As some readers of this blog know, the Canadian Association of University Teachers has criticized Trinity Western University for failing to practice academic freedom and has concluded that it does not deserve public support. Canadian Mennonite University in Winnipeg, Redeemer College in Ancaster, Ontario, and Crandall University in Moncton, New Brunswick, I understand to be on their list of similar schools deserving similar judgment. And major Canadian media, notably Maclean’s, have given voice to similar outlooks—notably the fairly shrill secular humanism of Prof. Todd Pettigrew of Cape Breton University.
I joined the public fray with an article in University Affairs published here. I have also responded to several Maclean’s posts about the matter.
For those interested in this issue, I refer you also to my previous posts offering more extensive apologiae, written in the context of British university life, here and here.
This controversy may be nothing but a tempest in the easily roiled academic teapot. But it may also be part of a larger contemporary secularizing movement to delegitimize and marginalize religious organizations from Canadian public life and service. If so, it deserves attention and engagement.
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