Kindgo
Advanced Member
Member # 2
|
posted
by Candi Cushman
http://www.boundless.org/2002_2003/...s/a0000694.html
At first glance, Megan Burns' dorm room seems pretty typical — amid the framed photos, silk flowers and Laura Ashley-type décor, there's an obstacle course of shoes and textbooks strewn about the floor and a pile of this week's laundry blocking the doorway.
But there's one noticeable difference. Instead of the lewd slogans adorning several of the rooms surrounding hers, Megan's walls feature her favorite Scriptures like the 23rd Psalm. And that's especially appropriate since knowing the Lord is her Shepherd has helped her survive one of the toughest ordeals she's ever undergone — a three-month fight for the right to invite colleagues to a Bible study.
The battle began last fall when Megan, a 24-year-old graduate student studying special education at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs (UCCS), found herself embroiled in a campus controversy. At issue was her decision to invite 18 student dormitory assistants, whom she helps oversee as a campus-paid supervisor, to attend weekly Bible studies in her room on a voluntary basis.
Megan started the meetings after one assistant began asking spiritual questions and expressed an interest in further study. On the first night, seven of the 18 showed up to discuss the Gospel of John.
But a few days later, a fellow supervisor accused Megan of pushing a "religious agenda" that might offend others and of violating civil-rights laws against mixing work with religion. Over the next two months, her superiors warned her that people had been fired for similar reasons and eventually forbade her from personally inviting assistants to any more religious events, Megan said.
Megan's not the rebellious type, but this was hard to swallow. "I was so frustrated," she said. "It just seemed like that would give me no rights at all."
And she couldn't help noticing that "offending others" didn't seem to stop a lot of other activities.
Campus-funded events that evoked complaints from religious students continued unchecked. Like the Valentine's Day event in which students got condoms in their mailboxes whether they wanted them or not. (Megan threw hers away, only to find someone had stuck it back in her mailbox later on.) And like banners promoting nonalcoholic drinks with slogans such as "Get Laid with Virgins."
Megan knew she had a clear-cut choice: Either give in or stand up for the right to talk about God's truth. She chose the latter, after realizing that "as Christians, we're compromising with the world. We're laying our values down for the world so we don't offend anybody."
So Megan told her boss that, in addition to being a supervisor, she also was a tuition-paying student who was prepared to take her fight to higher authorities unless her free-speech rights were honored. "I was tired of Christians getting steamrolled," she said, pointing out that if she had invited students to a meeting promoting gay rights or Islam, "nobody would be making a big deal about this."
Her supervisors refused to bend. So Megan followed through by going to a Colorado state representative, Dave Schultheis.
In a letter to UCCS Chancellor Pam Shockley, Schultheis argued that civil-rights laws were written to protect religious freedoms, not to restrict them. Besides, he noted, "given the official activities that the Housing staff seems to be organizing or condoning, their concerns that 'someone might be offended' by Ms. Burns ring rather hollow."
A few days later, Megan found herself in the chancellor's office, hearing a concession she never expected: She could invite whomever she wanted to Bible studies, explained the chancellor, as long as invitations did not appear on job-related documents.
But the pleasant surprises didn't stop there. Megan had concentrated her attention on securing the right to Bible study, mentioning the university-sponsored programs that offended her only to expose a double standard. But that, as it turned out, was enough. The chancellor told her the campus would stop putting condoms in student mailboxes and would remove the sexual overtones of Valentine's Day and alcohol-awareness promotions.
For Megan, both the battle and the victory were a direct answer to prayer.
"One month before this happened, I felt like I had a weak, wimpy spirit as far as standing up for the cause of Christ," she said. "I started praying the Lord would embolden my spirit.
"So it was rewarding to see how just one small step that I didn't think would make any difference at all changed campus policy. It strengthens you when you don't compromise."
The strength Megan found over the course of the months-long struggle came in handy when even some fellow Christians had been urging her to back down. While some supported her, others told her it wasn't "loving" to confront the powers that be.
Megan didn't buy that, though. "My first allegiance is to love God, then love my neighbor," she responded. "and it's not loving God when I allow the truth to be pushed out."
To other students who might face a similar conflict, Megan has a message.
"We need to keep an eternal perspective when we're facing these things. You know, if you lose a friendship or a working relationship, it's not the end of the world. It's better to stand up for Christ than to stand with the world and have Him say one day 'you could have stood up for me and you didn't do it.' "
![[Big Clap]](graemlins/clap2.gif)
--------------------
God bless,
Kindgo
Inside the will of God there is no failure. Outside the will of God there is no success.
Posts: 4320 | From: Sunny Florida | Registered: Jun 2002
| IP: Logged | 
|
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](graemlins/youpi.gif)
