Dissenting Views

Librarians are supposed to stand for intellectual freedom, diversity of opinion, and providing access to materials that represent all points of view. How can we do that when many of us are intolerant of dissenting views? Allowing our profession to be a bastion of orthodoxy of any kind defeats our purpose.

From “The Loneliness of a Conservative Librarian” by David Durant
The Chronicle of Higher Education, from the issue dated September 30, 2005


Anyone care to speculate how Mr. Durant’s point might apply to the church?

It seems to me that when the church, just like ALA( the American Library Association), endorses any political orthodoxy we are at risk of losing sight of our primary objectives, bringing Christ Jesus to a lost and dying world and living the Christ life in it. That doesn’t mean we should not bring our faith into the political arena just that we should expect our churches to help us do so rather than tell us what party we should support.

The Founding Fathers of our nation had observed the problems a State Religion caused for religion as much as for the state. They recognized how important it was for Americans to exercise their religion freely. In essence they freed the church to be the church. Rather than making one orthodoxy or the other a “test” for our faith, the men who set up our nation allowed faith to drive our politics. The church should be interested in political issues, take part in the political life of our country, and send its members into the political arena armed and supported by sound doctrine and prayer. But, when that participation becomes endorsement and how one votes is a test of how good a Christian one is, the church, as much as ALA, needs to stop being political and start being the organization it was intended to be.