Science and Scripture 1: Relationships between Science and Faith

In the fall, I teach a course for Houghton that I designed while I was there, called Science and Scripture. The course was originally taught 15 years ago or so by Carl Schultz, a legendary Houghton professor who passed away three years ago. My impression is that the man was a genius, the kind of professor that once gave Houghton its reputation as the Wheaton or Harvard of the Wesleyan Church. 

I've had as a long term goal to traditionally publish a book to go along with the course, although a popular self-published version might actually be more helpful to the church. But a pop version couldn't be used for the class, or at least I couldn't require students to buy it. In any case, in anticipation of teaching the course this fall, I thought I would dedicate my writing time on Tuesday mornings this summer to such a book or -- at the very least -- to creating some reading material for the course. This would replace Ian Barbour's book, When Science Meets Religion.

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Four Views
Over the years, Christians have exhibited several different attitudes toward science. Galileo in the 1600s came into significant conflict with the Roman Catholic Church over whether the sun went around the earth or vice versa. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, we saw strongly negative reactions among some Christians toward the theory of evolution -- convictions which continue unto this day. 

Yet there are also many Christians who see no contradiction whatsoever between their faith and mainstream science. Still others believe in both but aren't quite sure how to fit the two together. They may worship on Sunday and work as a scientist the rest of the week without a good sense of how to reconcile their two identities together.

Various models for the possible relationships between science and faith have been suggested. John F. Haught once suggested four: 1) conflict, 2) contrast, 3) contact, and 4) confirmation. [1] Those who see conflict are those like the atheist Richard Dawkins who sees no possible compatibility between science and Christian faith. [2] Meanwhile, Francis Collins would be an example of someone who sees no contradiction at all between mainstream science and his faith -- "confirmation." [3]

The "contrast" position sees science and faith as complementary or, as Ian Barbour has put it, "independent." [4] From this perspective, science and faith are just doing different things. Stephen Jay Gould says they are "non-overlapping magisteria." [5] By this he means that they are distinct and separate frameworks that each work in their own domains.

Haught's third category, "contact," is a little harder to describe. In some ways, it seems to combine elements from the other three. It would say that, at some points, science and faith are independent of each other (contrast). Nevertheless, they come into contact in various ways. For example, the study of the universe (cosmology) takes us back to the earliest moments of the universe, but it reaches a boundary. It does not ask why the universe exists. That is a question for philosophy and religion.

In that sense, science and faith "hand off" the conversation to one another. Religion says, "in the beginning God" and then hands off the conversation to science to speak of cosmic expansion from a singularity. [6] Coming at it from the opposite side, science gets us back to the moment of creation and then lets religion and philosophy continue the discussion of first causes and such.

If we apply these four categories to Scripture, we have four broad options for how a particular passage of the Bible might relate to mainstream science. It might seem to conflict. It might seem to integrate or overlap well. Scripture might simply relate to something completely different from science. Or they might be distinct but in continuity with each other. Let's call these four options conflict, agreement, independence, and continuity.

[textbox: Science and Scripture
Conflict -- when science and Scripture seem to conflict with each other
Agreement -- when science and Scripture seem to overlap in agreement
Independence -- when science and Scripture are addressing distinctly different questions
Continuity -- when science and Scripture connect with each other on a topic while addressing different aspects of it]

Perception vs. Reality
A key factor in such discussions is the difference between our perceptions of how science and faith relate and how they might actually relate. For example, I may think that Scripture is in conflict with science when I am misinterpreting Scripture. Similarly, the young earth creationist Ken Ham believes that his faith is in complete harmony with true science, but he is in strong conflict with mainstream science. [7]

Here we run into a serious philosophical problem: how do we know what the right interpretation of Scripture is and how do we know what the real science is? In philosophy, we call these problems of epistemology, where epistemology is the branch of philosophy that asks how I can know that I know what I think I know. Related is the branch of philosophy known as metaphysics, which asks what the ultimate nature of reality is.

Throughout this book, we will largely adopt a perspective known as critical realism. Critical realism assumes that the world is real and that we can indeed know truths about it. However, our views are susceptible to significant skew because we are finite and do not have all the data. Similarly, we are hindered by faulty reasoning and the fact that we are "stuck in our heads," unable to fully overcome our biases and unexamined assumptions. From a theological perspective, you might say that our minds are "fallen" and subject to Sin.

We must accept, then, that our sense of whether science and faith are in conflict to a large extent is a matter of our perception -- as is any sense that they are in agreement. We may similarly think they are independent when in fact they should be in continuity or agreement. As we mentioned above, young earth creationists generally think that their perspective is integrated with science, but others would see them as quintessential examples of science and faith in conflict.

Throughout our conversation, we will try to navigate this tension between our perceptions of Scripture and the current understanding of science. Is Genesis 1-3 in conflict with the prevailing scientific theory of evolution? Many would assume it is on the basis of their understanding of Genesis 1-3. Yet we should keep in mind that there is more than one interpretation of Genesis 1-3. Some interpretations of Genesis 1-3 are either in continuity with the theory of evolution or independent of it.

Similarly, science is not static. Thomas Kuhn's celebrated work on paradigm shifts in science reminds us that the prevailing models of the moment may not be those of tomorrow. [8] Newtonian physics as a paradigm was unquestioned coming into the twentieth century before Einstein and the quantum revolution completely reframed it. In the year 1400, everyone assumed that the sun went around the earth. We are not making light of evolution as a theory to say that it is ever-revisable for this is the very nature of science.

The question of science and faith is thus an ongoing conversation. They are distinct domains that frequently come into contact in various ways. At first, they may seem to conflict where once they seemed in agreement. Often, they are simply doing different things. Sometimes, one takes over where the other one left off.

However, we will assume that "all truth is God's truth," meaning that no truth ultimately is in conflict with God. [9] If we perceive science and faith to be in conflict, then our understanding of one, the other, or both needs modification. We will assume that God's thought does not contradict itself and that true faith and true science are thus in harmony with each other.

These are all assumptions. While they may seem reasonable enough, they probably bear some justification. Accordingly, the next section goes into a little more detail on our three key philosophical assumptions: 1) God and the world are "real," 2) our perception of God and the world is finite and skewed, and 3) properly understood, truth in all domains cohere with each other. If these claims seem acceptable to you, you are welcome to skip to the final two sections of the chapter.

Note that the intended audience of this book consists of theists, individuals who believe God exists objectively apart from humanity and that God remains involved with the world. Certainly we will engage non-theist perspectives -- hopefully fairly and as objectively as possible. Nevertheless, the point of view assumed at the outset is a faith seeking understanding (fides quaerens intellectum).

Critical Realism and the Coherence of Truth

The Nature of Faith

The Nature of Science

[1] Cf. John F. Haught, Science and Religion: From Conflict to Conversation (Paulist, 1995).

[2] For example, Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (Mariner, 2008). 

[3] Francis S. Collins, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief (Free, 2007).

[4] Ian G. Barbour, When Science Meets Religion: Enemies, Strangers, or Partners? (HarperOne, 2000), 17-22.

[5] Stephen Jay Gould, Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life (Ballantine, 2002).

[6] Barbour calls this category, "dialog" in Science Meets Religion, 23-27.

