For those unfamiliar with this common-to-universities phenomenon, it meant that Samford's policy was now to make race a factor in every course and club at the university. But not race per se. It was to be assumed that blacks are now persecuted more than any other race, and that they are to be preferred to other races when choices are made about faculty, staff, and even discussion topics. America was presumed to be systemically racist. Not just in its days of slavery and Jim Crow, but today.

The president promptly announced that he was on his way out, and the trustees hired Beck Taylor to take the helm. Taylor had been president of Whitworth College in Spokane, which under his leadership had already become dedicated to DIE--diversity, inclusion, and equity.

Taylor has done nothing to undo his predecessors' embrace of woke theory. If this has made observers question his commitment to evangelicalism--which in days past had "regard(ed) no one according to the flesh" (2 Cor 5:16) -- he has provoked further questions by suggesting that opposition to abortion is no longer important to evangelicals. Yet for most evangelicals' abortion is child abuse on steroids, as a repentant Joe Biden might put it.

These new questions were raised by Taylor's attempt to have presidential historian Jon Meachum speak at Taylor's inauguration last fall. Meacham is an outspoken supporter of Planned Parenthood, the biggest practitioner of baby-killing in America. A frequent speaker at Planned Parenthood fundraisers, Meacham recorded a promotional greeting for a Texas chapter that praised their work as that of "evidence-driven, entrepreneurial citizens."

To their credit, Samford's student government asked that Meacham's invitation be withdrawn, and an alum launched a petition to keep Meacham away. Taylor withdrew the invitation, complaining that Meacham was not going to speak on abortion but civil discourse, and vowed to bring him back at another time.

Civil discourse? A regular commentator on hyper-partisan MSNBC, Meacham lamented in 2012 to Google employees that "in the popular mind there is politics and then there is culture and intellectual work and reason-- uh, depending on what state you're in." Shortly before the last presidential election he referred to Trump supporters as "anguished, nervous white guys" with "a lizard brain." More recently he told the audience at MSNBC, "You have a significant number of people calling themselves Republicans who would rather put their faith in an authoritarian rather than in the constitution."

Now Taylor has announced that Meacham is speaking this week on "civil discourse" as part of a series entitled, "Love thy neighbor." One wonders what conservative evangelicals will think of this. Is it loving thy neighbor to promote the killing of little babies? Or to slander conservative Republicans--many of whom are evangelicals--as authoritarians against the constitution?

Then there is the question of Meacham's theological commitments. Meacham is on record as saying that Jesus is not the only route to salvation. In his book Hope of Glory: Reflections on the Last Words of Jesus from the Cross, Meacham writes, "I am in no sense an evangelical, for I do not share the view that faith in Jesus is the only route to salvation, nor am I determined to convert others to my point of view. It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god."

"I adhere to the broad outlines of the Christian faith as it has come down through the Anglican tradition," he writes in his book. It apparently does not include Article 18 of the 39 Articles of Religion which reads, "Of Obtaining Eternal Salvation Only by the Name of Christ."

John Fea congratulates Taylor for bringing Meacham to campus as a triumph for "the free exchange of ideas." Fair enough. But as the president of a university that proudly calls itself "evangelical," will Taylor demonstrate commitment to freedom for evangelical ideas by inviting pro-life and anti-CRT speakers like (black) Baptists Carol Swain and Voddie Baucham? To balance out Meacham's decidedly un-evangelical positions?

Or does that free exchange highlight only the ideas of anti-evangelicals like Meacham and progressive evangelicals like Miroslav Volf (recommended reading for the Meacham lecture)?

Samford might be a case study in the devolution of evangelical colleges from the orthodox legacy of Jonathan Edwards and John Wesley to a progressive pietism in which all that matters is having warm fuzzies about Jesus (no matter his relation to salvation). One can promote abortion, denounce conservatives, and champion heretical theology as long as one also talks about love and civility.

Conservative evangelical parents wanting to send their sons and daughters to an institution that supports orthodox faith might want to think twice about Samford. . . . unless the president changes his ways and shows as much commitment to orthodoxy as he has shown to progressivism.

END