Bob Jones, an Evangelical powerhouse analogous to Liberty University today, forbade white students and faculty from dating or marrying Black people. That was really the major issue that got us all involved.. In a way, its as unexpected as it would be for. Now the university has announced that its polices were wrong. And don't they ever wonder what they're missing, what possibilities lie in the conversations of the flesh? The lips of the girls rushing from one class to another glisten red and ripe, their long nails are painted every possible shade of passion. She whispers sweet nothings in my ear. Not wanting to be too blatant, they proceed staring straight ahead until they are dead even with us. Just yesterday, the Alliance Defending Freedoms Casey Mattox urged the House Judiciary Committee to remove Christian colleges from a public Department of Education list of institutions that have received exemptions from Title IX. Bibb Graves, who had just been elected governor of Alabama with the official backing of the Ku Klux Klan, gave the keynote address at the groundbreaking ceremony. When the school's appeal finally reached the Supreme Court in 1982, the Reagan administration announced that it planned to argue in defense of . This represented quite a change from the old days, when the studentbody was more denominationally diverse. Education. By FITSNEWS || Bob Jones University (BJU) - the Upstate, S.C. social conservative school best known for its recently rescinded ban on interracial dating - is The chairman of the board and the hardline faction leader, John Lewis, is a retired pastor of IFB churches in Guam and Michigan. Bob Jones University, the Bible college in Greenville, South Carolina, did not admit black students until the 1970s. "I've seen what it does to people, how they're always unhappy, always unsatisfied, always searching. It's something you decide to do. The universitys founder, Bob Jones, was a fundamentalist evangelist who believed that the theory of evolution was an abomination. 2000 Bob Jones III drops school's interracial dating ban. (Easter Egg: you can spot a very young Paul Matzko for approximately 0.3 seconds in the corner of a crowd shot in this, about the Soviet persecution of Russian Baptists. It brings into sight a centurys worth of cultural change and class contest. In exchange, staff salaries were low, exit rare, and loyalty expected. , presumably.) In the early 21st century, these latent tensions were still thick on the ground. "I made it at Bob Jones," she says. I've trod among the well-groomed Christian scholars as they herd to morning chapel, clutching dogeared Bibles, all of them sharing at least one thing -- their love of and trust in God. Please, brought down the mandolin-strumming president of a college that once billed itself as the Worlds Most Unusual University., But many in the network of fundamentalist pastors that are a major pipeline for incoming BJU students viewed the display in less metaphorical, , calling it blasphemous, gross, too feminine, and what happens when Christians model their college programs after those of sodomites. Facing widespread queer panic among stakeholders, university President Steve Pettit put out a. condemning the show as clearly sacrilegious and blasphemous. But the statement came too late, and with inadequate brimstone, to appease the hardliners. It must be theological compromise of the highest order! ", Instead the line is drawn for them, and although it seems to an outsider that drawing it before the hand-holding stage is somewhat drastic, they disagree. "If you're witnessing to a model, and you look like mud, she's not going to listen. As both a historian of 20th century religion in America and as an alumnus of Bob Jones University, Im somewhat uniquely qualified to walk you through the ultimate causes of the late unpleasantness. Bob Jones University is a fundie school located in Greenville, South Carolina.It was founded by Methodist evangelist Bob Jones, Sr. and is now led by former evangelist Steve Pettit, the first president of the college not in the Jones family. In 1976, during the administration of Gerald Ford, the policy on interracial dating resulted in the Internal Revenue Services revoking the tax-exempt status of Bob Jones University retroactive to 1970. The campus was separated from the city of Greenville by an iron and barbed-wire fence. whenever their team comes from behind to tie the game. Carlos Salinas is tough and wiry, his smile confident, his brown eyes direct in their gaze. We are still holding hands, but Michelle determinedly doesn't notice. ), Religious Education. Dr. Bob Jones Jr., the chancellor and board chairman of Bob Jones University in Greenville, S.C., who in the late 1970's forfeited his college's Federal tax exemption rather than. Many of them are the issue of a Bob Jones marriage, coming to the convent from the cloister, the Bible Belt equivalent of the old-boy network. You could get whiplash, one moment listening to sermonizing about the incipient dangers of worldlinessthe sinful spirit of lying in waitand then seeing, emblazoned over a classroom chalk board, a popular. )B7= Disagreements over changes made at the school during the eight-year tenure of Steve Pettit, the school's fifth president and first from outside the Jones family, broke out following an October 4 board meeting in which some board . When it is mentioned that this seems somewhat incongruous, what with the emphasis put on avoiding temptation, much less provoking it, it