Trinity University is a “private, independent” institution of higher learning in San Antonio, Texas. It was started by the Cumberland Presbyterian Church back in 1869, and for a century was identified with Presbyterianism (its campus was moved to the city in 1941 when it “accepted an invitiation [sic] from the San Antonio Chamber of Commerce to establish a strong Protestant institution of higher learning in the Alamo city”). Now, however, according to the San Antonio Express-News, Muslim students are asking that the school not remind them of its kafir past:
A group of students at Trinity University is lobbying trustees to drop a reference to “Our Lord” on their diplomas, arguing it does not respect the diversity of religions on campus.
“A diploma is a very personal item, and people want to proudly display it in their offices and homes,” said Sidra Qureshi, president of Trinity Diversity Connection. “By having the phrase ‘In the Year of Our Lord,’ it is directly referencing Jesus Christ, and not everyone believes in Jesus Christ.”
“Diversity Connection.” In an academic setting, “diversity” used to mean, “let’s get lots of people from various backgrounds together in a place where they can share ideas and experiences.” Now it means, “never having to be exposed to any ideas or words you might find disagreeable.”
Qureshi, who is Muslim, has led the charge to tweak the wording, winning support from student government and a campus commencement committee. Trustees are expected to consider the students’ request at a May board meeting.
Other students and President Dennis Ahlburg have defended the wording, arguing that references to the school’s Presbyterian roots are appropriate and unobtrusive.
Apparently President Ahlburg, unlike the student government, is not ashamed of his school’s past. Diversity advocates are appalled at his lack of sensitivity, not to mention honesty:
The debate started last year when Isaac Medina, a Muslim convert from Guadalajara, Mexico, noticed the wording while looking at pre-made diploma frames in the Trinity bookstore. When Medina applied to Trinity, university staff told him it wasn’t a religious institution and that it maintained only a historical bond to the Presbyterian Church.
So the godly reference “came as a big surprise,” said Medina, who graduated in December. “I felt I was a victim of a bait and switch.”
A “bait and switch.” Because Trinity, like hundreds of colleges and universities across the country, continues to use the traditional language of “Year of Our Lord” on its diplomas, Medina feels that the secular environment he thought he was getting into is actually the gaping maw of the Christian evangelistic machine. Or something of that sort.
Medina, a former international student, said he always has felt welcome at Trinity. The chaplain on campus caters to students of all religions, and the university recently dedicated a Muslim prayer space in Parker Chapel.
“I never had the experience that Trinity was a closeted Christian institution,” Medina said.
Yeah, for four years the school makes non-Christians feel all warm and accepted, and then, when it’s too late to do anything about it, springs from the religious closet and forces–forces, I say!–its graduates to proclaim the terrible truth: that they attended a university that used to be connected to Christianity. What an outrage against tolerance and diversity! What a sin against charity! WHAT A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY!!!
I guess it never occurred to these Muslim students that, if they’d been observant, a terrible tragedy might have been averted.
They might have noticed that there was something, um, suspicious about the name of the institution. Little do they know that the seal on the left is also going to be on their diplomas.
(Via Layman Online.)
March 30, 2010 at 5:18 pm
Where does one begin in commenting on these stories about Muslims being offended.
While individual Muslims cry that their feelings are being hurt in various places in the USA or in Europe, Muslim countries are expelling Christians. Morocco being the current example.
While the Western Cultures are being played for dupes by the Muslim activists to change our culture to satisfy Muslim ideals, the Muslim countries are saying nada to anyone who is not a muslim.
Whether the Western Cultures come to their senses regarding Islamofascism before it is too late remains to be seen.
March 30, 2010 at 6:26 pm
Memo to Sidra Qureshi and Isaac Medina:
Life is tough, but it’s tougher if you’re stupid! Read the labels before you purchase.
Here endeth the lesson.
March 31, 2010 at 8:13 am
The real problem here is not one of offense or non-offense. The Muslim students in question are, in part, operating on the presumption that institutions of learning that are either nominally Christian or historically rooted in Christian charters and symbols don’t, won’t, or shouldn’t stick up for such roots. And this presumption is not borne of arrogance – it is born of a largely correct surmising of just how weak and inconsequential Christianity is in so many institutions that are supposedly Christian or have some historical connection to a Christian charter. The list is a long one – the YMCA, CCF, countless universities both public and private, etc.
We can sit around being offended about what these Muslim students are trying to do at this school. But evangelicals should be offended infinitely more by the nearly complete and utter retreat by institution after institution of a distinctly and unapologetically Christian basis for their existence. This is why Islam will one day become the majority in the West. When the Christian worldview goes into retreat because supposed Christians and supposed Christian institutions forfeit their Christian identity, something will inevitably fill the void. Right now, Islam is filling the void, and it’s doing so with shockingly little resistance. Don’t blame Muslims for this; blame the Christians who are allowing it to happen.
March 31, 2010 at 10:47 am
After taking a few minutes and reading through their website, one could get every expectation that the college is post-Christian. If the diploma were making some statement about Christianity, I could certainly understand it. But a translation of “Anno Domini” to signify a date in a particular calendar system is hardly something of religious indoctrination. Would the student really expect that any American institution might print his diploma, “1431 in the year of the Hijra”?