RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED FOR AMERICAN CONSIDERATION: CANADIAN OPTIONS IN CHRISTIAN HIGHER EDUCATION + JOHN G. STACKHOUSE, JR. + Associate Professor of Religion The University of Manitoba Those who teach American students about Canada (as I did for a couple of years in Iowa) likely face audiences who assume that Canada does not deserve much attention from Americans since it is just like the United States, except colder and duller-what one of my students unintentionally (I think) characterized in a paper as "the whole Bland of Canada." To be sure, Americans as citizens of a superpower naturally have a lot of other countries to keep track of, too, so it is perhaps understandable that the average American knows little about the United States' largest trading partner and closest ally. It is much less understandable, however, that scholars of American culture rarely compare notes with those who study Canadian culture. Generalizations about America too often have been made with reference only to Europe (or, nowadays, to Japan) in terms of the "New World" experience as if this were unique to the United States,1 and yet many of these generalizations break down when applied to the one other country most suitable as an alternative test case, Canada. Canada, that is, unlike Mexico, is similar enough to the United States to provide a helpful comparison, and yet different enough sometimes to suggest options untried in the American experience. This is particularly the case in the field of Christian 1 higher education. Canadian history has produced the same institutions as has American history in this regard: Bible schools, independent or "free-standing" liberal arts colleges, theological seminaries, and universities-whether denominational or otherwise. Canadians also, however, have established at least five other models of Christian higher education that are unparalleled, or at least have not achieved comparable success, in the United States, and that deserve a look from those interested in possible future for American Christian higher education. I. Institute for Christian Studies The founding of the Institute for Christian Studies bears the mark of its original constituency. Among the many Dutch immigrants who came to Canada after the Second World War were those trained in the intellectual tradition of Abraham Kuyper and the Free University of Amsterdam, Reformed intellectuals who took Christian education seriously from the elementary level on up. Several meetings during 1956 in Ontario gave birth to the Association for the Advancement of Christian Scholarship (AACS), a fellowship of Christians intent on erecting a Christian university to serve Canada and the United States.2 Thirty-some years later, this vision looks as audacious as it must have looked them, but it has borne some significant fruit. Most notably, after a series of popular conferences featuring Dutch professors of the stature of art historian Hans Rookmaaker and philosopher Herman 2 Dooyeweerd,3 the AACS founded a permanent Institute for Christian Studies (ICS) in Toronto in 1967 with a handful of faculty and twenty or so students. As it now prepares for its twenty-fifth anniversary in 1992, the Institute has abandoned the original vision of university status,4 but has carved out instead a niche unique in North American higher education. The ICS has enrolled only from twenty to one hundred students in its programs each year-currently full-time students number about thirty-five. This small number manifests the specific and selective intention of the institution, which is to pursue the study of foundational theory, the basic interdisciplinary work of philosophy, history, and theology undergirding the entire intellectual enterprise. The main areas of study, therefore, which are theology, aesthetics, philosophy, history of philosophy, history, and political theory, are analyzed at the fundamental level of first principles. Every professor essentially is a "philosopher of" something, rather than a practitioner per se, whether a historian, artist, or political scientist. Indeed, since at least as early as a Board of Trustees decision in 1974, the ICS has explicitly eschewed professional training and instead has determined that "subject matter must be approached from the foundational theoretic vantage point."5 The ICS, therefore, has concentrated upon two programs, its original two-year master's program and its more recent 3 doctoral program. It continues its wrangling with the Ontario government over granting academic degrees, since that government has resisted allowing any explicitly religious institution to grant academic degrees without labeling them "religious" in some way-except, it turns out, those religious institutions affiliated with its own universities, as we shall see in the case of the Toronto School of Theology. Free-standing religious institutions, however, have been presumed by several successive governments to be hopelessly compromised by their convictions and thus unworthy of offering degrees equivalent to those offered by the ostensibly objective and scientific universities.6 In the meanwhile, the ICS offers a master's degree with the innocuous, if cumbersome, name of "Master of Philosophical Foundations" (M.Phil.F.) and, in a joint program with the philosophy department of the Free University of Amsterdam, a Ph.D. These rigorous academic degrees are soon to be complemented by two one-year programs oriented toward the intelligent Christian outside the profession of higher education. One is a master's program in "Worldview Studies," intent on furnishing university graduates with an introduction to serious, foundational Christian thinking that should inform their jobs and, indeed, all of their lives. In this, the Institute will share some of the calling of Regent College, to be discussed next, although it will do so from its distinctly Dutch Reformed view rather 4 than the Anglo-American evangelical perspective characteristic of the Vancouver school. The other is a master's program in education, reflecting the typical Christian Reformed concern for thoroughly and self-consciously Christian teaching at the primary and secondary levels as well. The ICS in its early years squandered some initial good will and support among the Christian