Why God Isn’t Doing Well - Dennis Prager. God is not doing very well these days.
Here are four reasons why: The first is that increasingly large numbers of men and women attend university, and Western universities have become essentially secular (and leftist) seminaries. Just as the agenda of traditional Christian and Jewish seminaries is to produce religious Christians and religious Jews, the agenda of Western universities is to produce (left-wing) secularists. The difference is that Christian and Jewish seminaries are honest about their agenda, while the universities still claim they have neither a secularist nor a political agenda. The more university education a person receives, the more likely he is to hold secular and left-wing views. A third reason God is not doing well is that most of the men and women who are products of this secular left-wing education (meaning a large majority of Western men and women) are theologically, intellectually, and emotionally ill-prepared to deal with all the unjust suffering in the world.
Why College Students Are Losing Their Religion - Conor Friedersdorf. Do university professors really possess the power to make students more secular?
Dennis Prager, as thoughtful a voice as you'll find on talk radio, has a new column up in National Review that presumes "God isn't doing well" and tries to explain why. His initial theory is that "increasingly large numbers of men and women attend university," and that "the agenda of Western universities is to produce (left-wing) secularists. " Let's say for the sake of argument that most institutions of higher education really were trying at their core to produce left-wing secularists (a motive I very much doubt). How on earth would they succeed? Typically a faculty member has one or two classes at most with a given student. This beggars belief, especially if you're someone like me who attended Catholic school for 14 years.
To me, there are better explanations for the fact that "the more university education a person receives, the more likely he is to hold secular and left-wing views. " Are College Students Losing Their Religion? Conservative talk radio personality Dennis Prager thinks that God is not doing so well in our society.
Why? The chief reason he cites is that college students are losing their religion. Students at Notre Dame, a Catholic University Over at National Review Online, he writes: Increasingly large numbers of men and women attend university, and Western universities have become essentially secular (and leftist) seminaries. The more university education a person receives, the more likely he is to hold secular and left-wing views. But if you believe that the average college graduate is a clear and knowledgeable thinker as a result of his or her time at university, I have more than one bridge to sell you.
Conor Friedersdorf, a writer who attended Catholic school for 14 years, is skeptical of Prager’s argument. Writing in The Atlantic, Friedersdorf thinks: The President’s Interfaith and Community Service Campus Challenge. Advancing Interfaith Cooperation and Community Service in Higher Education Since his inauguration, President Obama has emphasized interfaith cooperation and community service – “interfaith service” for short – as an important way to build understanding between different communities and contribute to the common good.
Interfaith service involves people from different religious and non-religious backgrounds tackling community challenges together – for example, Protestants and Catholics, Hindus and Jews, and Muslims and non-believers -- building a Habitat for Humanity house together. Interfaith service impacts specific community challenges, from homelessness to mentoring to the environment, while building social capital and civility. American colleges, community colleges, and universities have often been at the forefront of solving our nation’s greatest challenges. The White House invites all institutions of higher education to join this powerful movement for the coming year.
Deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/60817/1/jlsmall_1.pdf. Religion In College: How Has Your Faith Changed?