USU withdraws threat to deregister EU
“The Evangelical Union (EU) will not be deregistered, with the University of Sydney Union (USU) deciding at its April Board meeting to amend clubs and societies (C&S) regulations to allow faith-based declarations as a condition of membership…”
– from Honi Soit. More from Bible Society Australia.
‘Catholic church reminds campaigning business that Catholics are its customers, too’
“Archdiocese of Sydney business manager Michael Digges wrote to corporations whose logos were featured with their permission on a full-page Australian Marriage Equality advertisement in May last year…”
– from The Australian (paywalled) via The Herald Sun.
‘University of Sydney evangelical students vote to keep Jesus’
“An evangelical student group has refused to remove a vow to Jesus from its constitution despite being threatened with deregistration from the Sydney University student body.
The Sydney University Evangelical Union was issued an ultimatum by university’s student union last week to remove a requirement that new members sign ‘Jesus is Lord’ or be deregistered from the university…”
– Eryk Bashaw reports in The Sydney Morning Herald.
See also Enlightenment is just so yesterday at university by Brendan O’Neil, in The Australian –
“If there were a prize for the most Orwellian action of the year (there really should be), the USU would surely win.
The student union has given the EU until March 31 to overhaul its constitution. But the EU is fighting back: this week its members voted by a whopping 71 to 1 against changing its membership rules to suit the tastes of the interfering union.
… If ruling bodies, whether the state or a student union that wields power on campus, can use pressure or threats to make private associations rewrite their constitutions, which is the soul of all institutions, then we enter into very dark territory indeed.”
(Photo: Chappo – this photo of him was taken during the 1980 SUEU Mission – would be cheering the EU. Hear him speak at a 1979 SUEU lunchtime meeting on “Jesus claims to be the only way to God”.)
SUEU votes 71-1 against changes to controversial membership requirements
“An extraordinary general meeting of the Evangelical Union (EU) has seen the organisation formally reject proposed changes to its constitution that would remove a mandatory faith-based declaration for new members.
In a secret ballot, members voted 71-1 opposing the proposed changes, well short of the two-thirds majority required for constitutional amendments.
A packed Holme Reading Room heard over an hour of speeches from members who supported the declaration, most claiming it is inextricably linked to the society’s identity. Not a single speaker spoke in favour of its removal…”
– News from Honi Soit.
Eternity Newspaper has this report.
Earlier:
- Sydney University Evangelical Union ‘facing deregistration’
- ‘University of Sydney’s Evangelical Union shouldn’t have to give up its faith in fight against discrimation’
‘University of Sydney’s Evangelical Union shouldn’t have to give up its faith in fight against discrimation’
“Here is the new rule for student groups on campus at one of our leading universities: you can have any faith you like, as long as it’s not any faith in particular.
As of November last year, the bolshie student politicians running the University of Sydney student union have voted to stop clubs and societies from defining themselves by reference to a particular creed. Because, er, discrimination, or something.
And the union’s board has inaugurated this new reign of tolerance by deciding to kick one of its oldest and largest interdenominational faith based groups off campus. The Evangelical Union has been around doing its thing since the 1930s – my grandma was on the committee…”
– Andrew Judd has this sensible opinion-piece in The Sydney Morning Herald.
(This copy of the USU’s The Daily Bull is a snapshot of student activity at the university in July 1977. The SUEU had been active on campus for decades before most of the other societies mentioned.)
The Withering of Vice and the Sexual Revolution
“As already noted, the sexual revolution did not emerge in a vacuum. Modern societies created a context for moral revolution that had never been available in intellectual terms before. In other words, certain cultural conditions had to prevail in order for the revolution to get the traction it needed to succeed. One of the things we need to note is that we are looking at an explicitly cosmopolitan revolution…”
– Albert Mohler has posted the last in his four-part series on Secularisation and the Sexual Revolution.
Impossible to Believe: The Endgame of Secularism
“The story of the rise of secularism is a stunning intellectual and moral revolution. It defies exaggeration. We must recognize that it is far more pervasive than we might want to believe, for this intellectual revolution has changed the worldviews of even those who believe themselves to be opposed to it…”
– The third post in a four-part series on Secularisation and the Sexual Revolution from Albert Mohler.
How the Atlanta Fire Chief’s Christian views cost him his job
“Heretics will be punished.
That’s the clear message of the zealots who are defying more than 200 years of American constitutional tradition in their effort to establish a new state church, the church of sexual freedom. To the adherents of this church, no amount of virtue can compensate for apostasy. Even the best and brightest must be swept aside if they do not believe…”
– You may have read of the former Atlanta Fire Chief whose employment was terminated last year. Here’s the sobering tale from The National Review.
(Image from this video from Alliance Defending Freedom.)
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…