthodoxy which
may lead to an authentic orthopraxis? To whom can I turn for answer
or discussion?
To books? What is the perspective of those who comment on Liberation Theology?
Some denounce it as vaguely concealed Marxism. Others praise it as
the first steps
toward the realization of the Kingdom of God historically. The truth
doesn't necessarily
lie somewhere between. This fragment of the body of Christ institutionalized at
Calvin College must become engaged with those fragments with like
faith-commitments
throughout the Third World. We need each other and need to understand
each other.
To transcend the limitations of our specialization, professionalism,
and the very
historical perspective that informs most of our studies is the vocatio of the
Christian Academy. Obedience and faithfulness to Christ require this
kind of transcendence
of its own historicity even of Christian institutions.
A third ground for an affirmative response is to note a newly
emerging sensitivity
to the global dimensions of the Christian faith. That which Christ inaugurated
is coming to fulfillment in new and exciting ways in our own times. The life and
world view that I came to understand during my student days at Calvin
had a very
small world at its base. It was a Western Civ. world with some
romantically enticing
involvement with Greenland's Icy mountains and Africa's sunny clime.
Furthermore,
it was a Protestant world. Now Nick Woltersdorff can return from South Africa
and tell us with a sense of discovery about struggling Calvinists and
struggling
Christian colleges and seminaries throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America. To
our embarrassment, the faculty shared the excitement of his discovery because
our world view had been too small. There is a growing body of both Protestant
and Catholic thinkers about history who are insisting that Christians must be
working to realize the Kingdom of God historically in acts of love and deeds of
justice. In all of this new sense of unity, expectation and urgency there is a challenge
to the older
and more affluent Christians. Are we so attached to the comfortableness of our
historical situation that we cannot discover how to help our brothers in Christ
who are physically and politically oppressed? How can we make sense out of the
confusing and contradictory reality of history? Is Christ still the Lord? What
are we then required to do? For Calvin College to be able to handle
the ecumenical
and global scope of such inquiries, it must bring together within
itself representatives
of that global faith coming to realization. For this purpose it needs
the Christian
Academy to transcend institutional limitations.
Conclusion
In order to fulfill the potential of its own history, and
to more fully realize within itself the vocatio of the Christian
Academy, Calvin
must gather within itself a community of Christian scholars and
activists to address
themselves on a continuing basis to the intellectual and moral
challenges facing
Christians in this age. Conferences are but beginnings. The curriculum is too
fragmented and professionalized. Individual scholarship, however
worthy and relevant,
does not influence lifestyles until accepted and applied communally.
The articulation
of a Christian vision and of Christian answers to the moral dilemmas of our age
is the responsibility of the total Christian Academy both Protestant
and Catholic.
The acceptance of that responsibility by Calvin College and other
Christian institutions
will enable them more fully to integrate life and learning,
competence and commitment, books and bread.
Notes
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Notes
JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN SCIENTIFIC AFFILIATION