In the past, our fellowship has taken out a welcome-back ad in The Breeze to welcome students back and to signal our willingness to talk with students about matters of faith. Attached is a proposed ad from Taz Daughtrey for this fall. Please send any comments directly to Taz. Later we’ll put out a call for signatures and financial support. Here is a link to the ad.
Proposed layout of ad
Our fellowship is preparing to place an ad in The Breeze in anticipation of the Easter holiday. The ad features pictures of Alexander the Great, King Tutankhamen and Julius Caesar above a line of text that says, “They conquered everything but death.”
The body of the ad copy says, “Past world rulers like Alexander the Great, Tutankhamen, and Julius Caesar have all had one thing in common: the past. They’re stuck in it. It makes more sense to follow a ruler who has conquered death…and a leader who has shown us a better way of conquest, through love. Jesus is that ruler. The message of Easter is that Jesus passed through death into an eternal life. And his conquest can be our own, too, for we do not have to fear death but can — even now — enter into life everlasting.” Here is a .pdf of the proposed ad.
This note from Taz Daughtrey explains the details of getting the ad placed: “Please distribute and ask for signatures (name and affiliation) by noon on Thursday. If each person indicates a contribution of between $20 and $30, I will place a quarter-page or half-page ad for next week depending on the total pledged.”
The next meeting of our faculty fellowship will be on April 3 at 7:30 a.m. at Mr. J’s Bagels, East Market Street. The theme will be reflection and sharing on our fellowship’s visibility on campus: Should we do more in our witness to the JMU community? Should we remain low-key and informal? Resources for our discussion include: our own past advertisements in the Breeze, this article from leaderu.com , and these sample advertisements. There will be printed versions of the sample advertisements to pass around the table.
This will be our last regular meeting of the academic year. The use of the email list will remain open for anyone who would like to organize a get-together around final exam or graduation time.
At our regular faculty fellowship meeting March 6, we’ll have a roundtable discussion with C.J. Goeller of JMU’s InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. Here’s an article from The Breeze that provides background on JMU’s campus ministries. On March 6 our meeting is set for 7:30 a.m. at Mr. J’s Bagels, E. Market St.
Our next regular meeting is set for Friday, Feburary 6 at 7:30 a.m. at Mr. J’s Bagels on East Market Street. The topic of discussion will be “Evangelicals and Catholics Together,” a movement headed by Charles Colson and noted Catholic scholar Richard John Neuhaus, who died January 8. Our discussion will be based on this article in Christianity Today. Here’s a summary:
Evangelicals and Catholics Together: Since its first publication in 1994, “The Christian Mission in the Third Millennium,” the group has issued other consensus statements on salvation, the relationship between Scripture and tradition, the communion of saints, and other issues. It is next set to issue a document on Mary, the Mother of Jesus. But can the movement continue without its chief Roman Catholic architect?
Our January 16 discussion (7:30 a.m., Mr. J’s Bagels, E. Market St.) will be on the topic “Supporting Responsible Decisions.” We’ll have a roundtable discussion of how we can support students seeking to make moral choices in a culture that is decidedly unfriendly to such choices. Background reading for the discussion is this article from the Chronicle of Higher Education, which gave JMU unwelcome national attention last fall by pointing out the effect of gender imbalance and other factors in promoting a hook-up culture.
Here is our spring schedule of meetings for discussion and study (all meetings at Mr. J’s Bagel’s, E. Market St.):
If you’d like to be on a list to get e-mail reminders, send a note to reminders@faithatjmu.com.
Our regular first-Friday meeting for December is set for 7:30 a.m. December 5 at Mr. J’s Bagels on East Market Street. The topic: around-the-table sharing about “Keeping Christmas” in a culture that sometimes tends to cheapen and commercialize the holidays. Helpful reading: Ten Tips for a Simpler, More Meaningful Christmas.
For our meeting Nov. 7 at 7:30 a.m. at Mr. J’s Bagels, we will be discussing Nigel Paterson’s “Do We Need a Christian University?” This essay examines the relationship between secular society and the idea of the university.
Here’s a summary of the paper:
The concept of a university was substantially a Christian innovation, yet most modern universities are secular institutions. This paper surveys briefly the historical background which shows how this came about and the institutional landscape of higher education today. Next, biblical perspectives applicable to all Christians involved in higher education are explored. At the heart of the paper, there lies a discussion of the arguments for and against a Christian university, and the characteristics of such a new Christian university, as envisaged, are presented. The paper is intended to provoke readers across the world to thought, discussion and a more informed response to the many possibilities for Christian service within higher education.
Coming up are two new opportunities to get together with other Christian faculty for reflection and discussion:
The topic for both these gatherings is: “How being a Christian changes the way I teach.”
(Please let Taz know about October 21 or 29.