Winter 2014
Ivy League Christian Observer
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February 11, 2014
Christian Union Will Host Triennial Event in New Haven, Connecticut
At first glance, Baroness Caroline Cox appears an unlikely candidate to traverse the globe as a tireless campaigner for human rights and advocate for persecuted Christians.
However, the former deputy speaker of the House of Lords and grandmother has crisscrossed jungles, deserts, and mountains in her quests to investigate oppression and alert the political elite of the United Kingdom and beyond to the neglected casualties of far-flung war zones.
In March, Baroness Cox will serve as a keynote speaker for the Ivy League Congress on Faith and Action. Christian Union is hosting the triennial event from March 28 to 30 at the Omni New Haven Hotel in New Haven, Connecticut.
February 11, 2014
Kyle Duncan is Lead Attorney for Hobby Lobby Supreme Court Case
A Columbia University law alumnus says he simply wants to serve God as he prepares to enter the nation's highest judicial stage in his quest to champion religious liberties.
In November, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear twin cases testing the strength of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The 1993 measure commits the federal government to safeguarding an individual's "inalienable right" to exercise religion.
Kyle Duncan, Columbia LL.M. '04, is the lead attorney for Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., which is challenging a regulation within the federal healthcare law requiring employers to offer access to so-called morning-after pills.
February 11, 2014
Missionary's Testimony Inspires Penn Students
In November, students at the University of Pennsylvania heard a love story, not about a man and a woman, but about the love of a man for his God and the transformative power that inspired him to reach out his hand in friendship to the one who had tortured him for nine months.
Dan Baumann served as a missionary in Afghanistan and traveled to Iran to share the Gospel, where he was arrested in 1997.
February 11, 2014
Events Educate Harvard Community about Misconceptions
While Sex Week at Harvard promoted tolerance and the "exploration of diverse and varied sexual activity," another group of students simultaneously held events that sought to warn the campus community about the dangers and misconceptions of pornography.
White Ribbon Against Pornography Week (WRAP) was sponsored by the Harvard Catholic Student Association, the Anscombe Society, The Knights of Columbus at Harvard, and Harvard College Faith and Action, a leadership development ministry supported and resourced by Christian Union.
February 11, 2014
Marvin Olasky, Yale '71, Releases 25th Anniversary Edition of Groundbreaking Book
A quarter century ago, Marvin Olasky wrote Prodigal Press: Confronting the Anti-Christian Bias of the American News Media. Last year, with the help of journalist and colleague Warren Smith, Olasky, Yale '71, released the 25th anniversary, revised edition of the book, which continues to remain relevant, even in a vastly different media world.
"When Prodigal Press came out in 1988, it was a seminal book and had a huge impact on a generation of young Christian journalists," said Smith. "But in the past 25 years, much has happened. Cable news has proliferated. The Internet has dramatically changed both the news and the advertising environment. Satellite and Internet radio has tens of millions of daily listeners in the U.S. alone."
February 11, 2014
Andy Crouch Challenges Leaders in New Book
While Lord Acton may have believed "absolute power corrupts absolutely," author Andy Crouch, Cornell '89, believes that power can create beautifully.Crouch is the executive editor of Christianity Today and the author of a new book, Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power. This fall, he spoke about the book during "An Evening Conversation with Andy Crouch and Mike Gerson" at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Gerson, a columnist with the Washington Post, was a speechwriter and advisor to President George W. Bush, Yale '68 and Harvard MBA '75.
February 10, 2014
Conference at Princeton Focuses on Marriage, Family, and Sexual Integrity
The long-term impact of falling fertility rates can wreak havoc upon a country's economic stability.
Rather than experiencing doomsday scenarios of overpopulation, many countries, instead, are confronting economic stagnation because of declining populations of younger workers and, subsequently, consumers.
That was one of the messages offered by Jonathan Last, a senior writer at The Weekly Standard, during the sixth-annual Sexuality, Integrity, and the University conference in November at Princeton University.
February 10, 2014
Searching for the Historical Jesus
The study of Jesus Christ and the far-reaching, immense impact of Christianity is a legitimate topic for study within the academy.
That was one of the themes from N.T. Wright when the noted New Testament scholar visited Princeton University during the fall as part of a Veritas Forum entitled, "Searching for the Historical Jesus."
Wright termed it "strange" to suggest Christ is off limits for scholarly inquiry at universities
