Right wing goes after WSU

[wu_shizzle]

It all the U.S. media about. There is no just "reporting" the news anymore - it all biased and sensationalized. You can't take anything for face value as being true anymore.

While there are plenty of Click-bait, ad revenue driven political sites, there are sites that are more interested in issues than page views.

It's rare that I need to go further for commentary than The Federalist

[tropicalshox]

The Federalist is know as a conservative or right wing news outlet.

[WstateU]

EDIT: I will say the bidet request is totally asinine. When you move to another country you should plan on conforming to the culture you are entering, not with an entitled attitude that they should conform to you. I wouldn't settle in their land and request that large sums of money be spent to install western-style pedestal toilets, would I?

[RoyalShock]

While there are plenty of Click-bait, ad revenue driven political sites, there are sites that are more interested in issues than page views.

It's rare that I need to go further for commentary than The Federalist

I'll have to check them out.

[wu_shizzle]

The Federalist is know as a conservative or right wing news outlet.

They have many writers from a variety of backgrounds, and while they are conservative, you won't find shilling going on.

You won't find much love for establishment Republicans or Democrats, but they are intellectually honest and usually witty.

I find actual journalism being done there, especially from Mollie Hemingway.

[WSUwatcher]

Using the link trop provided, there's a perfect illustration of what is wrong with political "journalism":

First, is this paragraph:



Then two paragraphs later they quote Bardo:



How does someone logically go from "This chapel will be open to all creeds and to all races of people" to " . . . why didn’t they just give them a separate place? Because Muslims want dominance."

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Even Fox News' Todd Starnes (who has a weekly appearance on Steve and Ted's morning show), has used the same poor logic.

And the sheeple eat it up.

As a Christian who is concerned about the spread of Islam I'm not happy about the whole situation either. But if that's how Mrs. Grace wanted it, then it's not the muslims to blame in this case. Freedom is messy, and the 1st Amendment isn't selective.

If the place is supposed to be welcoming to everyone, how does removing the pews and an altar make it welcoming to Christians? Why not an east-facing prayer area for Muslims and an intact, if smaller, prayer area including a few pews and an altar for Christians? Is that really so hard?

[ShockTalk]

If the place is supposed to be welcoming to everyone, how does removing the pews and an altar make it welcoming to Christians? Why not an east-facing prayer area for Muslims and an intact, if smaller, prayer area including a few pews and an altar for Christians? Is that really so hard?

Yes, but what about Joboo.

[Wuzee]

WSUwatcher ...

Calling the current arrangement "not welcoming" to Christians would be news to the campus minister at the time of the renovation decision. The minister, of the United Methodist faith, was ecstatic about the removal of the pews, which he had advocated prior to the Muslim students' request. It would also be news to the Christian students who meet every Friday morning in the chapel to listen to Christian music, talk and study. I happened to be on campus this morning and dropped in to look at the chapel for myself. One of the group, guessing that I was there for that reason, came up to me specifically to say how much they loved the flexibility of the space without the pews. They can place chairs in a circle for Bible study sessions, for instance, or, as they were doing today, can hang out on the carpet and do homework or sit in the chairs and pray or meditate in a beautiful, peaceful space. Despite reports to the contrary, the prayer rugs used by the Muslim students are only out during their prayer time.

When you're standing in that room, it's clear that the hatred and vitriol being spewed forth is way out of line.

Also -- about the altar: It was essentially just a cabinet. It had no religious iconography whatsoever. In it's place is a smaller, similarly unadorned lectern, partially visible in the photos in this recent SGA photo gallery: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?...2660274&type=3

There is also a hanging candleholder with a base structure that casts an X shadow on the back wall. The base looks sort of like a modified brass Canterbury Cross (albeit unadorned in any way). It was the only permanent feature of the building that could reasonably have been interpreted to be a cross -- and my understanding is that no request was made to remove it.

[pinstripers]

So...........one guy thinks it's out of line and one guy doesn't.

