Wheaton College prof fired for converting

[David_Zampino]

JimG:

Wheaton College is a private Protestant college. A such, it is certainly entitled to require instructors to subscribe to its statement of Faith as a condition of employment. Mr. Hochschild was a Protestant when he began his employment with them, and he is no longer so. Nor can he, in good faith, subscribe to the required faith statement.

I fully agree. I tend to wish that more Catholic colleges and universities (including the one at which I teach) was a bit stronger on this issue!

Blessings,

 

[David_Zampino]

Reepicheep:

The college has the right to specify that its instructors belong to the denomination whose doctrines they’re expected to teach.

They have the right to dismiss someone who has now joined another denomination, the teachings of which contradict their own.

Unless Exoflare is using a definition of “bigot” that differs from the one Timidity posted, or unless we have widely differing ideas of what “intolerant” means, the college is not showing bigotry at all.

I completely agree. Although an Evangelical school, Wheaton is actually extremely tolerant of widely varying views of Protestant Christianity (many students and employees are conservative Episcopalians, for example). But in the situation cited, since the professor’s own views on Scripture (even though they are correct) directly contradict the mandatory doctrinal statement, the school is fully within its rights.

Some decisions by private schools are bigoted. Bob Jones University has provided plenty of examples. But Wheaton does not fall into that category.

Blessings,

 

[AquinasXVI]

I wish one day that ALL Catholic Universities have the intestinal fortitude to hold on to their founders’ mission.

in XT.

 

[GKC]

David Zampino:

I completely agree. Although an Evangelical school, Wheaton is actually extremely tolerant of widely varying views of Protestant Christianity (many students and employees are conservative Episcopalians, for example). But in the situation cited, since the professor’s own views on Scripture (even though they are correct) directly contradict the mandatory doctrinal statement, the school is fully within its rights.

Some decisions by private schools are bigoted. Bob Jones University has provided plenty of examples. But Wheaton does not fall into that category.

Blessings,

And, of course, there’s the famous Wheaton collection at the Marion E. Wade Center, of the papers and works of Chesterton, Tolkien, Sayers, Lewis, Macdonald, Barfield and Williams. The core of their Chesterton collection, which is superb, was the personal collection of a friend of mine, before it was purchased by Wheaton in the early 70s. And every now and then, they put out a great journal dedicated to these authors, SEVEN.

GKC

 

[David_Zampino]

GKC:

And, of course, there’s the famous Wheaton collection at the Marion E. Wade Center, of the papers and works of Chesterton, Tolkien, Sayers, Lewis, Macdonald, Barfield and Williams. The core of their Chesterton collection, which is superb, was the personal collection of a friend of mine, before it was purchased by Wheaton in the early 70s. And every now and then, they put out a great journal dedicated to these authors, SEVEN.

GKC

Indeed! One of these days, I’ll go down and look at the collection for myself!

Care to join me?

Blessings,

 

[estesbob]

He was fired becuase he didnt sign their faith Statement. That is a common requirement of Protestant organzations and is very much their right to do so.

I counseled at a Care Net affiliated CPC for several years. After I had been there for a while they discovered i had not signed their Faith Statement. It sounds like the same one the Professor refused to sign. It was, IMO, designed to weed out Catholics. Myself and several Catholics who counseled there asked to meet the board and explained to them how it was imposible for us to sign the statement and how it was anit-catholic. They were stunned-they didnt see anything controversial about the statement at all. After we calmly pointed out the problems from our standpoint we jointly wrote a new faith staement that everyone could sign. There were two results of this-Care Net dropped us an affiliate and several Proeststants quit the CPCr. I was very proud of the Board-almost exclusively Protestaant who made it clear that interfaith disputes would not stand in he way of saving the unborn.

However IF they had insisted I sign the statement I would have qui wth no hard feelngs whatsoever.

 

[GKC]

David Zampino:

Indeed! One of these days, I’ll go down and look at the collection for myself!

Care to join me?

Blessings,

In a flash. I’d love to see Andy’s Chesterton collection in that setting.

Let me know when.

GKC

 

[NPS]

## There is no bigotry in this at all; it’s a perfectly defencible & principled course of action.

Why should Protestant students at Wheaton College be exposed to the dangers of being infected by an unProtestant religion ? The people who run it have a grave moral duty, binding under pain of mortal sin, to prevent so terrible a thing happening. It would be grossly irresponsible, grievously immoral in fact, to allow an ex-Protestant to teach Protestant pupils. They had a duty to expel him. So it is immoral and absurd for him to complain - he was not compelled to cease to be a Protestant; no one put a pistol to his head and threatened to kill him if he did not convert.

So the authorities are doing just as the CC used to - so Catholics should praise them for their moral courage in doing so, in a world which is said to be not much troubled about good morals. They have acted in a wholly admirable manner; I’m sure they did not want to lose a member of their teaching staff - he will have to be replaced, and that is bothersome at the best of times.

What would happen if a seminarian became a Protestant ? I can tell you one thing that would not happen - he would not be considered for candidacy, let alone be ordained a deacon; and very properly, given that Christianity as at present set up regards dogma as more important than people.

It would be amusing if a Pope were converted from Catholicism… he would not remain Pope, for sure ##

They were definately within their rights, but I’d doubt pretty seriously that what they were worried about was a Protestant “mortal sin.” They’re worried about keeping the troops together. Completely understandable.
They want to keep it Protestants only-- Period. Fine. Goodbye and goodluck.

And he wasn’t complaining:

“I was sad to be leaving my colleagues and students and an institution I valued very highly,” said Hochschild, 33. “But I support in principle the right of the institution to have exclusive hiring policies. Not every institution is a liberal democracy. We both agreed that Wheaton has a right to exclude Catholics if it wants to. We both agree there are significant differences between what a Catholic believes and what a Protestant believes. Our significant difference was over whether the statement of faith was an effective way of implementing a policy of excluding Catholics.”

I’m actually glad when things such as this happen----it lets people know there are differences between Catholicism and other denominations…
Too many people think–“What’s the difference? We’re all Christians”
Maybe some of his (now former) students will take a closer look at Catholicism. If he’s any good of a prof at all, he has kids thinking about him and consequently thinking about Catholicism.
Heck, he may even have a few follow him to his new job at Mt. St. Mary’s. And maybe, just maybe…some Catholic schools will feel a little more empowered to make a similar decision.