Reformed churches and other sectors of evangelicalism by the brash and imperious manner of its young professors, full of their radical Christian perspective gained largely from Dooyeweerd, D.H. Th. Vollenhoven, and other Free University professors (most of the faculty throughout ICS's history have earned at least one degree at the "Free").7 As the 1970s turned into the 1980s and the ICS did not grow significantly, much less become a full-fledged university, and as the faculty matured and added new personalities, the stridency softened and the humility which was credited to their Dutch mentors became more characteristic of the ICS staff themselves. While a part of the early vision (and a good deal of popular support) of a Reformed Christian university was taken up by Redeemer College in Ontario and The Kings' College in Alberta, the Institute for Christian Studies settled into its groove as the only institution of its sort, a school offering Christian theorizing of a high standard upon the fundamentals of thought.8 While this focus has made the ICS, in its own words, "not for everybody,"9 it surely is a 5 worthy occupation in the epistemological confusion of the postmodern world. II. Regent College Founded just twenty years ago, by the mid-1980s Regent College in Vancouver had grown to become one of Canada's largest theological seminaries, enrolling 300 or so students each year. Yet this school, one of Canada's leading training centers for Protestant pastors, pioneered the graduate theological training of lay people, a project which inspired similar efforts at New College, Berkeley, California, and the London Institute of Contemporary Christianity in England, and stands as an option in Canadian Christian higher education that has in fact responded to American needs as well.10 The fellowship of Christians known as the Christian (or "Plymouth") Brethren in their Canadian and American communions generally have not supported advanced education as have those in Britain.11 But in the early 1960s, Brethren leaders in Vancouver, in cooperation with several young American theological students, discussed the idea of founding a graduate school to train Brethren leaders. Writing on behalf of the Vancouver group calling themselves the "School of Theology Committee," John Cochrane published an article in the fall of 1965 that introduced the area assemblies to the idea.12 He proposed the establishment of a school that would train leaders who could minister to the steadily increasing numbers of university graduates in the 6 pews and that it be located in Vancouver, a center of Brethren influence. In keeping with the Brethren conception of church leadership, however (that there is no distinction between clergy and laity and that the elders, or pastors, of a church generally do not work full-time in church-related work, although some indeed do), the school would offer a two-track program. The first track would be a one-year course for those who would go on to a "secular" occupation. The second track would be three-year course for those who would engage in church-related work full-time, whether at home or abroad. The school therefore would differ from Bible schools, Cochrane wrote, in that it would be primarily for university graduates. It would differ from theological seminaries, further in that it would serve especially the Brethren assemblies, as no other school did, and in that it would emphasize the training of all Christians, regardless of occupation.13 To be sure, Cochrane concluded, students of all denominations would be welcome, in keeping with the fundamental ecumenical spirit of the early Brethren movement. But the faculty and leadership would be Brethren. Contacts with James M. Houston, an Oxford University professor of geography, led to a meeting in 1967. Houston, then a visiting professor at the University of Texas, came up to Vancouver on the invitation of the school committee and laid out what for him were three essential qualities of the school: that it be located on a university campus and affiliated with that university;14 that it be at the 7 graduate level; and that it be transdenominational in character. Only the second of the three proposals was directly in line with the original Vancouver idea for the school, but the other ideas had been discussed favorably among the Vancouver Brethren before Houston had come15 and his preferences met with approval.16 The Vancouver committee was pleased to bring on board someone who could give the project instant credibility in the eyes of the university community, and, for Houston's part, his own visions seemed to be on the way to realization. In April 1968, the school was incorporated as Regent College, taking its name from the understanding that all Christians are to act as "regents," or stewards, of God's world under his authority. The school stood squarely and self-consciously in the evangelical tradition and adopted the doctrinal statement of the World Evangelical Fellowship (the international group that emerged from the National Association of Evangelicals in the United States). The school opened for full-time study in the fall of 1970 with four students, to be joined by two others in the new year, and several dozen part-time students swelled the ranks. A half-dozen full-time staff of various denominations were augmented with special lecturers. The school held its classes on the campus of the University of British Columbia, enjoying privileges at its libraries. As Regent grew, it changed sites twice, finally moving into new premises in 1989, but maintained its location at the University of 8 British Columbia, with which it was affiliated. The first program was a one-year Diploma in Christian Studies for lay people. This was expanded the next year so that students could go on to a two-year Master of Christian Studies (M.C.S.), which, even as other degrees were offered later, became Regent's most popular degree program. It was this focus in particular that made Regent stand out on the educational map. Most of the courses were traditional items in the academic theological curriculum: Biblical studies, theology, church history, and ethics. These were seen as the bases for a Christian worldview.17 But Regent made early attempts to fulfill its mission of explicitly integrating theology and