turns out there has been a misapprehension. The students may not dance or even listen to country and western music, and rock 'n' roll is "the music of bestial sex. The school had been organized along the lines of a New South mill town, a place in which everything was owned and operated by the company. The aspirations and fears of fundamentalists past continue to haunt those who remain at what truly is the worlds most unusual university. (And this despite the SBC being more consistently conservative today than it was in the 1960s.) I'm laid back and get along with everyone. Rock music was prohibited on campus. Sound like a stretch? Young Love. In 2005 I earned a Master's Degree in German from . For example, a crown-of-thorns haloed model strode the cat walk wearing a coat stained blood red, a visual representation of a crucified Christ who, in Foxxs words, covered our sinscompletely and fully like a wrap coat covers the body completely and fully.. Although its discriminatory policies preceded desegregation, historian Randall Balmer has noted that it lost its non-profit status due to President Nixons crackdown on so-called segregation academies. (Among those segregation academies: Jerry Falwells Lynchburg Christian School.) Ninety years after Bob Jones University opened its doors in the Florida panhandle in 1927, Bob Jones University President Steve Pettit said the importance of BJU is as great as ever. I've weaved my way down the yellow brick walkways that slice through almost-too-green grass. In their home towns they attended small, independent churches with names like Mount Bethel Baptist Church, the Gospel Mission Church, the Church of Everlasting Salvation. Bob Jones Jr. died in 1997. Anti-Catholicism was an ordinary topic of chapel messages, yet the university owns the largest. Bob Jones received numerous warnings from the federal government and ignored each of them, but when the IRS finally rescinded its status the religious right reacted with outrage, as Balmer recounts: As Elmer L. Rumminger, longtime administrator at Bob Jones University, told me in an interview, the IRS actions against his school alerted the Christian school community about what could happen with government interference in the affairs of evangelical institutions. This change of heart at Bob Jones University comes on the heels of recent good news about black enrollments at the nations other Bible colleges. The last Jones was eased out as the university board jonesed for a fresh face. Certainly, while I was there, the highest aspiration of a Bob Jones University student was to be considered a renaissance man, someone who combined religious ardor with scholastic aptitude, physical fitness, and artistic and dramatic finesse. Unfortunately the comments quoted in The Journal article leave room for doubt regarding the sincerity of this attempt. Now financially sound, the college began to offer masters and doctoral degrees and assumed the designation of a university. IFB dominance wasnt confined to the studentbody; the university board was also mostly IFB. ", Besides, says Don Allen, who with his crew cut and snappy jacket and sunrise smile looks like a suddenly resurrected '50s dreamboat of the Tab Hunter variety, "You get to know someone on a very, very strong basis, on an intellectual and emotional basis. In any case, the lack of formal denominationalism means that fundamentalist disputes tend to get particularly messy. Bob Jones University Apologizes for Its Racist Past Bob Jones University, the Bible college in Greenville, South Carolina, did not admit black students until the 1970s. The universitys mishandling of sexual abuse allegations made national headlines, a fundamentalist canary in a pre-Me Too coal mine. This led to odd juxtapositions. Evangelicals still fear secular interference with sacred affairs. When he entered what is now Birmingham-Southern College, he caught a glimpse of the way college education could open a door to middle class status and social respectability. SALON is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark of Salon.com, LLC. Not at all. Anti-Catholicism was an ordinary topic of chapel messages, yet the university owns the largest collection of Baroque religious art outside of the Vatican, with a particular focus on the Old Masters and Counter-Reformational paintings! In so doing, we failed to accurately represent the Lord and to fulfill the commandment to love others as ourselves. "The temptation always exists; if you play with fire you're going to get burned," says Tim Cline, who by his own admission had fallen into wicked ways in high school, drinking and smoking and chasing after what pass for fast women in Logan, W.Va. "No one's ever satisfied with just holding hands. Were it not for the rise of the Christian homeschooling movement, Bob Jones University might have closed down then. daily hair checks at chapel, no women in pants, no contemporary christian music, and so on. President Jones stated, For almost two centuries American Christianity, including BJU in its early stages, was characterized by the segregationist ethos of American culture. Gordon and Alicia Wimers are pleased to report that 100 souls now gather on their veranda on Sunday mornings, when it doesn't rain, that is, and they are building a temporary church of mud and brick with a metal roof, and for this Laura Wood gives praise. It is a complex, three-part maneuver: First, from afar, they acknowledge us with a sort of surprised recognition. (Its all but impossible to