BaptistLife.Com Forums.

Read about Falwell's first-ever SWBTS chapel appearance here: http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?ID=18940.

Observations:

1 - Falwell hath reiterated his earlier declaration: that Patterson, now president of the world's largest seminary, is even further to the right than himself.

2 - Let it soak in, especially ye Southwestern grads, that Falwell standeth at the pulpit once graced by L.R. Scarborough, Robert Naylor, T.B. Maston, Cecil Sherman, and Russell Dilday.

3 - Let it further soak in that Liberty - at least to the extent of Mid-America and Luther Rice - is now among the largest of Southern Baptist schools, and will continue to be increasingly touted in LifeWay publications along with its new law school, dedicated to the training of future little Roy Moores to protect Our Ten Protestant King James Commandments, which in turn guide Our Southern Baptist Zion.

4 - Americans United needs to declare in no uncertain terms (a) their equal disdain for any church which allows overt partisan political activity; (b) that they will equally monitor and condemn pro-Democratic activity in African-American liberal Protestant churches; and (c) that they will quickly proceed to do so.

Thanks mlovell--you beat me to it! Classes just went back in session, so I have less time than I had for a while there. (As a friend with whom I taught at a previous institution once said, if it weren't for these students, I could get a lot of work done!)

The reason AU is perceived not to be "an equal-opportunity watch dog" is that the Religious Right complains more loudly when they are caught than does the Left--probably because the Left knows they got caught doing something wrong while the Right thinks they were doing something. . . well, right!

Well, as to the enrollment figures, it is getting harder and harder to discern exactly how many students are enrolled and where those students are located. Since fundamentalist institutions and churches are so numbers oriented, it is a major embarassment for them to report declines in enrollment or attendance. The sign that they are in decline is when they stop reporting their "on campus" enrollment, and begin including everyone who buys a video course or logs on to an internet course as a "student". You'd have to have some of their old literature lying around to actually check if the full time student enrollment on the Lynchburg campus is in decline. I rely mainly on the word of people I know who went there, who tell me that both church and college are in a downward trend.