Agi Hammerthief wrote:Best solution: sign up with them, fuck around, get expelled for that, sue them over violating your rights.

Central to TWU’s Christian identity is its self-understanding as a persecuted community. (TWU President Bob) Kuhn calls us to be strong as a community because we are persecuted. To repeat the old adage: Christians are in the world, but are not of it. When the world resists the light and salt of the Christian faith, the Christian community must unite to protect its rights. The TWU community is never as confident of itself as when the media is persecuting it, for nothing else so powerfully affirms TWU in its separateness from the world. As Kuhn tells us, our “TWU community has a mission statement. That mission statement constitutes our purpose; why we exist; what sets us apart” [italics mine]. Had all the law societies initially approved of TWU’s bid for a law school, TWU would have suffered a crisis of identity—for TWU’s mission must run counter to the secular world, not run with it. Without the secular world’s “persecution,” opening a law school would hardly be a “Christian” undertaking.

TWU’s call to unity under the cause of the law school is so loud that is easy to forget that TWU is a university before it is a community. When we think about TWU as a community, it is almost necessary to forget that TWU is a university altogether, for these identities are irreconcilable. A Christian community, we know, is defined by and unified around its shared Christian values. However, TWU invites Christians and non-Christians alike, and in some media markets itself specifically to that latter group. TWU frequently publishes advertisements in secular media which emphasize its small class-sizes and the diversity of programs, while conveniently glossing over its religious affiliation. If TWU actively markets itself to non-Christians who then attend TWU, how can we consider TWU to be a “Christian” community? Do non-Christians qualify for only partial membership? If they do belong to TWU, then what unifies TWU as a community?

TWU defends its Christian values against persecution on the basis that these values are foundational to its “Christian community.” But if the student body is not unified as Christians behind those values, then for whom does TWU defend them? I believe that TWU has fabricated the idea of a “Christian community” in order to justify its defense of values that originate not with its students, but rather with the conservative administration that runs TWU. TWU’s community is merely a mythical front fabricated in order to justify the defense of Christian values against imagined persecution.

http://www.marshillonline.com/featured- ... community/

Shrunk wrote:An interesting article from what seems to be a TWU student newspaper:

Central to TWU’s Christian identity is its self-understanding as a persecuted community. (TWU President Bob) Kuhn calls us to be strong as a community because we are persecuted. To repeat the old adage: Christians are in the world, but are not of it. When the world resists the light and salt of the Christian faith, the Christian community must unite to protect its rights. The TWU community is never as confident of itself as when the media is persecuting it, for nothing else so powerfully affirms TWU in its separateness from the world. As Kuhn tells us, our “TWU community has a mission statement. That mission statement constitutes our purpose; why we exist; what sets us apart” [italics mine]. Had all the law societies initially approved of TWU’s bid for a law school, TWU would have suffered a crisis of identity—for TWU’s mission must run counter to the secular world, not run with it. Without the secular world’s “persecution,” opening a law school would hardly be a “Christian” undertaking.

TWU’s call to unity under the cause of the law school is so loud that is easy to forget that TWU is a university before it is a community. When we think about TWU as a community, it is almost necessary to forget that TWU is a university altogether, for these identities are irreconcilable. A Christian community, we know, is defined by and unified around its shared Christian values. However, TWU invites Christians and non-Christians alike, and in some media markets itself specifically to that latter group. TWU frequently publishes advertisements in secular media which emphasize its small class-sizes and the diversity of programs, while conveniently glossing over its religious affiliation. If TWU actively markets itself to non-Christians who then attend TWU, how can we consider TWU to be a “Christian” community? Do non-Christians qualify for only partial membership? If they do belong to TWU, then what unifies TWU as a community?

TWU defends its Christian values against persecution on the basis that these values are foundational to its “Christian community.” But if the student body is not unified as Christians behind those values, then for whom does TWU defend them? I believe that TWU has fabricated the idea of a “Christian community” in order to justify its defense of values that originate not with its students, but rather with the conservative administration that runs TWU. TWU’s community is merely a mythical front fabricated in order to justify the defense of Christian values against imagined persecution.

http://www.marshillonline.com/featured- ... community/

Shrunk wrote:I should mention that the latest round in this battle went to TWU, with the BC Court of Appeal ruling in its favour:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/bri ... e32613518/

This decision actually goes beyond the one from the lower court, stating that the Law Society violated TWU's charter rights, directly contradicting the Ontario decision. This will be going to the Supreme Court of Canada.

Nicko wrote: The article you posted does give grounds to think there might be some basis for challenging the validity of the Community Covenant directly, whether by a challenge to TWU's claim to be a religious community....

Just before Ashlee Davison helped bring home Trinity Western’s first ever Canadian university championship in women’s soccer, she received an e-mail informing her that she was under investigation for having a relationship with another woman.

Davison would graduate from the evangelical Christian university in 2006 as the team’s top goal scorer, but her memories of TWU are forever tainted by that e-mail and its aftermath. For breaking the school’s community covenant agreement, which forbids all sex outside of heterosexual marriage, she lost her scholarship, went on behavioural probation and was temporarily barred from the soccer pitch.

“I was allowed back on the team, but it was a much different experience this time around. I felt like I was being watched,” she said. “I can’t remember the early days of being there and feeling like I was just a normal, regular part of the team...”

http://www.theprovince.com/News/12441997/story.html

TWU spokeswoman Amy Robertson acknowledged that recent events show more needs to be done to make the school a welcoming place for everyone.

“President Bob Kuhn and TWU administration are taking recent stories from LGBTQ alumni very seriously, and are committed to listening. President Kuhn has been prioritizing meeting with students who wish to share their stories,” Robertson said in a written statement.

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:Kids go there because they live in the area and aren't moving away to go to school, not because they're devout.

Shrunk wrote:It's apparently a pretty good school. It's not like Liberty "University" or some place like that. And they seem quite happy to take the money of any sinner who wants to attend. So it is a problem they need to address if the ethos of the school itself does not reflect that of its paying customers. I suspect the anti-gay part of the Covenant will soon be dropped, no matter what the courts decide.

some fundie thought-nazi wrote:... reserve sexual expressions of intimacy for marriage ...

some fundie thought-nazi wrote:... sexual intimacy that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman ...

some fundie thought-nazi wrote:... reserve sexual expressions of intimacy for marriage ...

Trinity Western loses fight for Christian law school as court rules limits on religious freedom 'reasonable'

A B.C. Christian university has lost its legal battle over accreditation for a planned new law school, with a Supreme Court of Canada ruling today saying it's "proportionate and reasonable" to limit religious rights in order to ensure open access for LGBT students.

In a pair of 7-2 rulings, the majority of justices found the law societies of British Columbia and Ontario have the power to refuse accreditation based on Trinity Western University's so-called community covenant....

Trinity Western students won't have to sign covenant banning sex outside straight marriage

Students at Trinity Western University will no longer have to sign an agreement promising to abstain from all sex outside of heterosexual marriage.

The board of governors for the evangelical Christian university in Langley, B.C., voted on a motion Thursday to make the strict community covenant optional for students.

The motion said the change was made "in furtherance of our desire to maintain TWU as a thriving community of Christian believers that is inclusive of all students wishing to learn from a Christian viewpoint and underlying philosophy."

The change will come into effect beginning in the 2018-2019 school year, and applies to new and continuing students.

But faculty, staff and administrators will still have to sign the restrictive covenant, a school spokesperson confirmed....