December 3, 2001
TOGETHER:
BGCT schools have 'quality & soul'
___Lutheran scholar Robert Benne has written a thoughtful analysis of Christian higher education. "Quality With Soul" is about the challenge of keeping church-related universities fully engaged with their religious traditions.
___Texas Baptists have been determined to stay involved with our eight universities and to provide to them quality trustees, prayerful concern, the best students from our churches and generous financial support. And it is paying dividends.
CHARLES WADE
Executive Director
BGCT Executive Board
___Dedicated Baptist Christian presidents lead our universities. They want their schools to be faithful equippers of students who will take their places in the world and the church and make significant contributions to our life together. They want students to be exposed to faithful Christian leaders, high academic expectations and the Christian vision of life lived in effective service. I believe in these schools and their presidents. And I pray for them.
___All the schools face challenges. Their dreams of reaching out to more students and impacting the world through the Christian service and thoughtful witness of their graduates depend on how Texas Baptists do our part in supporting their mission.
___This academic year, our universities are setting records in almost every category. There are 34,870 students enrolled--29,920 undergraduates and 4,950 graduate students. Our eight schools have almost half of all the ministerial students preparing for Christian service in the 48 schools that are in the Southern Baptist educational family.
___But it is not just the growing numbers of students, the excellent faculties and the Christian leadership that make me proud. It is the depth of dedication and eagerness for being true servants of Christ that I see in these young men and women that inspires me.
___It has to make you grateful and proud to hear that Heather Mercer and Dayna Curry, who have just been released from a Taliban prison after more than 100 days of imprisonment, are both Baylor University graduates. Their testimony, maturity, deep willingness to be on mission for Christ, desire to serve the poor of Afghanistan and healthy piety are all great encouragement to us. Praise God for answered prayer!
___It is no wonder that when Robert Benne selected six Christian schools across America where he discovered a healthy, growing commitment to the Christian principles on which they were founded, Baylor was one of them. The schools he cited "are academically excellent according to any ranking system, secular or religious," he said. "Their curricula are well thought out and challenging, with excellent teaching by front-rank faculty and a good deal of impressive research and publication. The students are bright and engaged, and they often go on to successful careers. But a second thing would also become evident: The Christian account of life and reality made visible and relevant in all facets of each school's activities--academic, extra-curricular, music and the arts, worship, atmosphere and self-definition. In other words, the schools have both quality and soul, bound up together."
___I was on Baylor's campus last week, speaking in the chapel service at Truett Seminary. As I sat in on one of the Old Testament classes, I was thrilled to look around the room and see such bright and eager women and men. In the interaction of professor and students as they opened their lives and ministries before the Book, I felt what Benne was describing as the hallmarks of great Christian schools--quality and soul!
___We are loved!
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