non-ecclesiastical vocations. To this end it offered a "cross-disciplinary studies" course which brought in visitors from a variety of professions to lecture and discuss with students the prosecution of their vocations as evangelicals. Full-time students in the first year then were encouraged to take on a cross-disciplinary project in the second semester; M.C.S. students were encouraged to devote their theses to this sort of project. Despite a number of worthy programs like these, however, Regent tended to concentrate upon academic theological study and so left the integrative part of the program in a distant second place.18 By the mid-1970s, Regent had seen a pattern that brought to the surface tensions which went back to the initial differences of vision for the school in the 1960s. 9 Despite the school's international reputation as a laity-oriented graduate school, a large proportion of its students were coming with the intention of becoming pastors or missionaries and then would go on to theological colleges for the rest of their training-some, indeed, would go directly into pastoral work. Some at Regent saw this as reason to raise again the original concern to offer training for full-time church leaders, and following the appointment of Carl Armerding as principal in 1978, Regent decided to introduce a Master of Divinity program in the fall of 1979.19 The program developed to become a rival to the M.C.S. as the most popular at the college. The shape of Regent's program, however, betrayed yet its roots in the original vision of the Vancouver Brethren. On the one hand, the college continued to struggle with the applied theology part of the pastoral program as the priority it had given to theological and especially biblical studies reflected the typical evangelical and especially Brethren emphasis upon Bible knowledge and teaching as defining the role of church leaders. On the other hand, Regent continued to work toward doing full justice to its commitment to integrate theological studies with all vocations, rather than just to train church leaders, whatever their jobs, in that role per se. These problems, however, were on the way to resolution by the late 1980s. And Regent's general character was well established, including an explicit recognition of the third aspect of its 10 identity, that of a graduate school preparing Christian scholars.20 In sum, Regent College has moved well beyond its original goal of training Brethren church leaders to teaching a wide variety of Christians in all sorts of callings. III. Toronto School of Theology The Toronto School of Theology (TST) manifests two principles of theological education: cooperation among theological schools of different stripes, and affiliation of a theological institution with a secular university. Both of these principles are paralleled in the United States, with the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, being the largest venture of the first type and the Union Theological Seminary/Columbia University or Garrett-Evangelical/Northwestern University partnerships examples of the second. The Toronto School of Theology, however, is unique in that it combines these two principles, and does so in a remarkably broad-ranging way.21 The Toronto School of Theology emerged out of informal cooperation among seven theological colleges and faculties in Toronto that maintained advanced degree programs begun originally by the Toronto Graduate School of Theological Studies, which was founded in 1944. In 1970, these schools officially federated as the Toronto School of Theology for two apparent reasons. The first was to express more concretely the ecumenical vision of theological education that had prompted the existing cooperation. The program 11 meant that students in a particular college could take courses in any other college to earn their degrees, with each college free to set its own "in-house" requirements to maintain a denominational focus. The second was to consolidate resources at a time when too many faculty members were teaching too few students: a survey of twenty-three Canadian theological schools conducted a few years before had shown that 123 full- and part-time staff were teaching only 667 students.22 It was, of course, hardly the first time that the realization of ecumenical ideals was advanced by practical exigencies. Thus came together Emmanuel College of the United Church of Canada; Knox College of the Presbyterian Church in Canada; Regis College of the Jesuit order of the Roman Catholic Church; St. Augustine's Seminary, the Roman Catholic diocesan school; the University of St. Michael's College, run by the Basilian order of Roman Catholics; and Trinity College and Wycliffe College, the former representing the high and broad church tradition of Anglicanism, the latter the evangelical wing.23. Less than ten years later, TST took the first step in its development. In 1978, it signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the University of Toronto, the largest university in Canada, around or on whose campus almost all of these colleges were located. This agreement allowed TST students to enjoy the teaching and research resources of the University, including courses taught by its faculty and 12 materials in its libraries. It also meant that degrees would be granted jointly by the TST colleges and the University. The program essentially is at two levels. "Religious" degrees, that is, those other than the M.A. and Ph.D., which generally have been viewed by the Ontario government as "secular" degrees, range from the M.Div., M.R.E., and M.Rel. to the Th.M. and Th.D.24 and are granted by a particular college (e.g., Wycliffe) with which the student has a specific affiliation and by the University of Toronto. The M.A. and Ph.D. degrees are granted by the one college with a special charter to do so, the University of St. Michael's College. Thus the full range of advanced theological degrees are available to students in the TST. The affiliation with the University brings two main benefits to the theological colleges. First, it encourages a uniformity and a high quality of academic standards among the colleges, since a Council made up of representatives of both the University and TST preside over academic matters and, ultimately, because the agreement with the