Defending the Liberal Arts

Frances Fox Piven

Peter Powers, Dean of the School of Humanities at Messiah college, (Grantham, PA) defended his institution’s decision to host a lecture by Frances Fox Piven in an op-ed piece in Harrisburg’s Patriot News on Thursday. Piven is a controversial Political Science scholar and activist (and, not surprisingly, no friend of Glenn Beck), and the lecture event at Messiah College sparked something of a firestorm – attesting to the tensions that exist within Christian higher education. As Powers observed, Christian colleges often find that some constituents want them to provide a comfortable place of indoctrination. But the very nature of the liberal arts approach is one that facilitates the critical examination of a wide range of ideas, yearns to uncover tension and ambiguity, and challenges students to toward a self-reflective existence. As Powers put it:

Christian institutions vary tremendously, but in general we seek to educate students who will think more deeply and act more effectively in the world. At Messiah College, we pursue this goal not by sheltering students from difficult questions, but by encouraging them to think about those questions as Christian people. Invited speakers with different points of view help us achieve this goal, just as do assigned texts and classroom discussions on thinkers who are Christians and those who are not. We approach Christian higher education this way because even the best of our tradition should be subject to critical thinking and because we believe truth might be revealed in diverse places in the world God has made.

You can find Powers’ op-ed here.