As a student majoring in religion, I am urged with great regularity to keep an open mind with regard to whatever subject matter we cover. I see it as only fair and logical that we would be unbiased, and therefore try my best to remain impartial. Yet as I have often noticed, the education we receive is not as impartial as we might usually expect or even desire.
In the modern age of cultural equality, we as Americans have compromised a handsome lot of our own interests. While sacrifice can be good, we should not become indebted to the groups who for so long were indebted to us. As much as that might sound equal, it is really just irrational. The "tit-for-tat" philosophy behind such endeavors brings the society nowhere closer to goal of equality that it really desires.
What I am talking about is the concessions that are made in the classrooms of a large number of religion classes at Dartmouth. In trying to avoid a Judeo-Christian bias, they far surpass that goal, and present classic Christian and Jewish beliefs and traditions as false. While there are diverse ways of looking at the Bible that need to be investigated, one should not should not include those which thwart the faith of the students in the class.
There is a definite difference, in my opinion, between noting what is obviously false and actively seeking to disprove. The vast majority of professors I have thus far encountered act as though it is among their chief interests to discredit classic Christian and Jewish beliefs. If the course description or syllabus said that we would study such issues, that would be fine, but the prejudice is random and often comes across as subversive.
The prejudice is even more apparent in classes where multiple religions are studied. Many professors speak condescendingly towards and about Christianity and Judaism, yet laud other faiths. Would it not be better to look upon all faiths in an equal manner, without going out of the way to make one or more traditions look bad?
What I see occurring is the return swing of a pendulum that for a long time stayed on the side of Christianity. For hundreds of years, Christianity was favored to the point of nearly being our national religion; the effects of such favoritism are seen throughout everyday life. Why else does our classic week begin on Sunday rather than Monday? And since Judaism shares a measure of heritage and ancestry with Christianity, the Jewish traditions and people were granted similar favoritism.
Yet with a new movement toward cultural liberalism, not only have things been equalized, the balance of equality is becoming burdensome on the back of the Christian believer.
The scenario is analogous to that of affirmative action. The white male, who once had the world as his oyster, now has a greater likelihood of striking oil than finding a decent job. There was obviously something wrong with white males comprising nearly every high rank position available, yet the answer is not to then make the white male inferior. Christians should not be the white males of the academic world.
However, since a good challenge is always welcome for a firm believer in any cause or faith, I continue to be a religion major. To an extent, I will even happily associate myself with the religion department here at Dartmouth, where the faculty is among the finest we have. My only regret is that the equality and unbiased teaching that the department seeks has yet to come out in many of the classes I have thus far encountered.