University is not permanent but must be renewed. Second, it has brought government funding, in both financial aid to students and direct subsidies to the colleges. The latter funds are administered through the University, and so the government is not "directly" funding the theological colleges but the University with which they are affiliated. Imitated in a much more limited respect by the Atlantic 13 and Vancouver Schools of Theology on either coast, the Toronto School of Theology thus is by far the largest center of theological education in Canada and, indeed, a unique center of Christian higher education in North America. IV. Conrad Grebel College An even closer relationship with a secular university is enjoyed by Conrad Grebel College (CGC).25 Founded by Mennonites in 1961, it occupies one corner of the campus of the University of Waterloo, located on what was once Mennonite farmland in southwestern Ontario. The University was founded in the late 1950s on the collegiate principle and so sought out communities that would sponsor particular colleges, and the Mennonite community received one of the invitations. Despite the traditional Mennonite aversion to entanglement with secular government, the tradition of higher education among some Canadian Mennonites, particularly those formerly living in Russia, was strong and a group responded to the opportunity. Named after a leader of the sixteenth-century Swiss Brethren Anabaptists, Conrad Grebel College sees itself as a mediating institution between university and church: the school "challenges the church with the insights of the university and the university with the understanding of the church."26 The first task is more thoroughly and programmatically attempted than the second, as CGC students (that is, those living in its residence and therefore full participants in its program) take a majority of their 14 courses from the University. To be sure, the college is committed to teaching a Christian worldview, and its residential students take at least one-quarter of their courses at the college, including foundational courses in biblical, theological, or ethical studies. In addition, the college's faculty concentrate on a few areas central to fostering a Christian mind, namely religious studies, philosophy, history, and "interdisciplinary arts," as well as sociology, peace and conflict studies (reflecting the Anabaptist heritage), and music. Beyond academic pursuits, the college provides a program featuring athletics , musical ensembles, drama groups, public service opportunities, and regular chapel services-all for its residential students numbering just over 100 but also for another 75 or so who "associate" with the college (but whose academic programs prevent them from undertaking the full CGC residential student program, e.g., engineers) and those students enrolled in any courses, currently a full-time equivalent of about 300. Unlike many evangelical liberal arts colleges, though, the college is pluralistic in important respects: it requires no particular religious commitment of students, it does not require chapel attendance, it allows for considerable student freedom and responsibility in personal conduct,27 it seeks to bring in guest speakers of other points of view, and, of course, it relies on the pluralistic University for most of its instruction. Nonetheless, its 15 broadly Mennonite commitments in theology and ethics remain clear and the school retains a distinctive flavor throughout its program.28 CGC energetically engages in ministry to the larger community, furthermore, as in special public lectures, evening classes and workshops, tours by the musical ensembles, and the administration of a local Mennonite farmhouse museum. Its professors also are expected to be active researchers , contributing thereby not only as teachers but also as scholars shaping the progress of understanding in their respective disciplines. In fact, the majority of Bible courses and all of the music courses offered at the University of Waterloo are offered by CGC; the school has developed a growing graduate program in theological studies; and it is an internationally recognized center for studies in the Radical Reformation. Thus in various respects does Conrad Grebel College seek to inculcate and advance Christian thinking in the university context and beyond. V. Canadian Mennonite Bible College This discussion began with the Institute for Christian Studies, a school whose offerings parallel those of the secular university, yet from a decidedly Christian perspective in an autonomous school. Regent College, next, has affiliated with the University of British Columbia, but 16 for all practical purposes, besides shared library facilities and a few minor matters, it is on its own as well. The Toronto School of Theology, third, comprises full-fledged independent colleges which, through TST, nonetheless work together and enjoy a close relationship with the University of Toronto. Conrad Grebel College, fourth, maintains its own administration, funding, site, teaching staff, and ethos, but is deeply integrated into and dependent upon the University of Waterloo. The final category we might choose to examine would, on this trajectory, include those church-related colleges that are affiliated with a secular university and that offer no academic program of their own at all, but instead offer some combination of residence facilities, libraries, chaplains, worship services, and so on-and there are a number of such colleges in Canada.29 It is not likely, however, that this sort of institution has much appeal for the readers of this journal. Instead, our final category includes a perhaps-unexpected arrangement: an independent Bible college with a firm academic relationship with a secular university. Such a category includes the Canadian Mennonite Bible College (CMBC) and the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg.30 The arrangement grew out of a decade of short-lived agreements between the two schools from the mid-950s to the mid-1960s, but since 1964, with only a change or two along the way, the current arrangement has held and in quite 17 simple form. Essentially, the Bible college is known as an "Approved Teaching Centre" of the University-not an "affiliated college" per se. This former term means that the Bible college may offer University of Manitoba courses on its own campus with its own professors for University of Manitoba credit-as well, of course, as for Bible college credit. In fact, students may earn whole minors in certain areas, although not majors. Each course and each professor must be approved by the opposite department of the University; each student must take separate application to and be accepted by the University; all academic policies- including grading, appeals, etc.