[7]  Cf. the well-known website answersingenesis.com.  

[8] Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 4th ed. (University of Chicago, 2012).

[9] This expression comes from Arthur F. Holmes' 1977 book of the same name with InterVarsity Press. 

10. The Four Years of Wilbur Dayton (1972-76)

1. Richard Wing ended his history of Houghton College with Stephen Paine's presidency in 1972. Hopefully, someone will pick up the historian's mantle in the next few years and write the story of the last fifty years. As for me, I'll end my notes with the presidency of Wilbur Dayton, which lasted four years.

Previous posts in this series:

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college
• Luckey achieves accreditation
• A growing campus and faculty
• Stephen Paine becomes president
• Houghton and World War II
• Houghton and Post-WW2 Expansion
• Houghton and the Tumultuous 1960s
• Houghton Campus at the End of Paine's Presidency

Wilbur Dayton
1972-76

2. I was privileged to meet Wilbur Dayton in the early 90s at Asbury, and I knew his son Don Dayton. Both were Houghton grads, but they seemed like night and day to me. The father was very conservative and taught at Wesley Biblical Seminary for a number of years after his presidency at Houghton. To my young Wesleyan mind, Don seemed quite liberal within broader Wesleyan circles and quite the rabble-rouser. Don's work on the evangelical tradition in the 1800s was seminal, a classic for both Wesleyan and evangelical history.

Wilbur Dayton strikes me as somewhat of a tragic figure. Here is this nice man who didn't even apply to be president of Houghton. There were other names in the mix who were actually interested in the position. Bob Luckey, the son of the first president, could have been chosen, and he did go on to become president at Marion College. Mel Dieter probably would have made a great president, and he was in the mix.

Yet the board called Dayton, and he answered the call. He did his best. Yet as best I can tell from anecdotes from that time, the four years of his presidency were not particularly enjoyed.

Reinhold Campus Center

3. He was president during the Vietnam War. This was a time when many in the older generation felt like the younger hippie and protest generation needed to be brought under control. My impression is that the students at Houghton in those years may have felt the campus atmosphere quite restrictive. I think the Dean of Students may even have been a former military man.

Perhaps he was also seen as the Wesleyan Church sending in a man in to get a "liberal" college under control. The faculty had expanded significantly in the 60s. I imagine that a great number of these faculty were not Wesleyan, perhaps not very well acquainted with the Wesleyan Church. These are hypotheses about which I welcome redirection.

Lambein Hall

As Dayton exited, he was asked what he thought of being a college president. He remarked, "I have difficulty understanding the mentality of someone who would seek a presidency." He would finish out his career as a New Testament professor at Wesley Biblical Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi.

In the four years he was president, the Allegany campus maintained its enrollment around 1200, while the Buffalo campus was close to 200 students.

3. Here is a brief list of other events from Dayton's time as president.

• The Reinhold Campus Center was completed just after he started as president in 1972.
• A second girl's dorm, Lambein Hall, was built in 1973.
• Houghton joins The Consortium, a group of 13 Christian colleges that partner together on study-abroad, off-campus programs, and more.
• A learning center was added to the Buffalo West Seneca campus, called the Lambein Learning Center (1974).
• Woman's tennis begins (1974).
• The first woman joined the Board of Trustees (1975). This was Elizabeth Feller who had been so instrumental in the design of Gillette.
  
• Field hockey is added (1975).

Here endeth the series.

9. Houghton Campus at the End of Paine's Presidency (1972)

1980 campus

1. We finally reach the end of Stephen Paine's 35-year presidency in 1972 and perhaps the end of the second phase of Houghton's existence. The first phase was the founding, with J.S. Luckey as president. During that phase, it achieved accreditation but in many respects still had the flavor of an inwardly-focused, holiness school in the narrow sense. At the same time, its liberal arts curriculum touched the universe.

That phase effectively ended with World War II. The second phase, under the rest of Stephen Paine's presidency, turned it toward broader evangelical Christianity in a more outwardly-facing way. It became more than a denominationally-oriented institution as "worldly-wise" GIs returned from war. [1] With over 1200 students and nearly 100 faculty, it became a major Christian institution. It participated in and contributed to the broader (neo) evangelical developments of America at the highest levels. 

2. One of the most interesting developments in the last years of Paine's presidency was the connection with the Buffalo Bible Institute in 1968. This partnership would begin a Houghton presence in Buffalo that continues to this day. The Buffalo Bible Institute was located in the Buffalo suburb of West Seneca. The site at one time had been an amusement park.

Houghton had capped its campus capacity at 1200, so the Buffalo connection seemed both an opportunity to continue growing, to extend into other areas of study, and to connect with the possibilities of a large city. BBI was in financial trouble, which is always worrisome, but its board was willing to assume the debt if Houghton would take it over, which happened in September of 1969.

The Houghton trustees and administration had "grand ideas" for the new site, including a dream of over 1000 students. [2] It would never materialize, although Houghton retained the campus until 2009 when the Great Recession hit. Nevertheless, hundreds of Houghton students would graduate from the Buffalo campus over its forty-year existence. For many in Buffalo, it was the only Houghton they ever knew.

3. There are a couple buildings from the last decade of Paine's presidency that we haven't mentioned yet. One is the first men's dorm. While it is hard to believe, Houghton went almost the first eighty years of its existence without a dedicated men's dorm. Men lived in various homes and places around the village.

Shenawana Hall

That changed in 1961 with the completion of Shenawana Hall. It is hard to believe that it is now almost an sixty-year-old dorm, with of course significant upgrade over the years. The men of Shen are known to dress up in curious garb for soccer games, to stand next to the field, and to make curious noises. Before I came to Houghton, I also heard tell of some version of highlander games during the year, although I missed it this past year if it happened. The name, like Gaoyodea, is Seneca.

4. The mascot, "Highlanders," was assigned in 1967, the year Houghton took the leap into intercollegiate sports. The terrain of Houghton, the stone, the weather no doubt made a Scottish theme seem just right. A Scottish friend joked that this was appropriation of his culture, but I'm sure some of us have a wee bit of Scottish in our blood.

Intramurals had always been part of the Houghton campus, from races on the main road through Houghton to a track on what is now the Quad, to tennis courts behind Old Admin to the baseball diamond where Luckey is to the swimming pool in Bedford gym. Sports are often a sensitive question on Christian campuses because there is a rumor that they can lower the spirituality of a campus, with individuals signing up for sports rather than a college's Christian identity.

I don't at all think anything like this has to be the case. It isn't the case at Houghton, and it wasn't the case at IWU. In fact, there are parallels between physical and spiritual disciplines. About a third of the students at Houghton are athletes.

It started with men's soccer, cross-country and basketball. The next year Houghton joined the NAIA and added tennis, golf, track, and baseball. In 1969, women's basketball came on board. Women's volleyball followed in 1970.

Paine Science Center

5. Two more buildings were started at the end of Paine's presidency. The Paine Science Center was finished in 1970. Then the second was the Reinhold Campus Center, which was finished right after Wilbur Dayton became president in 1972. In 1971, Paine was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, the very next day he indicated to the Board his intention to retire.

cyclotron

For a liberal arts college, Houghton has a long history of excellence in the sciences. When I arrived last year, Mark Yuly was showing me around the science building, and I joked that we should build a nuclear particle accelerator around the campus. "Well," he said with complete seriousness, "we already have one." Apparently, Houghton's cyclotron is only one of two accelerators in the world of this size.