imagine pentecostals at BJU today!) That tension was never fully resolved, except perhaps in the personalities of the Jones family itself. The campus curfew is 10:25 p.m., and small-group prayer lasts until 10:45 p.m. A bell signifies lights out at 11 p.m. Then we visit the library, where I do a quick flip through the BJU yearbooks. Sometimes, that meant going to truly ludicrous lengths, like when the campus chief of police applied for a machine gun permit in order to deter any potential anti-Vietnam war protestors from invading the campus. This space has been changed to students services, (Hub) staff offices & the executive wing. The imbroglio began with a student fashion show in December 2021. This is no longer much fun, for I am suddenly the unwelcome minority. Jones had always been a prodigious fundraiser; and in short order, Pettit proved to be apt in that regard himself, shoring up university finances while pulling on his informal network of churches to bolster student enrollment. March 7, 2000 / 9:39 PM / CBS/AP. "But it turned out that Barry Manilow was just as bad as all the rest." Its embedded deep into the movements rhetoric and political priorities. But they like it as well because Bob Jones, with its vast auditorium and its award-winning film department and its playing fields and Shakespeare productions, its musical societies and operas, has a grandeur, a physical proof of the blessing of God's bounty, that the tiny little churches along the two-lane roads didn't have, where all the preaching and praying and hymn-singing in the world doesn't quite disguise the fact that if Jesus loves the saved in this life he doesn't seem to have much against the sinners. Looking at us, students probably can't even decide what issue to worry about first -- that we're an interracial couple, that we're making a public display of affection or that we might be from "60 Minutes," shooting low-resolution videos from our secret eyeglass cameras. Rich woman - statement about interracial dating ban on interracial dating university's president, a long court decision in greenville, non-denominational evangelical . Three days later, Dr. Bob clarified his statement, saying that students would need to submit a signed parental consent form to the dean before the school would allow them to commingle. Salinas is a Mexican-American from Phoenix; his parents were divorced when he was 9 and his mother worked two jobs to support 13 members of the family. Denise and I pick a spot heavy with cross-campus traffic and sit close together, making a point of flashing our pearly whites and laughing with the jolly, carefree mirth of young interracial love. BJU walked an uneasy middle ground when it came to cultural engagement. It found it in Steve Pettit. The students at Bob Jones University are almost all, like me, white. %PDF-1.7 % Experience. The rules, says Beam, "make you look at things though the school's eyes, so when we leave, we'll look at the world through the Lord's." In an eloquent statement, Stephen Jones, great-grandson of the founder and the fourth president of Bob Jones University, has apologized for the institutions racist past. You get to know the substance of a person. The trip will cost her $900, and already she has received $500 in anonymous contributions from fellow students who have heard of her trip and know that she cannot afford to go without help. He has "I love you" written in ink on his hand and she has "I love you" written in ink on hers. Answer (1 of 9): I graduated back in 1976, so this answer is a bit dated. He owns his non-mention radiometric dating how to the university is an enormous, willie nelson, a partner and stories; callahan, on jesus and the leader. So Denise and I hit the campus grounds on foot, tucked and buttoned into our Sunday best and full of ersatz evangelical zeal. It finally entered the 20 th century, just as the 21 st . In 1946 construction began on the 210-acre campus in Greenville, South Carolina. I went to BJ because I wanted to. How long will they have too wait? 30 views Jim Fri, 08/10/18 5:19 am This is NOT the Babylon Bee folks! It wasn't discussed at my school. It was a near total corporate welfare loop: one could be born in the university hospital on one of the most comprehensive healthcare plans outside of the VA; schooling was free (but compulsory) for faculty children; there was subsidized on-campus housing; attendance at Sunday morning church services was mandatory; and the university operated a radio station, dairy farm, and retirement home. There was a literal dating parlorthough we called it the land of coucheswhere students could get not-too-cozy under the eye of spinster chaperones. Sure, says Lisa Dale, a junior majoring in English, it's hard sometimes, especially when a friend on campus has a male relative visiting her and you see them embrace and the frustration level just goes off the charts. To say that people are going to die and go to Hell who have never had a chance to be saved is to our shame," she says sadly. Chaste Cheerleaders. I was more conservative than my evangelical church. I went in as a fundamentalist zealot, and came out a Calvinist rebel. "It was God who gave us the cars, even though half the students here can't afford even one." In a way, Jones Sr. replicated his own experience of college while setting up BJU, which was then mostly frozen in amber until the 21st century. Victory comes by ruining the public image of the targeted party. 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