-must conform to University policy; and the whole arrangement must be renewed periodically-currently every seven years. The arrangement also makes explicit that this policy says nothing about transfer of credit by the University for teaching centre courses. The program is quite popular, despite the limitations, as currently 80-85% of CMBC's students (FTE about 170) enroll in this arrangement. This, then is an extraordinary approach for Bible colleges seeking to improve the academic quality and diversity of their curricula-yet it is consonant with the patterns of Christian higher education emerging in the foregoing sketches, patterns that now deserve some sustained reflection. VI. Conclusions At least two orders of conclusions emerge from this 18 discussion, the first having to do with lay training, the second with Christian institutions affiliating with secular universities. First, the church in the United States as much as in Canada needs to examine its commitment to lay ministry and, indeed, to the quality of life of all Christians. The models of the Institute for Christian Studies and Regent College perhaps should prompt Christian leaders to consider whether similar schools need to be multiplied to train Christians of all occupations in Christian thinking. Christian liberal arts colleges attempt to achieve this goal , of course, but what of the many Christians who attend secular universities and who have no such opportunities? Bible schools, for their part, generally are geared toward high school graduates, not university graduates. And Christian graduate education is devoted almost entirely to academic or professional specialization. Furthermore, do the Regent and ICS models go far enough? Should not there be centers for "life training," not just "thinking" in the narrow academic sense, that would provide Christians with fundamental and substantial instruction in singleness or marriage, child-rearing, financial stewardship, vocation, mission, and so on?31 Unless we are satisfied as we survey the state of contemporary Christian thought and life in our countries, some more radical possibilities must be considered, and schools that offer one- or two-year programs like this are 19 such possibilities. Second, what about the question of Christian institutions establishing a relationship with secular universities? Experts on constitutional and educational history can shed much more light on this subject, but it is not clear that the models presented above cannot be duplicated in the United States. Indeed, at least in the case of the first three, there are already some parallels in the United States, and there may be some for the latter two as well. Moreover, the Canadian provincial governments and Canadian higher education establishment generally seem no warmer toward religious colleges than their American counterparts, and, on the other hand, American taxes already support some religious schools and secular accrediting associations do certify them, so perhaps the church-state issues are not as intractable as they might first appear to be on the southern side of the border.32 There seem to be considerable advantages to Christian schools (meaning now both undergraduate and graduate institutions, including seminaries) establishing links with secular universities. In the first place, the university can act for the college as universities have traditionally acted for colleges here and elsewhere: as a guarantor of academic quality. This relationship should increase the college's credibility and prestige in the eyes of both prospective students and the graduate schools or employers who are considering such students. 20 More substantively, students and faculty members will be exposed to the pluralism and rigor of the broader academic forum. In the case of pluralism: however carefully a Christian professor teaches Marxism, for instance, it simply is not the same for a student as being taught it by a Marxist. The same applies at the faculty level: discussion of ideas has more substance and spice when conducted among people who actually believe the various alternatives. In the case of rigor: Christian college students will encounter professors who are too absorbed in research to coddle them and who are unmoved by specious appeals to Christian charity when assignments come due- encounters which ought to toughen their self-discipline. Moreover, university professors who routinely supervise graduate students and who themselves publish for their peers have a broader frame of reference for judging academic quality in their students than many college professors who know only undergraduates and have few links with the world of scholarship. Christian college professors, for their part, will have to measure their teaching and especially their research output against actual university colleagues across the campus or across town rather than merely rationalizing their mediocrity (as some do) by measuring their work against some distant and mythical "university professor" who assumedly has all sorts of advantages they do not. Christian college professors who do come up to the mark 21 and beyond it in relation to their university colleagues (and doubtless there are many of these) may well then look hard at the compensation paid those colleagues and have a stronger bargaining position with their administration- assuming , of course, that they are paid less than those at the university! That administration, in turn, may well be in a better position financially because affiliation might well mean increased governmental support for both students and the institution itself. Beyond these considerations lies the one at the very heart of the educational enterprise. The increased resources, both human and material, that are made available through the college-university linkage