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Christian fraternity stays
A federal appeals court last week ordered the University of Florida to recognize Beta Upsilon Chi, a Christian fraternity, while a trial court hears arguments over the university’s decision to deny the Christian fraternity official recognition.
According to The Independent Florida Alligator, the campus student newspaper, the University of Florida has refused to recognize Beta Upsilon Chi as an official student group because its requirement that members be Christians violates the university’s policy on religious discrimination. With the help of the Christian Legal Society and the Alliance Defense Fund, the fraternity sued the university for discrimination in a federal lawsuit.
In a free society, Christians and other groups should be free to associate and be recognized on college campuses. The central issue, of course, is that with recognition comes access to state government funding. It’s an odd case given the fact that every fraternity discriminates against women. Is that not in violation of the school’s discrimination standards?
However, could this lawsuit have been avoided? It may be better for Christian fraternities to remain Christian but not require a profession of faith in order to join.
If a non-Christian wants to join a Christian fraternity that is a good thing, right? What better way to share the gospel with people than have them join your Christian fraternity? I say, let the non-Christians join, room with Christians, attend Bible studies, worship services, missions trips, accountability groups, prayer times, road trips to hear John Piper, and so on. Why not? It’s not a church but a campus organization where the fraternity men are all missionaries.
Are non-Christians lining up to join Christian fraternities and organizations on other campuses? For example, are Christian colleges being flooded with non-Christian applicants? Doubt it. Why would Christians not want non-Christians to be in their fraternity? Or better yet, why would a non-Christian even want to join?
If Christians would think missionally about their campus groups perhaps they could avoid these types of lawsuits altogether. (Of course, there are some non-missional Christians I’ve heard who also don’t believe that Christian kids should attend “secular” universities at all, but that’s a separate issue.)
What if Beta Upsilon Chi was so missional that it was burdened not to simply accrue status for themselves as “Christians” but to serve the University of Florida and renew the campus for Christ socially, spiritually, and culturally? That is, remain faithfully Christian but create space for the Holy Spirit to use the organization to draw people to the Father and renew the campus. There would be no need for lawsuits.
back to top12 Comments to “Christian fraternity stays”
Quotes taken out of context from one of the links in this post. (Feel free to flame me for pulling stuff out of context. However, you might want to think about what I pulled in the context of how many people conduct themselves on this web site.)
The disadvantage was that Christian morality without gospel-changed hearts often led to cruelty and hypocrisy.
…the church often was silent against abuses of power of the ruling classes over the weak.
The missional church avoids ‘tribal’ language, stylized prayer language, unnecessary evangelical pious ‘jargon’, and archaic language that seeks to set a ’spritual tone.’
• The missional church avoids ‘we-them’ language, disdainful jokes that mock people of different politics and beliefs, and dismissive, disrespectful comments about those who differ with us
• The missional church avoids sentimental, pompous, ‘inspirational’ talk . Instead we engage the culture with gentle, self-deprecating but joyful irony the gospel creates. Humility + joy = gospel irony and realism.
• The missional church avoids ever talking as if non-believing people are not present. If you speak and discourse as if your whole neighborhood is present (not just scattered Christians), eventually more and more of your neighborhood will find their way in or be invited. • Unless all of the above is the outflow of a truly humble-bold gospel-changed heart, it is all just ‘marketing’ and ’spin.’
• Finally, Christians will have to use the gospel to demonstrate true, Biblical love and ‘tolerance’ in “the public square” toward those with whom we deeply differ. This tolerance should equal or exceed that which opposing views show toward Christians. The charge of intolerance is perhaps the main ‘defeater’ of the gospel in the non-Christian west.
• In Christendom, when ‘everyone was a Christian’ it was necessary (perhaps) for a church to define itself over against other churches. That is, to get an identity you had to say, “we are not like that church over there, or those Christians over here.” • Today, however, it is much more illuminating and helpful for a church to define itself over against ‘the world’–the values of the non-Christian culture. It is very important that we not spend our time bashing and criticizing other kinds of churches. That simply plays in to the common ‘defeater’ that Christians are all intolerant.
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Anthony makes a reasonable suggestion that the fraternity permit both believers and non-believers to become members. Could you imagine if a secular fraternity did not allow Christians to become members? There might be an equal outcry from Christians (and rightfully so).
There is an Islamic Sorority with around 6 chapters throughout the United States called Gamma Gamma Chi. The Sororities standards are based on Islamic values but is open to both muslim and non-muslim women. This sounds far more inviting and open than an exclusive Fraternity just for christian men.
However, God put Beta Upsilon Chi on someone’s heart to start and if this is Gods design for His campus ministry, then who are we to criticize their requirements. If I were a member, my biggest concern regarding non-believing members would be that non-believers might be more apt to give the Fraternity a bad name. In fact, there could be some students who carry a hatred of christianity that might become members just to destroy from within. Christians can do enough destroying on their own, they don’t need the help of hard hearted pagans to assist them.
A Church’s doors should be open to all who may come. But membership requires a profession of faith. Perhaps there is a line the fraternity can draw between keeping their rules for membership, but permitting all who will come to come. That is probably the best answer for all.
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Where are the cries about an activist judiciary?
University policy requires that organizations not discriminate on the basis of religion as a condition of receiving state funding. Under the Supreme Court’s standard expressed in Smith, such a rule does not violate the free exercise clause of the First Amendment.
I find it interesting that the arguments proffered by ADF mirror those proffered by liberals in abortion-related litigation. Why do evangelicals howl against unenumerated rights in one context, but claim unenumerated rights for themselves in other contexts?
This case again demonstrates that evangelicals in America are not merely interested in a place in the public square. Rather, they want the government to confer upon them a privileged status within the public square.
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I think that a Christian fraternity should allow non-Christians in, but not into leadership. If the leadership loses its worldview, then the whole group will too.
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Maybe I’m mistaken, but I thought the whole purpose of fraternities was to be able to choose your own members and set your own criteria.
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Just another way for Christians to act worldly without admitting that they’re worldly. There’s already a Christian fraternity, it’s call The Church.
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I guess black frats and student unions will just have to go since you can’t discriminate based on race? This is nonsense. Private organizations can discriminate any way they wish because we, as Americans, have a constitutionally right to associate with whoever we wish.
Country clubs can exclude Jews if they wish – Jewish ones don’t let in Goys either. Gays are out of the Scouts. You have to have a religion to be a Shriner.
It is only the left that tries to discriminate against anyone today and this is another prime example where they are trying to keep Christians from doing what anyone else can do legally as a God given right under the Constitution.
Being a Christian and turning the other cheek by saying they should let non Christians join a Christian Frat is total nonsense and should never ever be allowed.
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Next thing you know you will become brain dead enough to allow atheists join your church and preach in it as your pastor.
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Amen, Llama.
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I suspect part of the difficulty of the Christian frat opening up to non-Christians is what happens when a non-believer becomes a leader, and is not Christian? Just like most of the original colleges and universities in the country, gradually led away from the faith.
Being missional for the frat might be a good thing. Or it might be a way for some folks to stay true to Christ in the midst of a pagan land.
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#1, Random Name:
Nice way of addressing the post…without addressing the topic at hand. Maybe next time we’ll actually hear your thoughts?
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frats are places for zeroes to meet other zeroes.
by that token it’s a wonder there aren’t more christian fraternities.
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