Church leaders and parents are often anxious about their children going off to college. And one of the most frequent concerns among them is the liberal nature of professors. The amount of “liberal” professors far outweighs that of conservative. In fact so much so that there have been studies on why this is the case.
One recent study done by the New York Times titled “Professor Is A Label That Leans To The Left,” asks why liberals seek to become academics, and why conservatives do not. They say its basically like any other profession that is overwhelmingly held by one gender, such as nursing (women), or one political outlook, such as law enforcement (conservative). They say the reputation of that particular field causes certain people to pursue it.
Makes sense to me. But most interesting, to me at least, is another study called, “Conservatives Just Aren’t Into Academe,” found that the lack of conservatives in the academic field wasn’t due to discrimination, but rather because conservatives weren’t choosing to go into the field.
Now, I’m not sure how they define liberal and conservative – whether that’s Democrat and Republican, Christian and non-Christian, Green or non-Green…no idea. Nevertheless, I think it’s interesting that this field is not pursued by conservatives more. You’d think it would be different…
Why do you think this is the case?
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Chuck Bomar is pastor of Colossae Church in Portland, Oregon and founder of CollegeLeader (
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I think the trend toward liberal profs is slowly changing, especially in certain academic fields. For example, I have a graduate degree in history, and try to keep up on the field. Guys like George Marsden and Mark Noll are evangelical historians who are recognized across the board as top in their profession. They have trained a whole cadre of historians who are now beginning to make their way into the halls of the academy and make a significant splash. Also, in philosophy, because of people like Alvin Plantinga, that field is now populated with many Christians churning out solid scholarship from a Christian worldview.
Furthermore, just from my own time as a grad student back in the day, and with my work on campus now as a college minister, there are quite a few Christian profs who are hesitant about expressing faith on campus. I believe they need some significant pastoral attention to help them live their faith in a sea of liberalism. We can both listen to them and their thoughts on living the Christian life in the academy, as well as walk alongside them and help them integrate their faith and their work. After all, reaching any campus isn’t just about students, but faculty as well.
i think this is the case because college is a time to discuss other perspectives and ideas…Conservatives by definition aren’t really into this…if one is a conservative, they wish to “conserve” the status quo…in other words, there is typically only one way of doing things, and any other way just will not do…liberals, on the other hand, and almost by definition, are free to look at other ideas as much as they want and never have to settle on just one idea…ideology also has a great deal to do with it…i would contend that ideology comes about when only one perspective is focused on or accepted…Conservative tend to have a stronger ideology than that of liberals…the way to “combat” ideology is to take in as many perspectives, especially those that contradict the set ideology…although, i consider myself conservative with some liberal tendencies, i think it is good to have liberals as professors…even though i find myself disagreeing with a lot of their ideas, it at least gives me a chance to look at ideas that differ from my own…and then i have a chance to refine my own thoughts and beliefs
dale, i tend to agree with you. as a person that leans more conservative when it comes to theology, i can relate to the, for lack of better terms, “close-mindedness” of conservatives. i don’t personally feel like we have to negate solid doctrine to discuss issues and hear the voices/opinions of others. In fact, like you, i enjoy hearing other opinions. thanks for your comment.
timotheos, like you i have have become aware of more believing professors. but i don’t know if that’s because there’s a movement toward that or if i’m just getting older, and more familiar with others. do you really feel like there’s a movement out there?
I do think there is at least some significant movement in certain fields toward entering the academy. One evidence of this would be the growing number of Christian profs that are organized together at annual academic conferences. Also, it seems to me that many students now are beginning to better understand that they can live whole hog for God in a secular place, and not just think that vocational ministry is the way to go in order to impact the world for Jesus.
no prob chuck