means more potential learning for everyone-a point to be recognized by the university every bit as much as by the college. To be sure, in a much larger community (like the state university) there can be relatively less intellectual conversation than in a small one, particularly across disciplinary lines. Those in the smaller community of the college, however, can reap both kinds of benefits when linked with the university in this way. There are, of course, disadvantages to be considered as well. With the university setting certain standards comes the possibility of unhelpful interference in the Christian teaching in the college, and Christian colleges are well advised to make clear their distinctive identity, mission, and philosophy of education so as to be protected from 22 overreaching university departments. With pluralism comes a lessening of an overarching and pervasive Christian tone and a possible loss of community spirit, and Christian colleges must ensure that their basic educational goals are advanced, particularly thorough core courses-especially those that help students deal with that pluralism-and other mandatory "in-house" experiences. With university standards of academic rigor can come unhealthy emphases, most obviously that of an overemphasis upon research and publishing, and particularly of a narrow, academically-respectable kind that may have limited value in the kingdom of God and to which only a few may be suited well-to the neglect of other worthy scholarship let alone excellent teaching.33 For their part, Christian students likely will face anti-Christian behavior at the university, even certain embarrassments in classes and coolness or even antagonism in university professors' offices, which would not normally be found in a Christian college-although they should not be found in a university either! Practical problems of affiliation run beyond these. Timetables become more awkward, particularly scheduling all-college functions like chapel. Faculty members teaching the required "core courses" of the college may well have larger classes than their colleagues at the university- although in these days of shrinking government support, many state-supported universities are in worse shape in this regard. Student activities in the college compete with the 23 blandishments of the university, with the best student leaders, athletes, musicians, actors, writers, and so on attracted to the larger stages of the university.34 Finally, with government money can come government control, and as colleges depend upon that money they become vulnerable to changes in public policy, from affirmative action to civil rights for all sorts of minorities. Perhaps the most vexing issue here is academic freedom and tenure. Real integration of academic programs usually will mean that the colleges adopt the university policy regarding academic freedom, and that will mean in virtually every case the impossibility of dismissing a faculty member for no longer subscribing to the college's pattern of theology or conduct. Universities may well be sympathetic to a college's difficulty in such a circumstance. The University of Manitoba, for instance, has recognized this and has allowed the Approved Teaching Centres to use a religious test upon hiring, but also has insisted that all faculty subsequently involved in this program be protected by the university policy on academic freedom. The committee charged with resolving this issue, among others, concluded that We see but one solution to this problem, and that is to depend upon the integrity and discretion of the individual faculty member to offer his resignation, if he should ever find that his religious beliefs have changed to so drastic a degree that he can no longer carry out his duties at the centre without being a 24 hypocrite. The faculty member himself is then the judge of the tenability of his position, and the initiative lies with him to terminate his connection with his college if his altered religious convictions have made his position morally untenable.35 Needless to say, this arrangement may well not suit every Christian college, but the question of academic freedom is hardly one that has been satisfactorily resolved everywhere within Christian higher education, and the possibility always remains that a secular university will allow a Christian institution to abrogate absolute academic freedom at this point as it would at hiring on the same principles. The church-state relationship in America may well prevent such formal affiliations, however, especially in regard to government funding, although there remains the intriguing possibility of religious colleges affiliating in some respects with state-supported institutions without receiving government funds per se. Nonetheless, Christian colleges can still reap some of the benefits set out here and perhaps distance themselves from at least a few of the problems by making the linkage unilaterally. That is, Christian colleges could encourage and even prescribe a semester or more of study at a secular institution. Many colleges already have internships or foreign study as part of their programs: ought no this "cross-cultural" experience to be considered as well? A final word applies these ideas to those Christian 25 institutions in communities that have more than one college, if no major university. Surely some of the benefits of pluralism and rigor can be obtained through cooperation along the TST modes (sans university). While it is administratively simpler to allow little if any cross-registration, and economic constraints tempt one to jealousy over every student and every student dollar, would not the educational experience of students and of faculty be improved by this interaction and accountability? Picture things, then, like this. A Christian intellectual can "read books" (standing here for the whole teaching he or she receives) written almost exclusively from non-Christian perspectives and have a daily time of worship: so much for church-related colleges on secular campuses that are little more than residences and chapel services. A Christian intellectual can "read books" written almost exclusively from Christian perspectives (or perhaps one particular Christian perspective) and have a regular time of worship: so are most Christian liberal arts colleges, universities, and seminaries.36 A Christian intellectual, however, might opt to "read" some "books" by persons of various viewpoints, some books by those of his own viewpoint, and especially some books by Christians that would help him interpret those by non-Christians-as well as maintain his spiritual vitality. So, then, those Christian schools with organic relationships with different institutions. If the analogy and particularly the argument 26 it illustrates have merit, perhaps consideration of these Canadian models should compel some Christian institutions of higher education learning in America to emerge from their cloisters to some new educational possibilities. Notes I am indebted to Mark A. Noll, John Webster Grant, Jay Van Hook, and Larry W. Hurtado for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper, and also to the Abilene Foundation for support of the research. 