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So if you have an organization with a stated mission and objective, why would you be required to retain those who do not share that mission or objective?
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“I don’t know if I even believe in God anymore,” one ex-staffer said.
In early October, Time.com published a story accusing InterVarsity Christian Fellowship USA — a campus organization that runs evangelical student groups at 667 colleges across the country — of adopting a policy of firing employees who openly support marriage equality. (That is, firing people who oppose what InterVarsity stands for.)
The article sent a shockwave through America’s evangelical Christian community: students, alumni, and authors who work with the group’s publishing arm were quick to condemn the policy, calling for its reversal. (That is, agitators started howling.)
The pressure eventually goaded InterVarsity, which has over a thousand chapters all over the United States, to issue a flurry of statements in which they clarified they would not fire staffers who support same-sex “civil marriage,” but would reserve “involuntary termination” for those who theologically back unions between two people of the same gender. It also noted that the policy, which is embedded within a new 20-page theological document, condemns any sexual activity that occurs outside of a marriage between a man and a woman, including premarital sex or adultery. (InterVarsity starts to cave...)
The nuance was important: like many groups that take an anti-LGBT position, it behooves InterVarsity to avoid being cast as prejudiced in any focused way, as such a negative distinction could hypothetically put them at odds with many colleges’ nondiscrimination policies — and possibly result in chapters being pushed off campuses. (Standing for biblical truth is not prejudice.
Interesting that nondiscrimination is a discriminatory position. That is, the choice to discriminate against some but not others is what the critics are engaging in themselves.)
But in a recent interview with ThinkProgress, Greg Jao, an InterVarsity vice president and director of campus engagement, confirmed that InterVarsity does, in fact, plan to fire individuals who say that their faith supports same-sex marriage. He continued to insist, however, that the termination process includes an element of choice, with administrators asking staffers who disagree with the policy to come forward on their own to preserve their “integrity.”
“We’re also going to acknowledge [staffers] have a choice in it,” he said. “We have told supervisors not to go after people we have heard disagree in the past.”
“I believe from the bottom of my heart that this has categorically not been the motivation for removing LGBTQI people from our staff,” he added.
ThinkProgress reporting tells a different story. Interviews with former InterVarsity staff and internal documents obtained by ThinkProgress reveal a systematic, top-down campaign to remove staff members who even entertain theologies that do not condemn LGBT relationships—both before, during, and after the implementation of the policy. (Such purity is de rigueur for leftist organizations. Can you imagine a pro-life person being allowed to remain working for Planned Parenthood?)
It appears that InterVarsity’s “integrity” language falls flat with many of their employees, that the difference between “civil” and “religious” marriage was never cogently articulated, and that the supposed “choice” afforded to staff does not accord with the experiences of many who have been fired by the organization. (Employees do not get to choose the policies, the employer does. The employee's obligation is to conform to those policies or find another job.)
Not only does the organization have a history of pressuring LGBT-affirming staff members to leave, but it also has utilized harmful anti-LGBT rhetoric and teachings that have damaged the lives and faiths of employees—and likely of students as well. (No examples given. But we certainly know how easily offended some of these leftists are. They need their safe spaces and go aflutter when their tender sensibilities are offended.)
Some staffers report the organization’s policies left them despondent, suicidal, and even abandoning their faith altogether. (Oh the humanity! Can you imagine? The historic position of Christianity for thousands of years leaves people despondent and suicidal? Why on earth did they join up with such an organization to begin with? Was this a surprise to them?
What is happening here is that leftist infiltrators have began the task of converging InterVarsity in an effort to remold it to their tastes and worldview. This is the modus operandi of the Left.
And we note that these people already abandoned their faith. They're just being called on it.)
The new theological statement
The purpose of the new theological statement, according to the statement itself, is a bit vague. It states that it exists to “articulate InterVarsity’s convictions about human sexuality” and to serve as “a resource for teaching on human sexuality for InterVarsity staff, student leaders, and faculty.” Though it specifies that InterVarsity staff is the primary audience, the document itself doesn’t lay out any kind of enforcement expectations.
When the organization’s national leadership first presented the statement last year to their staff — employees and volunteers who help run InterVarsity’s various chapters— leadership also unveiled a plan to spend a full year implementing it instead of adopting it all at once. They developed a rollout with a training that included nine 60- to 90-minute sessions for staff to work through — with homework in between.
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