[1] There's a story about one returning GI who smoked his last smoke in Filmore before returning to finish his education after the war.

[2] Wing, 188.

Previous posts in this series on the story of Houghton:

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college
• Luckey achieves accreditation
• A growing campus and faculty
• Stephen Paine becomes president
• Houghton and World War II
• Houghton and Post-WW2 Expansion
• Houghton and the Tumultuous 1960s

7. Houghton and post-WW2 Expansion

Vetville, 
where Houghton Academy now is

1. The GI Bill helped to propel the US into late-twentieth-century prosperity. (Insert here the realization that it disproportionately favored white veterans. Features of this period that helped propel white America into suburban prosperity largely left African-American veterans behind, a situation of disadvantage from which black America, on the whole, has not yet fully recouped.)

In any case, you had the bulk of American men returning from the war, looking for a peacetime purpose in life. The GI Bill gave them the opportunity to study whatever they wanted to study and thus to pursue career paths they probably wouldn't have otherwise. It would slingshot Houghton College into the second phase of its existence in a spurt of rapid growth.

If Houghton had 292 students and 24 full-time professors in the 1943-44 school year, in 1949 it would have 816 students and 47 professors. 

2. This required a lot of building in a short period of time.

Willard Smith

For many years, Paine worked with a team of three other key administrators--Willard Smith (35) over finances, Art Lynip (38) as Academic Dean, and Bob Luckey (37) over development. Apparently, they were all very opinionated and strong-willed. Paine kept the peace, allegedly remarking in private once that, "An administrator never has the luxury of saying exactly what he thinks." [1]

If Luckey had his Bedford, Paine had his Willard Smith. Smith would serve first as professor of social sciences, then as business manager from 1935-72. From there he would go on to be the General Treasurer of the newly merged Wesleyan Church from 1972-78. One wonders the degree to which the success of the campus in this era involved him. He is another unsung hero of Houghton and the Wesleyan Church.

In the early 2000s, Smith reminisced about those days when the board mostly consisted of preachers who didn't understand business. "I found I had an audience that didn't know what I was talking about when I talked about hard-nosed business matters. I was stuck two ways: the typical academician who didn't know what I was talking about and the board members who didn't know what I was talking about, so I had nobody to talk to. Even Stephen Paine didn't understand the hard-nosed issues of the cost of deferred maintenance" ... etc. [2]

It is a well-kept secret in the academy that a college is a business that requires students in order to keep the doors open and that students only come if they perceive a college to have something to offer them.

3. As early as 1944, Smith and Paine went to Albany to meet with the governor to prepare for the coming onslaught of returning vets. First, the college rented and prepared one of the dorms on the Wesleyan campgrounds up the hill where Nielsen is now (Dow Hall). The old Wesleyan church building, which had become a recreation hall after the new church was built in 1934, was also fitted for temporary housing. Some classes would be held in the basement of the new Wesleyan Church.

Deer Hall
Seymour & Luckey Street

A barracks-type building was quickly constructed up Luckey Street in 1945, called "Deer Hall." A series of ten makeshift housing units was put up in early 1947 where Houghton Academy is now, called "Vetville" (picture at top). The college farm, up where the equestrian center currently is, was put into overdrive producing milk, meat, and vegetables.

Fine Arts Building

The shell of an old mess hall from a naval station was thrown up in late 1948 just beyond the music building, with creek stone put on the exterior. This new Fine Arts Building housed an art studio, 3 classrooms, and a new radio station named WJSL (for James S. Luckey). The radio station grew out of a physics project.

4. In 1945 planning began for a second girls dorm, which would first be known as East Hall but is now Gillette, named for Frieda Gillette the history professor. The planning for the new dorm would owe much in the end to Elizabeth Beck (Feller). She had been Dean of Women in 1944-45, and would later become the first female board member (1974). [3] In 1945, Paine sent the initial plans to her for her thoughts, a sign of great confidence in her judgment.

Gillette in the making

It would change the course of her master's work at the University of Michigan. [4] She now went around studying college dorms at various institutions of the moment, developing a functional approach to student housing. Her work was so good that it would be used by the federal housing authority. Thus was the birth of "East Hall," which had some occupancy as early as 1952. Eventually, two wings would be added to the ends, "Gillette" (1959) and "Rothenbuler" (1964).

5. A Middle States team visit in 1953 would also have a significant impact on the college. For example, it called for a more adequate library, a better gym, and housing for male students. It suggested that a 30-hour teaching load a year--the norm then--was excessive (even a 24-hour load is sometimes considered on the high-end today). It suggested wages were one-half to two-thirds what faculty could get elsewhere.

Of course to make all these improvements would take lots and lots of money, which is always the problem.

Houghton Academy

One of the most immediate recommendations had to do with the high school part of the school. They recommended that it be separated from the college. And so in 1955, Houghton Academy became a separate and distinct entity, with Walden Tysinger as principal. A new building for the academy was built in 1958 at the location where "Vetville" had been.

Over the years it would especially draw international students, which of course has been very difficult during this COVID year. My wife is actually teaching sixth and seventh grade this year there.

In 1956, everything was going great for the college. An enrollment goal and cap was set at 1200. A plan was adopted for the Quad structure that exists to this day, and a new library and chapel building was planned for it. In 1957 ground was broken on the new chapel.

[1] Miriam Lemcio, Deo Volente: A Biography of Stephen Paine (1987), 130.

[2] Wing, 203.

[3] I'm not sure how to interpret Wing's comment that it was only after Paine's retirement that Feller was elected to the board (258) or that Frieda Gillette was only "interim" chair of the Division of History and Social Science for six years until she pushed Paine to make it permanent. Am I to infer that Paine had theological problems with women in leadership? If so, this was probably a reflection of his engagement with neo-evangelicalism and the Calvinist hegemony of the day.

[4] Interestingly, Michigan was in Houghton's regional territory within the Wesleyan Methodist Church at that time.

Previous posts in this series on the story of Houghton:

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college
• Luckey achieves accreditation
• A growing campus and faculty
• Stephen Paine becomes president
• Houghton and World War II

6. Houghton and World War II

Luckey Memorial Building

1. When Paine became president, there were 406 college students and 52 high school students. There were 31 faculty members. Five buildings were on campus--the Old Admin (Fancher), Gaoyadeo (women's dorm), the Bedford gym, the science building (Woolsey), and the new music building.

Having a charter with New York state had already doubled enrollment under Luckey from 1923-28. When Paine retired, there would be 16 buildings on campus, some 1200 students, and almost 100 faculty.

Houghton train station
behind Three Bums

So Houghton would grow to its largest size under Paine. But it would also face its greatest threat during the World War II years, when it was not entirely certain it would survive. In a portent of the days to come, the last train left the Houghton station in 1937.

2.  In the last year of Luckey, an "Arcade" had been built to connect Old Admin (Fancher) and Old Science (Woolsey). This is where the library, the print shop, and some new classrooms would go.