1Only the most recent example to come to my attention is Richard E. Wentz, Religion in the New World: The Shaping of Religious Traditions in the United States (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1990). Compare the title and subtitle. 2The original name was the Association for Reformed Scientific Studies (ARSS), whose unfortunate acronym prompted the later name change. 3The ideas of these men have been mediated to Canadian and American audiences most widely not by their professional philosophical disciples, like those at ICS, but in the simplified and very popular work of Francis A. Schaeffer (1912-1984). 4Although not completely. For years persons associated with schools of the Christian Reformed Church have discussed various plans for a Christian university in North America, and the ICS has been involved in some of these discussions. Indeed, ICS professor Bernard Zylstra wondered in 1981 27 whether the new colleges of Redeemer and King's could cooperate with ICS to constitute a "tripartite" Canadian university ("The Mission of the AACS: Its Spiritual Identity and Academic Future," Perspective 15 [Sept.-Oct. 1981]: 23). By 1990, however, no formal links of this sort had been established. 5Quoted in Bert Witvoet, "The Years of Consolidation: 1974-1981," Perspective 15 (Sept.-Oct. 1981), 14. The articles in this issue celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the AACS constitute the only historical account of the ICS in print. 6On this see especially the "Discussion Paper on the Issue of the Establishment of Freestanding Secular Degree-Granting Institutions in Ontario" produced by the Institutional Policy Committee of the Ontario Council of University Affairs, October 1989. 7On this see, for instance, Bert Witvoet, "The Early Institute Years: 1967-1974," Perspective 15 (Sept. - Oct. 1981), 10-11; and several comments in the "As Others See Us" section in the same issue, 16-19. 8The ICS's faculty listed in the 1990-92 Academic Calendar have authored, co-authored, or edited an average of four books each, not to mention numerous articles and papers. 9So suggested President J. Harry Fernhout in the ICS 1990-92 Academic Calendar, 2. 10This section relies on interviews granted by Principal 28 Carl E. Armerding and Professor W. Ward Gasque at Vancouver in November 1986; further interviews were conducted by telephone with Armerding and Professor (and former Principal) James M. Houston in March 1987. It also draws from three helpful sketches of Regent's history: Brian P. Sutherland, "Historical Development," and James M. Houston, "The History and Assumptions of Regent College," papers contributed to the conference, "Openness to the Future: A Prelude to Planning," held at Regent College, 1974; and W. Ward Gasque, "A History of Regent College," in "Report on Institutional Self-Study in Support of Application for Accreditation by the Association of Theological Schools" (Vancouver: Regent College, 1984), pp. 1-20). (Photocopies) All citations from Regent College documents come from those at Regent College unless otherwise noted. A fuller presentation of Regent's history can be found in chapter eleven of John G. Stackhouse, Jr., "Canadian Evangelicalism in the Twentieth Century, " (Book MS.). 11On the Brethren, see especially F. Roy Coad, A History of the Brethren Movement (Greenwood, SC: Attic and Exeter: Paternoster, 1976); and Ross H. McLaren, "The Triple Tradition: The Origins of the Open Brethren in North America" (M.A. thesis, Vanderbilt University, 1982). 12John Cochrane, "The Effect of Increased Education-and a Proposal!" Calling 7 (Fall 1965): 9-11. 13Cochrane writes: "The 2- or 3-year course of study would be comparable to that offered by existing graduate 29 schools such as Fuller Seminary in California, but the program would probably be modified to emphasize the training of laymen rather than the development of clergymen" (10). This latter qualification, of course, must be understood in "Brethren" terms to indicate, nonetheless, "a three-year course for those who believe the Lord may be leading them into full-time ministry at home or abroad" (11). This explicit image of an American evangelical seminary as modified by Brethren convictions is important in determining what was in fact the original vision of the college, a matter of some controversy later. 14Houston explained this concern in "The Importance of Being on a University Campus?" Regent College Bulletin 1 (Spring 1971): n.p. 15Carl Armerding indicated that he possessed correspondence from that period to demonstrate this discussion (second interview). 16See Houston's account of the discussion in "History and Assumptions," p. 3. Houston introduced some of the newer ideas in "A New Venture in Christian Education," Calling 9 (Fall 1967): 16-18, and in "Regent College, Vancouver: A New Venture in Christian Scholarship," Thrust 1 (January 1969): 2-8. Houston later wrote again of Regent's principles in "Regent College," Crux 9, no. 1 (1973); reprinted as a pamphlet, Regent College archives. 17Houston addressed this in "Work and Christian Vocation," Regent College Bulletin 4 (Fall 1974): n.p. 30 18Armerding, second interview. Armerding's view is borne out in the account of Regent's history in Stackhouse. 19This development, not surprisingly, meant the end of Regent's affiliation with the Vancouver School of Theology. 