At Oxford the university has always had a number of colleges associated with it which train people for the Christian ministry. This is a legacy of the days not so long ago when every college fellow was in orders. The colleges degrees are issued by the university.
Well, apparently that’s now illegal in Britain. At least, there are some tax-funded academics in Wales who think so, and have demanded that the Inquisition investigate this genial practice, with a view to banning it. Christian colleges cannot be affiliated with state-funded universities.
Wales Online has the story:
Academics complain to equality commission about University of Wales
THE University of Wales could face an inquiry into an allegation it is breaching a new equality law by validating degrees at Christian fundamentalist colleges run by groups that believe homosexuality and sex outside marriage is sinful.
Note the pejorative “fundamentalist” — they mean people like me, of course.
A report written by a professor at a Welsh university, who wishes to remain anonymous …
I’ll bet he does. Who in the world thought that tax money was funding a self-selected inquisitor?
… who wishes to remain anonymous for professional reasons, examines the University of Wales’ association with eight colleges that subscribe to a Christian fundamentalist viewpoint …
Professor Debbie Epstein, of Cardiff University, a leading expert on issues of sexual identity and one of the academics backing the formal complaint, said: “In my view, there are three reasons why it is wholly inappropriate for the University of Wales to be validating degrees offered by these colleges.
“First of all, there is the issue of having to accept the inherency of the Bible as the word of God.
“For these people, there is no debate – and that is incompatible with the fundamental basis on which universities operate. Secondly, it is not acceptable for universities to operate a policy of only accepting staff or students who subscribe to certain belief systems.
“Thirdly, and particularly after the general duty to equality becomes a legal requirement next week, it would, in my view, be unlawful for a university to condone, through its degree validating procedures, colleges that do not uphold equality.
Straightforward bigotry there: anyone I disagree with must be forced out.
The author of the report has already approached the Equality and Human Rights Commission and intends to make a formal complaint next Tuesday, when the public sector equality duty takes effect.
The commission said it would begin an inquiry, should it receive a formal complaint.
Someone who doesn’t want to be named, denouncing the Christians to an inquisitorial body, for Thinking Wrong Things… yuk!
Thanks to eChurch blog for this one.
UPDATE: The attacks are coming in thick and fast today. There’s a story in the Daily Mail here, which is courageously cataloguing these things, how two schools have banned the Gideons from coming in and distributing bibles, as they have done for decades. The pretext is not to upset “other faith groups”. I wonder when the established religion became “another faith group”?
Orthodoxy must be suppressed, heresy defended, and those I disagree with silenced — a suitable manifesto for the most Tolerant (and irony-deficient).
All this, note, merely because those in power in our days don’t want to keep their trousers zipped and find the existence of Christianity an uncomfortable reminder of their moral failure and an interference with their vices.
“If it feels good, do it” bears its final, hideous children: Bigotry and Persecution.
Given that universities were invented by Christian clerics to teach people to be Christian clerics, this is like demanding that a chef do every job in the world except prepare food.
Beautifully put!