Then in 1941, ground was broken to begin construction on the Luckey building, which as then continues to this day to house the President, Academic Dean, and CFO. [This is where my office and advancement are currently also.] Not every student was excited about the new building. It was, after all, taking away a baseball diamond facing Bedford gym. (There were also tennis courts at that time about where the Chamberlain parking lot is now.)

The night of the groundbreaking, some students took an outhouse and put it over the hole that had been dug by Bob Luckey. They put the sign "Luckey Memorial Building" on the latrine. Let's just say the Dean of Men (Stanley Wright) was not particularly happy about it. Luckey would be the first building on what is now the "Quad," which had also served at one time as a track of sorts. 

Old Admin chapel
(now MarCom in Fancher)

I might note that there were plenty of pranks in those days, mostly by the male students. There's something about a nineteen-year-old male brain that usually isn't quite fully cooked yet. For example, more than one prank was done in the late 30s with Stanley Wright's cow. They once somehow got it up to the second floor of Old Admin (Fancher) where the chapels were held (current MarCom). They were ministry students, of course. [1]

At another point, some boys set a crate of chickens loose in the girls' dorm, terrifying one of the single faculty members when the lights came on. [2] A particularly recidivist pranker named "Red" Ellis turned the power off in Gaoyadeo one night and then turned all the radios on highest volume that he could find in the dorm. He put cigars purchased in Fillmore into three pop-up toasters and pushed the lever down, then turned the power back on while exiting the building. Let's just say everyone soon woke up abruptly once the vacuum tubes in the radios warmed up and the whole dorm began to smell of cigars.

Chester York

3. Pearl Harbor would happen eight months after ground-breaking on the Luckey building. The construction manager from 1932-47, Chester York, had the brilliant idea of using creek stone for the outer facing of the building, a practice that became the signature feature of Houghton buildings around the Quad thereafter. A young man by the name of Paul Mills, son of the grounds-keeper, helped collect that stone from the nearby creek bed.

When it was all done, a building that was projected to cost $75,000 only cost $39,000, largely due to the ingenuity of Chester York and the grace of God.

4. Enrollment did not immediately decline after Pearl Harbor. Most male students finished out the 1941-42 year (482 students). The next year declined to 432 students. Then from 1942-43 it was 392 students. The lowest year was from 1943-44, when there were only 292 students.

The students and faculty that remained on campus did their part. Some faculty taught courses without pay. Ten Houghton alumni were killed in the war. Many more served (371 in fact), including Warren Woolsey. Students rolled bandages, gave blood, wrote letters. Instead of corsages, those men still around might give a "warsage" made up of war stamps.

As far as male prospects for the women, later history professor Kay Lindley (Michael Jordan's grandmother) remarked that it was mainly ministerial students and 4F men that were around. [3] :-) On Sadie Hawkins Day, it was three women to every one man.

By God's grace, however, Houghton would survive. And like a comet swinging around the sun, the war would soon accelerate the college almost beyond its capacity in the other direction.

5. A final thing that should be mentioned during the war years was a second revival on campus in 1942. The first had been in 1926. A boy had drowned after falling through the ice of the Genesee River. At that time, the Houghton church was already in the middle of two weeks of special services. It was during that revival that Warren Woolsey, then a junior, became a Christian.

[1] It is apparently quite difficult to get a cow to go down stairs. Willard Smith, whom we will soon meet, apparently assisted in the cleaning of evidence left behind.

[2] Alice Pool, French, Spanish, and English teacher.

[3] 1996 chapel address. Read President Mullen's 2018 eulogy of Lindley's service to the college here. In February (2021) we will be dedicating the Katherine W. Lindley Center for Law and Constitutional Studies.

Previous posts in this series on the story of Houghton:

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college
• Luckey achieves accreditation
• A growing campus and faculty
• Stephen Paine becomes president

5. Stephen W. Paine--America's Youngest President (1937)

President Stephen Paine
1937-72

1. God can take the worst of situations and use them for good. The tragic death of Dean W. LaVay Fancher in 1934 probably made it possible for Stephen Paine to stay at Houghton and, thus, to become its president in 1937. Frieda Gillette went so far as to say, "The way he went was traumatic, indeed, but perhaps the Lord was in it." [1]

Paine would become the second president of Houghton upon the death of James Luckey and would be the youngest college president in the nation at the age of 28. Paine would have the longest presidency of any Houghton president--35 years (1937-1972). In that time, Houghton would grow from about 300 students to just over 1200, its peak! In that time, the college would become a mature academic institution.

2. Wing's account indicates that there were tensions from time to time between a holiness church and an evangelical liberal arts college. He mentions that Luckey, "wanted the best Christian liberal-arts school possible and was willing to battle the Wesleyan Methodist hierarchy to achieve that goal." [2] One alumnus of the Luckey years remarked, "I got the impression from his attitude that he was not always in accord with the strict rules he had to enforce." [3] Remember we're talking about matters of dress and clothing and whether a boy and girl could walk down together to the village.

Paine was a Wheaton grad. His evangelical and Wesleyan Methodist stock was obvious, with one grandfather a founding member of the Wesleyan Methodist Connection in 1843 (George Paine) and the other the founding president of what would become Wheaton College (Jonathan Blanchard). [4] Still, the New York church feared he was "on the liberal side," from the Illinois district, you know. [5] It's a little ironic given that he is the man who more or less put the term inerrancy in the Wesleyan Discipline in 1955.

Roy Nicholson, who later would be General Superintendent of the Wesleyan Methodist Church (1947-59), noted that, to settle all doubts, they read a passage from the Discipline to see if Paine would pass muster. I assume it was the passage on entire sanctification. "I can answer in the affirmative," was the response. On the other side, some from Allegany county were concerned that the church, "would put in some tactless preacher" as president.

Paine's goal as president was to make Houghton, "the outstanding Christian college in the East." The fact that Houghton is usually put next to Wheaton and Westmont in the yearly national rankings suggests he achieved his goal. It is not too dissimilar from Willard Houghton's goal, which was that Houghton Seminary be "high in standards, low in expense, and fundamental in belief." [6]

3. The workings of God are a mystery to me. I believe that God could easily arrange for just the right person to take someone to a train station. So it was in 1933. John Willett goes to Michigan to a district conference. Paine, just having finished a PhD in classics takes him to the train. Willett asks him if he would consider teaching for Houghton. Paine says he would.

At the time of Fancher's death, Wheaton had offered Paine a professorship at three times the salary. His fiance lived in Illinois too. From a human perspective, he would be crazy not to take it. But Fancher's death opened up the dean's position in 1934. Three years later he would be president.

4. I've already mentioned that Paine would have a Greek textbook published by Oxford in 1961. I have wondered if almost everyone who teaches Greek for any length of time eventually wants to write their own Greek textbook. I have over 220 pages of my own attempt lying around. Paine used his work to teach until it was finally published as A Functional Approach to Beginning Greek.

Paine played a key part in the founding of the NAE, the National Association of Evangelicals in 1941. He would serve as its president from 1948-50.

Using the language of the mid-twentieth century, Paine and consequently Houghton were mainstream evangelical. Paine was there when neo-evangelicalism was born of individuals like Harold Ockenga, C. F. H. Henry, and Harold Lindsell. Paine was there when Billy Graham started his evangelistic crusades. In fact, George Beverly Shea, who sang in those crusades, attended Houghton in the late 20s, and the Shea family continues to have strong connections to Houghton College and the Houghton community.