20President Walter C. Wright, Jr., formerly an administrator at Fuller Seminary who succeeded Armerding in 1988, spoke to the question of scholarship in the school catalogue for 1989-90. He identified Regent in terms of the established two tracks of lay and pastoral education, but added to the definition what had been implicit for some time: "a theological research centre preparing men and women for lives of scholarship" (4). 21There is no scholarly history of the TST to date. Information below comes largely from the calendars (catalogues) of the schools and from the various official documents (Letters Patent, By-laws, and Memoranda of Agreement) pertaining to TST (photocopied from files of E. James Reed, TST Director). 22Charles Fielding, "Twenty-three Theological Schools: Aspects of Canadian Theological Education," Canadian Journal of Theology 12 (1966): 229-37; quoted in John S. Moir, A History of Biblical Studies in Canada: A Sense of Proportion (Chico, CA: Scholar's Press for the Society of Biblical Literature, 1982), 95. 23Currently McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario, of the Baptist Convention of Ontario and Quebec, and Waterloo Lutheran Seminary in Waterloo, Ontario, are 31 affiliated with TST, but do not participate fully in its programs since they are located some distance away. 24In 1990, the University decided to withdraw its support for the Doctor of Ministry (D.Min. program) until TST changed it to make it conform with other doctorates (e.g., a particular sticking point was the University's requirement of at least one year of full-time academic residence). By 1991, TST and the University amicably had agreed simply to keep the D.Min. program separate from the conjoint agreement. 25Again, there is no formal history of Conrad Grebel College. Most of the information below is from the College publications, especially the calendar for 1990-91, and student handbook for 1989-90, but also from the Agreement between the University of Waterloo and Conrad Grebel College (15 December 1961) and the report of the Long-Range Planning Committee to the Board of Governors, June 1985, entitled "Re-Vision: Definitions, Principles, and Directions for Conrad Grebel College." I am grateful to President Rodney J. Sawatsky for the provision of these documents, for a long and informative conversation at CGC on 13 August 1990, and for a written response to an earlier draft of this section (7 November 1990). 26Undergraduate Calendar, 5. 27For instance, CGC forbids the illegal use of drugs, but tolerates smoking in designated areas and the private consumption of alcohol-practices commonly outlawed in certain 32 kinds of American Christian colleges. CGC does, however, explicitly draw the line at students spending the night with those of the other sex and inappropriate decor for dormitory rooms. See the Student Handbook, 1989-90, passim. 28Most obviously, the school is supported and governed by the Mennonite Conference of Eastern Canada and hires mostly Mennonites as full-time faculty. 29Examples close to home include St. Paul's (Roman Catholic) and St. John's (Anglican) Colleges at the University of Manitoba. 30F.G. Stambrook offered a helpful sketch of the origins of the "Approved Teaching Centre" arrangement at the University of Manitoba in "A Sensible Resolution: The Canadian Mennonite Bible College and The University of Manitoba" (banquet address, n.p. [1990]. A brief description of the arrangement current in the later 1980s is provided by the Chair of the University of Manitoba Senate Committee on Approved Teaching Centres, L.W. Hurtado, "University of Manitoba Approved Teaching Centres" (18 October 1989). I am grateful to Larry Hurtado for copies of these documents and others that aid in the following summary, especially the "Final Report of the Ad Hoc Committee of Senate to Reconsider the Institution of Approved Teaching Centres," amended and approved by the Senate of the University of Manitoba (6 November 1979), 83-93; and the "Report of the Senate Committee on Approved Teaching Centres" (4 June 1990). 33 31An intriguing parallel to this recommendation can be found, for all of Canadian society, in Reginald Bibby, Mosaic Madness: The Poverty and Potential of Life in Canada (Toronto: Stoddart, 1990), 131-36 and 189-92. 32Indeed, a continual problem in recent years for Christian schools has been to obtain the right to grant "university-type" degrees, particularly in Arts (B.A., M.A., Ph.D.). Governments and the universities they support have been nervous about religious institutions, generally seeing them as intellectually biased and weak and the university as scientifically balanced and rigorous. This view, of course, is highly problematic and difficult to defend in the postmodern era, but it persists powerfully and is a considerable obstacle for these schools. 33N. Keith Clifford comments on related problems in "Universities, Churches and Theological Colleges in English-Speaking Canada: Some Current Sources of Tension," Studies in Religion/Sciences Religeuses 19 (Winter 1990): 3-16. And for warnings on the American scene, see James Tunstead Burtchaell, "The Decline and Fall of the Christian College," First Things (April 1991): 16-29; and (May 1991): 30-38. 34See Donald G. Lee, "Luther College of Regina: A Successful Experiment in Federation," paper presented to "Educating for the Kingdom? Church-Related Colleges in English Speaking Canada," Conrad Grebel College, Waterloo, Ontario (1-2 May 1990), 6-7. 34 35"Final Report of the Ad Hoc Committee of Senate to Reconsider the Institution of Approved Teaching Centres," amended and approved by the Senate of the University of Manitoba (6 November 1979), 89. 36Clearly the analogy underestimates the real interaction with non-Christian thinking at a typical Christian institution in the sense that these institutions normally study these ideas and often from original sources. Nonetheless, the analogy holds in that this learning is always filtered through Christian convictions (or, at least, it should be at a self-consciously Christian college: there is no belief implied here for the church-related college disingenuously taking money from its supporters but failing to provide a thoroughly Christian education)-and this is quite different from being taught the same material by people of markedly different convictions. 35