I love Google alerts, because you find the most interesting things you’d never see otherwise.
I read this post today from a blog written by “students in Dr. Jim Miller’s print news writing course at Harding University.”
According to the university’s website, “Harding University is a private Christian institution of higher education committed to the tradition of the liberal arts and sciences.”
And yet, according to the blog, the university won’t let Christian bands perform there. They’ll let mainstream bands, but it seems the reason Christian bands can’t is because Christian music offers a more worship-like concert environment, and an entertainment-focused concert isn’t the environment for worship.
The issue, as the reporter Rachel D. writes, seems to center around not just worship, Citing Corey McEntyre, director of Campus Life, who is in charge of booking entertainment, Rachel writes that Harding has a written policy of no Christian bands.
Apparently Switchfoot (pictured) has performed at the university before, which I think is funny, because Switchfoot is a bunch of Christians who don’t label themselves a Christian band. So what’s the criteria? You can be a Christians as long as you don’t call yourself a Christian band?
The whole thing is really weird. A Christian university with an actual policy of not letting Christian bands play, but letting mainstream bands perform? I’ve seen Christian universities that don’t let any bands play (can’t have electric instruments, you know), or only allow only CCM or Adult Contemporary Christian music and not rock or screamo (because CCM is godly and rock isn’t).
But this is really odd, don’t you think?