We can distinguish the evangelicalism of that day both from what it called "fundamentalism" and what we call evangelicalism today, which are actually more or less the same. The neo-evangelicalism that arose in the late 1940s distinguished itself from groups like Pentecostals, dispensationalists, and, indeed, holiness folk. It called these groups, "fundamentalists."

The difference was not entirely theological, although neo-evangelicalism did tend to be more Calvinist. Neo-evangelicalism was more cognitive, while many of these "fundamentalists" were more experiential in orientation. "Fundamentalists" tended to believe in a tribulation and were pre-millennial. Evangelicals tended to be more post-millennial.

But these were not the only differences. You might argue that the most significant differences had to do with social status. Neo-evangelicalism had more money. It had more education. It had a higher social status.

Christianity Today and Fuller Theological Seminary were founded as (neo) evangelical institutions, underwritten by significant funding. Billy Graham stayed with Lyndon Johnson in the White House and knew every president personally. Evangelicals produced the Lausanne Congress and the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy. In short, it was a somewhat elite movement and, of course, thoroughly white.

I wonder if some of the tensions that Houghton has experienced over the years with the surrounding church can be explained in terms of this evangelical-fundamentalist contrast. If so, the tension would in part be one of both social class and education. Could it be that Houghton has often had more the flavor of Wheaton evangelicalism than holiness fundamentalism?

5. Stephen Paine was the key player behind the creation of the NIV. In 1957, Paine was given the task by the NAE to examine the new RSV for its accuracy. The Christian Reformed Church wanted a group to unite to create a different translation to replace the King James Version, one they deemed more faithful than the RSV. Although his wife disagreed, Paine himself saw the ultimate publication of the NIV in 1973 as the most important contribution of his life. [7]

As I mentioned, the statement on inerrancy in the Wesleyan Discipline was largely the result of Stephen Paine's efforts in 1955. It was important for him that the statement would say, "inerrant in their original manuscripts." This statement made it clear that "lower criticism" was permissible, namely, the textual criticism that has led to modern versions of the Bible like the NIV. The Bible is inerrant in the original manuscripts, so there can be errors in copying. Therefore, the King James Version may not be correct in its sense of how the original Bible was worded.

[1] Wing, 121. I won't stop to ponder how shocking a statement that is!

[2] Wing, 118.

[3] Wing, 101.

[4] Wheaton was originally founded by the Wesleyan Methodists as the Illinois Institute. Financial problems led to its transfer to Congregationalists.

[5] Wing, 122.

[6] Recorded in Houghton College's first Constitution in 1948. Wing, 155. "Fundamental in belief" was equated in that Constitution with the approach to Scripture of the rising neo-evangelicalism.

[7] She thought it was his influence on students (Wing, 128).

Previous posts in this series on the story of Houghton:

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college
• Luckey achieves accreditation
• A growing campus and faculty

3. James S. Luckey, First President of Houghton (1908-37)

J.S Luckey
1867-1937

This is now the third post of my notes on the story of Houghton.

• Williard J. Houghton and the Founding 
• Seminary adds four-year college

1. In the second term of the school's existence, in December 1884, a "tall, thin, rather awkward" farmer's boy from Short Track made his way to Houghton Creek. This was the seventeen-year-old James S. Luckey, the second graduate of the school and its first president.

The school would never have existed without Willard Houghton. Who knows what would have happened if Silas Bond and A. W. Hall had not moved the campus to a better location. Similarly, the school might have gone into the ash heaps of history if it weren't for Luckey. The current administration building is aptly named for him, and there is a special group of donors to the college today who are known as the James S. Luckey Society.

2. Luckey worked to pay his way through. He did four terms at the seminary and then, to make money to continue, took a job as a teacher at a school for a year. He returned to Houghton in 1886, working on campus. In 1887 at the Houghton Church he went forward to the altar to consecrate his life to God. He thought at first God might be calling him to ministry. But in the end, God did not. 

He then finished his degree in 1889. In 1892 he came back to Houghton to teach math and Greek. He tutored one student in Latin until she married him in 1894. "amo, amas, amat," you know. 

3. He would become the principal of Houghton Seminary in 1894 and continue until 1896, during which time they switched from calling the head of the seminary, "principal," to calling them, "president." He thus was, in this first respect, the first president of Houghton.

Luckey was a math person. It is interesting that both he and President Stephen Paine continued to teach classes while they were president. Luckey was known to write a math equation on the board, pause to look at it, and then remark, "Isn't that beautiful?" Paine taught Greek and even wrote a Greek textbook published by Oxford Press. 

4. Then in 1896, Luckey continued his education and worked. A master's degree in education in 1898 from Albany State Teacher's College. Four years as principal of a high school. Then they moved to Oberlin College, where he got a BA in 1904 and an MA in 1905.

Oberlin was an important piece of the early Houghton equation. Before Houghton College was accredited, Houghton students would sometimes do three years at Houghton and then finish up at Oberlin. Oberlin had been a key institution in the evangelical revivals of the 1800s, a place that stood on a similar path as the Wesleyan Methodists on abolition and woman's suffrage. Luckey would actually teach there for two years (1905-1907).

He then studied math for a year at Harvard (1907-1908). He had a scholarship to continue to get his Ph.D. Then Houghton called. The hardest decision of his life, he forewent his Ph.D. in math at Harvard and returned to Houghton as president again, in 1908. Wheaton would finally give him an honorary doctorate in 1933.

4. Beyond question, the most significant of Luckey's accomplishments was to get Houghton accredited by New York State. It was not an easy feat. On the one hand, it was not easy because of New York state requirements for accreditation like $500,000 in assets, eight distinct departments with distinct heads, and faculty with the appropriate degrees and salaries. 

Meanwhile, the church wasn't sure it wanted anything more than a Bible college. Looking back, our colleges in the 1920s scarcely seem very liberal. But in the snapshot of a moment's time, some in the surrounding church may imagine that they are. Imagine the late 1960s when the church surrounding Houghton consisted of the two parts of the Wesleyan Church that didn't go with the merger over things like jewelry and hair length--the Allegheny Wesleyan Methodists and the New York Pilgrims.

Luckey, tireless in purpose and undaunted by resistance, pushed through to the goal. The state requirements, while difficult to achieve, did provide greater stability. Except for OKWU, none of the Pilgrim Bible colleges survived, and OKWU arguably survived because it went on to become a state-accredited liberal arts college. 

Many people won't try something because they don't think it's possible. They need to see someone else
do it first. Who knows what would have happened to Wesleyan higher education if Luckey had not shown that secular accreditation was possible--and without losing spirituality? Luckey showed the way. 

H. Clark Bedford

5. As a side note, in this era Houghton was the education dynamo for the Wesleyan Methodist Church. I've already mentioned that Silas Bond left Houghton in 1908 to be the founding president of Miltonvale. But perhaps the most interesting figure in this regard is H. Clark Bedford.

He was an early Houghton grad, one of those that went on to finish at Oberlin. He was then a math and Greek teacher at Houghton in the early teens. I'll mention some of his work with Luckey to develop the Houghton campus in the next post.

