Students arming for 'war' at new website

It's an occurrence all too common, the experts say. Christian students at Georgia Institute of Technology suddenly were confronted with a speech code and "Safe Space" training that promoted religious groups featuring homosexuality, but denigrated traditional Biblical beliefs.

Protests, challenges and eventually a lawsuit followed, according to the Alliance Defense Fund, where officials said a federal judge now has overturned the school's "draconian" speech code.

Now the ADF is launching a website that is intended to provide students facing situations like the one at Georgia Tech with information, training and encouragement as they arm themselves for the religious wars being waged on college campuses in America.

"America's colleges and universities should give Christian students the same rights as all other students," said David French, the director of the ADF's Center for Academic Freedom.

"Unfortunately, Christians are increasingly being treated like second-class citizens unless they bow at the altar of political correctness that exists at many of our nation's public university campuses," he said.

Most have heard the horror stories: Christian student organizations banned from campus unless they open their leadership positions to non-Christians, students given mandatory reading assignments that denigrate Christianity, professors ridiculing traditional Biblical beliefs, and the like.

Now the new Center For Academic Freedom website is up and running, along with its own blog.

It is dedicated to providing Christian students and student groups with support and information they will need, officials said.

"Our desire is to defend Christian students from having their religious expression marginalized by university officials, but we also desire to educate those officials so that they understand what the Constitution really says about the free religious expression rights of students," said French.

"We do not oppose universities themselves; we simply oppose unconstitutional policies and treatment. This new website will provide students and officials with the information they need, as well as offer support to those students and ministries experiencing difficulties exercising their constitutional rights on campus," he said.

The blog will feature student discussions of campus issues and the state of their religious freedoms.

The CAF already has challenged policy issues for students or faculty at Penn State, Ohio State and North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

The Georgia Tech case had school officials enforcing a strict speech code that carried a strong anti-Christian bias.

"Officials … had been enforcing draconian speech codes that prohibited any kind of student speech they deemed to be 'intolerant,'" said French. "Universities are supposed to be the marketplace of ideas."

While the free speech portion of the case has been resolved, the ADF still is proceeding with challenges to the school's unlawful exclusion of religious activities from student fee funding and its choice to establish pro-homosexual religious perspectives in its so-called "Safe Space" training.

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