Soulforce Equality RideTo Visit Northwest University
Visit Schedule
A message from Dr. Paul BanasVice President for Student Development
You may have heard by now that Equality Ride is planning to visit Northwest University this spring. Equality Ride is a youth movement within Soulforce, an activist organization working for gay rights. The stated purpose of Equality Ride is to confront religious colleges and universities that have policies banning enrollment of actively gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender students. Northwest University is being targeted by the Equality Ride because of our standard—specified in the Community Handbook—which states that the University will not condone practices that Scripture forbids, including sexual relations outside of marriage and homosexual practices. Several weeks ago, Northwest received a letter from Equality Ride that provided the opportunity to invite the riders to our campus. We did not reply, since we did not feel our students or our mission would be well served by their visit. Recently they contacted us again and made it clear they are planning to visit Northwest University. We determined that cooperative dialogue would be more Christlike than confrontation. Thus, a task force is being assembled at Northwest University to coordinate and supervise their visit. It will be comprised of members of our faculty, staff, administration, and student leadership. We have already begun to engage with the resources of the CCCU (the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities) and with colleagues at institutions who were visited by the Equality Ride last year. This is the second year that Equality Ride has sponsored bus rides to visit the campuses of high-profile Christian colleges and universities which, like Northwest University, affirm the traditional Christian view of homosexuality and follow policies and practices consistent with Biblical teaching on that issue. Last Spring, one bus visited 19 campuses and military institutions. This year, Equality Ride has announced plans to send two buses to 33 campuses, including Pepperdine University, the University of Notre Dame, Seattle Pacific University, Trinity Bible College, Central Bible College, and Northwest University. The group on the West Coast route will visit Northwest after visits in California and Oregon. While we disagree with the views of Equality Ride and Soulforce, we still view their visit as an opportunity to affirm our core values and demonstrate the compassion of Jesus Christ to those individuals who will visit our campus. The visitors will not be allowed free access to our students or the campus. We are already working with representatives of Equality Ride to establish procedures and boundaries. In the next few weeks, additional planning and preparation will take place on our campus to ensure that this is a time that all of us at Northwest University will be able to model—to our students, to the Equality Ride students, and to the surrounding world—the character of Jesus Christ as we engage in dialogue with those of opposing views. The Equality Ride is scheduled for April 11. As this day approaches, we will inform you of our preparations and expectations. In the meantime, if you have any questions or concerns, please contact me at paul.banas@northwestu.edu.
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