In 1915, Bedford went to be president of the recently established Wesleyan Methodist College in Central, South Carolina (SWU) for four years. Bob Black tells me that he was one of the best presidents of that era. In keeping with lessons learned at Houghton, he facilitated the building of "Grimes Hall" in 1916 at Central. Black says it was the building that legitimized the college, having electricity, running water, and steam heat. [1]

Then after a year back at Houghton, in 1920 he became the first president of the newly founded Marion College (IWU). His two years were not without turmoil. First, there was tension between the theological students who had come from Fairmount Bible College and the liberal arts students that made up the rest of the college. Marj Elder reports that Bible college students thought the other students were too worldly, and the liberal arts students thought the Bible college students were uneducated. [2] Bedford got up in chapel and pleaded for both sides to be charitable to each other.

It wasn't too long before Bedford himself was in the cross-hairs of the surrounding district. He was said to have a faulty view of entire sanctification. [3] The denomination vouched for him. His own statement affirmed full salvation and an experience of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. In the end, the district said they wouldn't support Marion College, and he resigned to keep the peace. He went on to be president at Penn College in Iowa.

6. In 1929 James Luckey actually commuted once a week to act as temporary president of Marion College as it continued to struggle in its first decade. It was still only 9 years old (it's celebrating its centennial this year). His youngest son Robert Luckey would actually go on to be president of Marion College from 1976 to 1984, and again as interim from 86-87. The old gym at IWU is actually named for him.

There's a fun story about father and son in 1934. Robert was apparently a bit of a "lucky" surprise when the senior Luckey was fifty years old. In 1934, alumni and friends raised the funds for the president to take a trip to Europe as a much-deserved vacation. He left from the train station in Houghton only to return the next day to pick up his son. He figured that if he went second class, he could afford to take the seventeen year old Robert with him.

7. Luckey danced through the landmines to see Houghton provisionally accredited in 1923. Now he truly was the first president of Houghton College! He raised funds both within the church and in the surrounding region. In 1925, there was the first group of accredited graduates. Then in 1927, the charter was made permanent. I'll save the quest for Middle States accreditation for the next post. 

8. Luckey was apparently a very positive and friendly face. But he was also highly detailed and quite a micromanager. Frieda Gillette, whose arm he twisted to come as a history professor in 1923, called him a "benign dictator." If one of his proposals did not pass, he would simply bring it back again and again until it did.

The students apparently had a ditty they said about him: 

Head full of brains,
Brains full of knowledge,
Rather go to Luckey's school
Than any other college

[1] Bob wrote a history of Southern Wesleyan for its centennial in 2006--How Firm a Foundation: Southern Wesleyan University 1906-2006.

[2] Marjorie Elders, The Lord, the Landmarks, the Life (1994), 76. This book commemorated the 75th anniversary of Indiana Wesleyan University.

[3] We can imagine the level of debate they might have had in those days about the nuances of entire sanctification. We probably wouldn't even recognize the minute issues of debate today.

2. Houghton Seminary adds four-year college (1899)

1884 Seminary Building

 1. From 1884 to 1899, Houghton was only a Christian high school or "seminary" as they called it. Then a full college program was added in 1899. This is the second post in some notes on the story of Houghton.

For more than one reason, we think of James S. Luckey as the first president of the school. More on him in the next post. But there were a number of principals before Luckey came to stay in 1908.

Except for Luckey, all of the first leaders of the school were preachers. William H. Kennedy was the first, apparently a very dynamic teacher (1884-86). The red-haired A. R. Dodd was principal for six years while also pastoring the Filmore Wesleyan Methodist church (1886-92). E. W. Bruce was principal for a year and pastor of the Houghton church. He would return to teach theology from 1905-11.

Luckey did take a stint as principal from 1894-96 before going on to do further study. It was in his second year, with around 60 students, that they started calling the leader of the school a "president." But there were still no college students yet.

Silas W. Bond
Luckey Building

2. The most significant of these other early school leaders was Silas W. Bond, who was president from 1896-1908. During his time as president, Houghton would start offering college classes. During his time, Houghton would move from its original site to its current one. One of the buildings constructed during his time still stands, albeit in a different location. My office was in that building my first year at Houghton (Fancher).

I have a hunch that Bond was a little peculiar. But he must have been very capable. He ran for office unsuccessfully a number of times for the Prohibition party. In any case, in 1908 he went to be the founding president of Miltonvale Wesleyan College, which would eventually merge with Bartlesville Wesleyan College. He was the only one other than Luckey to be called a president in those early days.

3. The first graduate of the seminary came in 1887. [1] The second was the great James Luckey himself in 1889. Programs were added one by one. In 1886 the principal's wife started a complete course in drawing, crayoning, and oil painting. In 1885 a business course was added for both men and women. I've already mentioned the Bible Training class in 1888. In 1890 a music department was added. In 1893 a two-year elementary teacher course came. Notice how late formal Bible training was added!

Then in 1895, the denomination approved the addition of college-level courses, an "Advanced Department" or "Academic Department." In 1899, they voted to raise the level of the seminary to that of a college as soon as possible. A four-year college curriculum was implemented that fall, with John Willett as its first graduate in 1901.

At first, the curriculum was very prescribed (Wing describes it as "imaginative"). [2] Five faculty taught everything. There was German. There was all sorts of Greek and Latin literature, and they assumed you would already have learned the Greek and Latin languages in high school. There were multiple philosophy classes, the histories of England, France, and Germany. Chemistry, physics, biology, and more.

When Luckey came back in 1908, he would follow the Harvard model and incorporate a new concept known as "electives."

4. The original site of the seminary was a bit of a haul up the hill, particularly in winter. There was a plateau even further up the hill, but few had the stomach for expansion there.

memorial to
Houghton's birthplace

So practical minds began to eye the property where Houghton College now sits. This is where the house of Willard J. Houghton's birth was, in the grassy lawn where Fancher is now. In 1914, the remains of the last Seneca native American, Copperhead, were moved across the street and given a boulder to commemorate him, a gift from Houghton's son Leonard. Thus the student yearbook of Houghton was named The Boulder. [3]

I smiled a little reading the account of this campus move in the Gillette and Lindley story of Houghton's first fifty years. [4] One gets the impression that there were people in 1902 who did a lot of talking about moving. Then there were a couple doers who got things done.

The first doer, if I am reading correctly, was the Reverend Sylvester Bedford. He bought the land where the current Nielson Center and art building are. The intention, at least in part, was to use it as a camp meeting site. To this day the annual camp meeting of the Wesleyan Church is held on the Houghton College campus. [5] At that time, the Wesleyan Methodist conference was called the "Lockport conference." 

The second doer was A. W. Hall, who bought the southern part of Bedford's land for the seminary/college (for $547.27). This is where the central Houghton College campus now sits. Still, conflict with an out-of-state brickmaker delayed groundbreaking on "Jennings Hall" till 1905.

5. Hall was the financial agent of the college at that time, just as Willard

A. W. Hall

Houghton had been. I see his name as one thread in this key period. I might add that he went on to work with the funds of the denomination but was eventually removed from denominational service for shifting funds around between accounts without permission. I don't mean embezzlement. I mean using money designated for one purpose for another. He thought this was his prerogative. The trustees of the church disagreed.