[ShockBand]

I would agree that the white folding chairs come off as cheap. There are much nicer stacking chairs, and I would bet one could find chairs with kneelers on the back if so desired. We had very nice wood frame padded chairs that stacked at my church, prior to building a dedicated use sanctuary with permanent seating, which are not pews, but standard auditorium style seats.

[Aargh]

If the place is supposed to be welcoming to everyone, how does removing the pews and an altar make it welcoming to Christians? Why not an east-facing prayer area for Muslims and an intact, if smaller, prayer area including a few pews and an altar for Christians? Is that really so hard?

How are pews and an altar requirements for a Christian experience? The church where I grew up was the Ebenfeld Mennonite Brethren church about 5 miles south of Hillsboro. That's a fairly conservative and rather Christian group of people.

About 15 years ago, they expanded the church to include a fellowship hall. The service was available in that area through video screens and audio feeds. That area proved to be so popular that regular services were moved to the less formal setting. There are no pews or an altar in that area of the church.

The less formal setting saw the church experience a growth of about 50% - and that's not because of a population explosion in rural Kansas. People in the community preferred that setting for their Christian services and church attendance.

The main sanctuary is used on special occasions when there is a reason for a more formal service.

If you require pews and an altar for a Christian experience, those seem to be things. My understanding is that Christ wasn't a big endorser of using "things" in worship. I was also taught to kneel when praying. We didn't kneel in church because we were sitting in pews.

[Wuzee]

Aargh, I was surprised by this reaction, as well, having never considered pews to be sacred objects of worship despite 30-odd-years as a church musician in various denominations. It turns out that Catholics are more prone to consider pews as integral. This may be because of the kneelers -- although the Anglican Church of England (Episcopal), which also uses kneelers, recently cleared the way for some of its churches get rid of them if they wished. I would speculate that there may also be an age divide on this issue also, with older churchgoers less prone to warm to the change.

With that in mind, it seems to me worthwhile to have nicer chair-based seating solution that includes kneelers, as ShockBand suggested. Hopefully that would placate the largely Catholic voices who got this backlash, such as it is, started.

Interestingly, permanent pews didn't exist in the Catholic Church until after the Reformation, when Protestant churches began installing them. Now, according to some articles I've read, more and more Protestant churches are turning away from pews in favor of chairs, but Catholics don't want to let go of them. That's Alanis-Morrisette-level irony right there.

[Dave Stalwart]

That's Alanis-Morrisette-level irony right there.

The ultimate irony of that song is that none of the stuff she said in it was actually ironic.

A song all about ironies had no actual irony in it. For example, rain on your wedding day is not ironic. It is sad, frustrating, disappointing, yes, but not exactly ironic.

She is either a genius or an idiot.

[WuDrWu]

OOOO!!!! Me me ! I know!

[WSUwatcher]

Thanks for your observations, Wuzee. I haven't been to the Grace chapel recently or talked to anyone there, and you apparently have, so I appreciate your perspective.

Pews are certainly not a required part of the Catholic worship experience -- and we're the original Christians, as you know, having been founded by that Christ fellow Aargh referred to. No johnny-come-latelys for us. I've been in a number of Catholic churches, student centers, etc., without pews, and it never bothers me in the least. It's been years since I attended a Mass at the Catholic student center at WSU, but I don't remember that they had pews either, at least then. I'm also at a church with individual chairs that have kneelers on the back at least once a month, and that's a fine solution as far as I'm concerned. It definitely does provide flexibility. And certainly there are plenty of Christian churches without altars, whether real ones as used in Catholic liturgy or the sort of simulation you described at WSU.

Still, I don't doubt that some Christians of various types, and not only Catholics, could find the complete removal of pews disconcerting or bothersome. And as long as public institutions are going to be catering to everyone who claims some sort of grievance, which is unfortunately the norm in our pandering, politically correct times, it's hard not to notice the double standard applied to folks in the cultural, demographic, or religious mainstream. They're the ones whom it's safe to offend nowadays and who aren't allowed to complain when it happens without their being disparaged as racist, intolerant, xenophobic, or any of the other words used to silence discussion in contemporary America.

So I'm not surprised that there's some backlash. But, as has also been observed, it'll no doubt blow over soon, and life will go on.