Those of you who have been following our series on current issues in Christian higher education have noticed our attention to Cornerstone University. We’ve joined Pastor Randy Powell, Pastor Noah Filipiak, and our friend Voice of CU in speaking out for dozens of people—administrators, faculty, and staff alike—who have been unjustly fired or otherwise forced out of the school during the turbulent days that began when Gerson Moreno-Riaño assumed the president’s office office in 2021.
In this post we announce that the letter of pastoral concern has been delivered by USPS to the CU Board of Trustees. We also reflect briefly on the unpleasant yet necessary role we have played in this unsavory drama.
The Pastoral Letter
We’ve alluded to the letter and why it was sent in a previous post. The letter expressed concern to the CU Board of Trustees about four issues:
- Toxic leadership leading to unjust treatment of numerous CU personnel and a campus atmosphere of administrative intimidation
- A lack of transparency and integrity in communicating with CU stakeholders about the financial status of the school and the real reasons why so many personnel were terminated
- Radical reorientation of CU’s programs away from Christian worldview, core values, and academic quality to programming based on marketability, employment potential, and cheap online delivery systems
- Aligning the school with current right-wing politics and culture instead of the eternal kingdom of God and the church, leading to marginalization of staff and students who do not support that particular political view.
News of the letter spread by word of mouth, without any sort of marketing campaign, resulting in 165 signatures. Some commented that delicate relationships within families, churches, and employment situations kept them from signing, although they heartily agreed with the letter. Others who agreed with the letter said, “why bother, it won’t do any good.” Such cynicism might be justified if one didn’t believe in the power of gospel truth to change hearts.
Has anyone heard the old Sinatra song “High Hopes”? I can remember my mother singing it. Check it out here. That silly song from 1959 spoke of ants moving rubber tree plants and a ram butting a hole in a million-kilowatt dam, all because they had “high apple pie in the sky hopes.” If the world believes that problems may surprisingly be overcome by perseverance, how much more should we who say we believe in the power of the gospel?
For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)
For those who are interested, here’s a brief demographic survey of the 165 signatories:
- Pastors. Of the 55 CU stakeholder pastors who signed the letter, 7 were CU alum’s, 40 were GRTS alum’s, 6 were alum’s of both CU and GRTS, and 2 were alum’s of neither school.
- Non-pastors. Of the 110 non-pastor CU stakeholders who signed, 52 were CU alum’s, 33 were GRTS alum’s, 7 were alum’s of both CU and GRTS, and 18 were alum’s of neither school.
Go here if you’d like to see the signed letter sent to CU.
How will the letter be received?
God only knows the answer to this question. As I write this post, none of us who organized the pastoral letter project have heard a word of acknowledgment from CU. It seems doubtful that there will be any official CU response. I wonder whether the board will even discuss the letter.
Judging from a recent interview posted on Youtube, President Moreno-Riaño views himself as a victim. He views the legitimate concern of stakeholders expressed through proper channels as a smear campaign directed against him personally. He believes he has courageously followed God’s vision for the school, comparing himself to Joshua, King David, and yes, even to Jesus on the cross. One of the many problems with that narrative is that Moreno-Riaño, aided and abetted by the CU trustees, has blown up the lives of around 150 CU personnel, however he attempts to cloak his ruthless actions with Bible verses taken out of context.
This is a classic case of DARVO. Will God be pleased to change the narrative?
Why did we bother?
Jesus taught us that we shouldn’t do what is right to get applause (Matt 6:1-18). Actually, in this broken world, the opposite result commonly occurs: “no good deed goes unpunished,” as B. J. Hunnicutt once sardonically told Radar O’Reilly on my all-time favorite TV show M*AS*H*. We do what’s right because it fits somewhere under the umbrella of the two Great Commandments (Matt 22:37-40), and we leave the outcome to our Father in heaven.
We grieve for CU and pray for better days when historic biblical values will be reaffirmed on campus. As nearly as we can tell, the CU board is currently enthralled with President Moreno-Riaño’s dream of a nationally dominant CU with an alum in every household in the USA. Equating this delusion with the call of God apparently justifies running roughshod over anyone on campus who gets in the way. After all, the president likens himself to Joshua and David, who actually were called by God to fight against those who opposed them.
Will you join me in praying that God will be pleased to alter the current path of the CU board of trustees? In case you’ve missed what I’m saying, I’m talking about what one of my Pentecostal friends calls a Holy Ghost Revival, one that leads to repentance,confession, restitution, and change of direction.
• • • • • • •
With what shall I come before the Lord
and bow down before the exalted God?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with ten thousand rivers of olive oil?
Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly, and to love mercy,
and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6:6-8 NIV)
Thank you so much for standing up and speaking truth to power. We join you in prayer for that Holy Ghost Revival. I appreciate you and Noah (whom I know), and Pastor Randy Powell (whom I don’t think I’ve had the pleasure of meeting), and all those who signed the letter. May God be pleased to use it to advance the cause of truth, justice, and love at CU.
Amen!