Two buildings constituted the new campus. The first was "Jennings Hall," now known as Fancher Hall. [6] The second was a girl's dorm, started in 1906. It was first known as Besse Hall and then as Gaoyadeo.

Besse and Jennings Halls

Of course, these buildings are different now. In 1987, Gaoyadeo was torn down. Fancher was then rotated 90 degrees and moved to where Gaoyadeo had been. In the picture to the left, you can also see in the back the "plumbing facility" for the dormitory (read, brick outhouse) and the heating building for the dorm.

6. Another one of Hall's legacies was the relationship between the Wesleyan Methodist Church and Sierra Leone, Africa. In 1889, the church sent Hall there and the report he returned was the spark that made the connection permanent. [6] The first missionaries of the church were to Sierra Leone, and most of those missionaries were Houghton grads.

Mary Lane left Houghton in 1900 for Sierra Leone and married George Clarke, whose wife died there after four years in Africa. Marie Stephens went in 1901, dying there also in 1904. John and Lizzie Ayers married and left in 1905. He died back stateside by year's end. James Luckey's old roommate, William Boardman, died in Sierra Leone less than a month after arriving with his new wife in 1902. By 1949, eighty-eight Houghton alumni had served on the mission field in sixteen different countries.

[1] Melvin Warburton.

[2] A Vine of God's Own Planting: A History of Houghton College from Its Beginnings Through 1972 (Indianapolis, 2004), 76.

[3] A contest was held and Keith Farmer of the class of 1925 won with this name.

[4] Frieda A. Gillette and Katherine W. Lindley, And You Shall Remember... a Pictorial History of Houghton College (1982), 67.

[5] I suspect this past year was the first time since its founding that it did not take place, because of the pandemic.

[6] A.k.a. "Old Admin."

[7] His reflections were published as Three Hundred Miles in a Hammock or Six Weeks in Africa.

1. Willard J. Houghton and the Founding of Houghton College

site of the original "seminary"

1. I've been at Houghton now for over a year and have been meaning to write down some notes on its story for some time. It has a rich history. You don't always know the history of a place, even when you go to school there, even when you work there. You know your part of the story.

original location

For example, it would be easy not to realize that it was actually started about a half-mile south, down the road, as "Houghton Seminary" in 1883. The word seminary is misleading because it was really just a high school (Houghton Academy also considers 1883 the year of its founding). And very little of the curriculum was Bible. The classes were much like any public high school today, except every student took a lot of Latin. Cicero, Caesar, Virgil, Chemistry, German, Botany, Rhetoric, Physiology, and so the list goes on.

Willard J. Houghton
1825-96

2. Willard J. Houghton wanted the youth of this very rural county to have an education, and he wanted them to have a Christian, holiness education. He was a farmer, perhaps with the equivalent of a third-grade education. A revival in 1851 led him to rededicate his life to God. From then on he was a Christian force to be reckoned with.

In addition to farmer, now he became a preacher and a reformer. He was grieved at the sin brought to Houghton Creek by the traffic on the Genesee Valley Canal. The main drag of town was "Jockey Street," where on Sundays they raced and bet on horses.

When the Wesleyan Church building was constructed in 1876, [1] Houghton had a hand put on on the steeple to point individuals coming out of the tavern across the street to God. It gives a good sense of the piety of this man. He carried cards with Scriptures on them around with him. If he ran into any child of any color anywhere, he would stop his horse, jump off and give one to the child.

He became a lay preacher and evangelist. He often signed his letters, "yours for fixing up the world." The Wesleyan Methodist church of that day saw no division between what we would call social justice and personal holiness. It was founded against slavery. It played its part in the women's rights movement. They opposed drinking and card-playing and gambling and secret societies. And they preached personal holiness and entire sanctification. The first president of the seminary struggled with wearing a tie for several years. These issues all blurred together.

3. In 1882, Willard Houghton had seen to the rededication of a Wesleyan Methodist Church in Short Tract, not far from where he lived in Houghton Creek. While there, a denominational official put a burden on his heart to start a "first class seminary" in Western New York. The Wesleyan Methodists had started Wheaton College a few years previous, but had not given it adequate financial support and it was turned over to the Congregationalists.

ca. 1890, women, men, black, white

Now it was time to try again. The church wanted a school "away from the cities and large towns where it would be free from the environment of evil." It would be for all students, male and female, regardless of race. The school was to be a moral "lighthouse to this dark world," a "strictly Christian school." Only firm believers in Christ "and we hope partakers of the divine nature" would teach there. And "we want to make this school one of the easiest for poor children in the county."

Houghton started raising funds in February 1883. The incorporation papers were completed in April. The charter approved by May. Ground was broken in August, 1883. The first students arrived in the almost completed building the next year in September 1884. It had a principal (W.H. Kennedy), three teachers, and 70-80 students on both the elementary and high school levels. In 1888 they added a "Bible Training Department" to the high school.

Houghton became its financial agent, traveling to raise money for the new school. He would work himself to death raising money for the school. He wrote the year the school opened, "I have lifted and lifted, runn and runn night and day until it seems to me that I shall die... Please remember me in your prayers. And pray especialy for our school work."

He would live, work, and preach another eight years, finally passing in 1896.

[1] The church stood till 1989.

A Year at Houghton (2019-20)

Letchworth Forest, my first day at work

1. A year ago today was my first day on the job at Houghton College. For the first three months of my time here, I lived in the flats by myself and commuted back to Marion, Indiana about twice a month to help my wife with some of the packing of our house. She and her friends did the lion's share of the packing, I'm afraid, and got rid of a lot of stuff. (Meanwhile, I took out a storage unit to sneak my own "memory material" to a safe place.)

The flats here are symbolic of a Houghton that touched 1200 at one point. It was built for growth in an earlier era. 2008 and the Great Recession changed that trajectory. Dr. Mullen brought me here because of my reputation for innovation and with an ever-strengthening conviction that Houghton needs to make major changes in the current climate. Before COVID, everyone was talking about the coming demographic cliff in 2026. Of course the pandemic has changed everything overnight.

2. When I came, I was given an interesting collection of direct reports: enrollment, marketing, ministry resources, and "hospitality" (non-tuition revenue generation). There was a Dean of Enrollment, so I wasn't really expected to give micro-direction in that area. There was also a Director of Marketing and Communication, so my role was much more 30,000 feet, to engage them in relation to innovation.

I came in thinking of the long game. I wanted one big win my first year but mostly wanted to get acquainted with the people and story of the college. I love teaching. Teaching will always be a role I welcome. (In fact I ended up teaching five classes this year, four online and one on the residential campus--Science and Scripture, philosophy, and three Biblical Literature classes) Pastoring is something I have done in interim spaces and would be a privilege to do.

What about academic leadership? I was a Dean for six years at the starting of Wesley Seminary and another three years over the mostly undergraduate School of Theology and Ministry. Was this a direction for me? The work of academic innovation has always been like cat nip for me. A number of convergences made me feel like I needed to lean into that side of myself this year. In the chess of life, coming to Houghton helped some things fall into place at IWU and in my own life.

