Esse Quam Videri

Contratimes readers familiar with Credenda Agenda, New St. Andrews College, or Douglas Wilson, should read the New York Times Magazine article, "Onward Christian Soldiers." (You may need to register at the NYT, but the process is quick, easy and worth it.)

I am eager to learn what readers think, not so much of the article per se, but of the vision of Christian higher education proposed by Mr. Wilson and New St. Andrews. Ask yourself (if you wish) what it might mean to be a "medieval Protestant"; whether such a goal is desirable. Some of us are currently in the market looking for colleges for our children: Is New St. Andrews good enough for our children, or too good? Do Wilson and company espouse true Christian intellectual virtues, or does their philosophy amount to so much pastiche? Is this all just some romanticized picture of a don in pedantic pose, or is this a picture of the true Christian mind in the raptures of rigorous discipline and inquiry? Are there idols afoot, or would this all be representative of the matriculating Christ, or Christ as senior fellow? Is this really about transforming culture or salvaging civilization, or is it Inklings Make-Believe, an almost idolatrous fixation on C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien and Owen Barfield and Charles Williams maintained as a sort of academic theme park, complete with gay draughts of bitter, bawdy conversation and the apt Latin phrase?

What do you think?

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2007/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.