Thank you David, Noah, Randy and the Voice of CU for the letter. Reading those signatures was a balm for the wounds suffered. I am sure many of my colleagues feel the same way. My reason for not signing the letter was simply that the letter was stronger without some of our signatures. Having been labelled a trouble-maker and portrayed as the organizer behind all the protest, the letter would have been more easily dismissed with our signature. It may still be. The legal discussions are over. Maybe Noah should organize a podcast with a few of us who experienced what you all described so well in the letter.
Thank you Matt. My friends and I are proud to speak up for everyone at CU who has been unjustly terminated or forced out by GMR with the approval of the CU board.
Thanks Matt. I’ll reach out.
Although I cannot speak with certainty on her behalf, I believe Nicole would be willing to partner with you on Noah’s podcast.
Online education is the wave that is taking over the world. I remember meeting with Dean James Grier asking if I could take distance learning courses from Liberty Seminary and transfer them to what is now CTS. He said no. He felt that distance learning was not the future. Grier was wrong. Online seminary and college is real and effective.
I’m surprised at your anecdote Mark. One of the first projects Jim Grier assigned me was to put together a distance education Hermeneutics class, mainly for the MRE extension students. So I wrote a programmed instruction manual and went over to WCSG to record lectures that were put on cassettes and mailed to students. I still have one of the bulky binders that contained everything. State of the art stuff then!
I don’t agree that online education is necessarily effective any more than traditional classroom education is effective. There are so many variables in student motivation and course construction. In my view asynchronous online courses facilitated by people the students never meet are not effective when it comes to promoting critical thinking skills and learning with a community of peers. I think competence-based theological education has the best of both worlds. Read about it here.
I learned a great deal about theology and education from Jim Grier. Like all the rest of us, he was wrong occasionally.
Sounds like CU’s current President is leading the school down the same path as my beloved, now-defunct, Alma Mater, Clarks Summit University, which I will always call Baptist Bible College and Seminary. Sad.
Good to hear from you Randy. Long time. Amen to the name BBC&S.
Your comment interests me because I see a lot of differences between the two schools and their administrations. From a distance, it seems to me that the BBC&S administration did little to fix problems (financial and otherwise) that only got worse year after year. At CU the new president promoted a false narrative that the school was financially on the brink and spiritually compromised, all in order to make radical changes in personnel, curriculum, and culture. The board chair went so far as to say in a letter that the demise of BBC&S warned CU not to have a similar end and justified the changes.
The ways you live out the theology you taught me inspires me in ways you may never know. Grieving and hoping with you!
Thank you David. It’s been a very long time since we’ve spoken, and it’s great to hear from you. I’d love to get a coffee and talk if you’re ever in GR. God bless your work!
What’s wrong with having a CU graduate in every household? If you are a fan … or believe in the university.
This may sound like a wonderful goal but it’s a delusional, quixotic quest.
Do the math. Take the largest university today in the USA. Find out how many people it graduates annually. Then divide that number into the total number of households in the USA. That number is roughly how many years it would take to accomplish GMR’s “vision.” And that’s only after the years it would take for CU to become the largest university in the USA. How long would that take? It’s an unattainable goal and much worse, it distracts people from what CU ought to be about.
I realize Ephesians 3:20-21 is in the Bible, but the verse is not talking about diluting core values in order to gain market share over competitors. This is a worldly agenda, the gospel according to Bill Gates, capitalism camouflaged by the thinnest veneer of spirituality.
Non multa sed multum. The quality of a university outweighs the sheer volume of its graduates.
Thank you for keeping us in the loop and for your efforts, alongside others, to help alumni/pastors have a voice in these situations!
You’re welcome Ethan.
You give the impression that a university cannot have quality and quantity. The best university in the world could have one graduate a year. What influence would that have in our society? This reminds me of a cartoon. A couple opens the door of a church. Inside the church there is one person behind the pulpit. One person sitting in a chair in the middle of the church. And the usher who says: welcome to our church. We believe in quality not quantity.
That’s a caricature. That’s not what I’m saying at all.
Obviously a Christian university wants its student body to grow, and awareness of market trends is part of offering programs that attract more students. All good so far. What’s not good is diluting core worldview values and unjustly firing quality faculty mentors to achieve growth.
Getting the word out about a quality education should lead to sustainable growth. Abandoning the historic CU brand probably won’t lead to increased market share. Even if it does, is selling the university’s soul worth a larger student body?
Non multa sed multum is the motto of the Martin Guitar Company in Nazareth PA. They’ve been making guitars there for over 150 years. They sell thousands of them every year because they are among the best guitars available. Their reputation for quality instruments results in huge sales, not vice versa.
Where is Joe Stowell in this CU situation? I thought that he was the Chancellor.
As I understand it from the outside, the plan was for Dr. Stowell to remain at CU as Chancellor when Dr. GMR assumed the presidency. However, Dr. Stowell soon resigned that position, apparently after GMR’s board-approved agenda became clear. Stowell obviously could not support GMR’s message that caricaturized Stowell’s legacy.
You understand this is just my opinion . . .