To be frank, I didn't feel there was much space at IWU for me to do the kind of innovation I saw as important to the future of higher education. I just wasn't in the right part of the university for that. Houghton seemed to me both to be a place where there was a wide open space for innovation and to be a place that was ready to do it.

3. "Change is the only constant in the universe." This has been a year of upheaval in higher education. But even before that, the stimulus for change at Houghton was heightened. In my first semester, the Director of Marketing and the Director of Online Education left, both leaving me more in the weeds but also giving opportunities to innovate.

The enrollment was also a little down from its goal when the semester started. My goal for one big win over the course of the year changed to "Let's get this party started." I started with what I knew best--ministry. Someone had suggested not to begin innovating in that area. "Show you can innovate in other areas too." Necessity seemed to say otherwise. Houghton already had an AAS in Christian Ministry on the books. I took ideas I had already been developing and applied them to this context.

The result was a multi-layered approach that 1) resulted in an associate's degree if you wanted one, 2) was done in situ, where you live--no need to move anywhere, 3) involved evening live sessions like Kingswood, 4) could be audited in a way that satisfied ordination requirements in an inexpensive way. The idea of auditing online classes was another idea I had tried to implement even in 2009. It doesn't make much sense with an asynchronous class but it is easy with one that has live sessions.

I am stressful on infrastructure people. It is the nature of innovation to bend things in ways they haven't bent before. The audit price point needed changed, for example. The webinar that is about to finish on Race and American Christianity was my first real success in auditing, with some 1700 participants. But the weeks leading up to the course wrought havoc with Houghton's infrastructure.

4. My time with Wayne Schmidt left me with a philosophy of academic growth--new programs, new venues. This is not the going philosophy in academia. Frankly, it doesn't really fit with Jim Collins' philosophy of the hedgehog. I will say that Wayne did keep Wesley Seminary in the lane of "practical," so he started new programs in new venues within the brand of practical ministry.

My instinct in this time of upheaval was "fire everything." Of course we can't fire everything because we don't have everything. I focused on "low hanging fruit" that is scalable. Low risk, low investment, with the highest possible yield. I tried some "boutique" courses--Science and Scripture, for example. I was going to teach Latin with a home school market primarily in mind. I tried a trick I had tried at IWU with philosophy, trying to market a Christian philosophy course to Christian students at secular universities.

We did generate some interest among home schoolers. We did generate some interest among life-long auditors. My AAS Biblical Literature class had a number of auditors in early summer wanting to expand their knowledge of the Bible. Going into my second year, we are likely to start offering certificates in areas like Business Administration and Missions Leadership, but possibly also Linguistics.

At first I avoided certificates because of previous rules requiring institutions to track gainful employment, something beyond our capacity at this point. But if no aid is offered, it is not necessary. An intermediate idea was to offer our minors as free-standing opportunities. I had never realized you could offer a minor without a major. This summer we tried to promote our Art Business and Political Science minors but without any takers. Nevertheless, the minor structure easily converts to a certificate structure.

In January 2020, we offered Introduction to Linguistics in a hybrid format. A student in South Asia participated in the class. Initially this was going to be via Zoom using an OWL that turned around to capture the conversation in the class. The time difference indicated that it would be better simply to video the class with a higher resolution camera. All of this foreshadowed what is going to happen this fall.

5. I met with a lot of people around campus in the fall. I worked especially closely with marketing, since they were understaffed and did not have a new permanent director until April. Very enjoyable and instructive, but the new Director shows what real expertise can do.

Our house moved fairly quickly once it was on the market, and Angie was soon with me in the house we have rented since the end of November. She finished out the semester in Marion and then fully moved here. Providentially, she was already teaching Chinese students English online when COVID shut New York down. That has been an outlet for her throughout this time. She will be teaching 6-7 grade at Houghton Academy this year.

I learned a lot about the enrollment process this year. One very interesting feature of the year was a financial aid packaging strategy put together by one of the math professors. Difficult to gauge its success because of the pandemic, but I was convinced. :-)

6. The pandemic will be like a ring on a tree in the year of a fire. It is not entirely clear what the long-standing impact will be but it is sure to be transformative in very significant ways. A number of colleges will probably close both in the short and long term. Colleges were already closing. Those adept at online education can adapt much more easily. Those who have banked on a residential future are in greater danger than ever.

My transition from in-person to Zoom class was business as usual for me. I've been doing Zoom for some time. For others it was something completely new. The standard for online teaching is asynchronous, so many are quick to argue that we did not really do online teaching in the spring but remote teaching. I have long wondered, however, if there was a market for live online classes, now that bandwidth is not a problem. People with experience in online often look at me as if I'm crazy at this point.

I feel like I was born for the pandemic crisis of 2020. I thrive in this sort of situation. I saw the opportunity of offering fall classes in hybrid form almost immediately, since I had already done it not only with Linguistics this spring but at IWU in 2009 with a Hebrews class. We would eventually decide in that direction.

"Fail early, fail often, but always fail forward" (John Maxwell). This is a motto I found myself saying increasingly this past year. This is difficult for the academy, which in general wants to have everything perfect before even trying something. One difficult thing for me is that I am intuitive. My intuitions are based on cumulative data from years of experience, but people need to see a chart. I work best when paired up with those who can bring the detail alongside my intuitions.

I might also say that it is difficult when you have the mind of a futurist. You think you see things when others don't see them. I'm speaking in general now of something that has been an increasing difficulty of mine for years. You learn to keep your mouth shut so people don't think you're crazy. You dole out your thoughts when the doors open. You get frustrated but have to keep your cool. Getting upset with people doesn't help anything. You go for lots of runs and start talking to yourself. You find someone to vent to.

7. "Never waste a crisis." This is the season to try things. You have an exigence. If they don't work, no problem. We currently have a two semester online biology class on offer especially to high school students. I don't remember ever hearing about such a thing. For one, it is an online lab science class, which is rare. Second, it's stretched out over the whole year.

I believe Houghton has risen to the challenge. But the challenge is only beginning. Ideas I had two years ago that were still a little innovative then are becoming common fare now, like using churches as co-curricular centers for online education. I've been hearing about competency based education for a long time but it's now coming into our back yard. I believe AI and gaming are the key to most future education. Now is the time to launch into them and it's already happening.

Colleges are connecting and you can see a musical chairs phenomenon where there are no more seats left. This year my work will focus on partnerships, and I will be working closely with Michael Jordan and J. L. Miller. I'm also still involved with online programs with Tammy Dunmire as the master of detail. I'll still be in contact with enrollment and marketing, but we've hired someone for whom those are actual areas of formal expertise. And I'll continue to work with the academic leadership of the college.

You can do general demographic study on curricular areas of interest, but what do Houghton's most natural partners specifically want? What is the need? What is the desire? My danger is always to design a great show, like P. T. Barnum's first attempt in The Greatest Showman, but for no one to show up but my family.

You can't predict what will go viral. You just have to be ready when it happens. I've developed a six-fold framework for expansion. We'll see what happens. Houghton is full of brilliant people. They are innovative people too. Should I say I didn't expect Houghton to be innovative, but there is a rich history of innovation here. I wrote about some of the many surprises when I first came here a year ago.

My motto remains what it was at Wesley Seminary--"If you come, we will build it!"