Letter to the Editors

This letter was written in response to Amanda Seebaugh's column that appeared in the October 18, 2007 print issue of The Pharos.


Dear Editors:

Practitioners of Christianity have been persecuted since the religions’ first emergence; it’s practically a foundation of the dogma. Amanda Seebaugh voiced her opinion that she feels persecuted by much of the student population because of her beliefs. My response to this is: who doesn’t? West Virginia Wesleyan College is a very unique animal—a religious liberal arts college. With a student body of less than 1300, we are going to encounter, in close proximity, people and ideas that challenge our beliefs. But if I believed for one second that there is a wave of anti-Christian sentiment on this campus as massive as the one described by Miss Seebaugh in her article, I’d have to eat my shoe. I have seen nearly nothing here but positive acceptance of a variety of convictions, and I can’t imagine something so widely endorsed as Christianity would meet with the amount of opposition expressed in her article.

As we are a predominantly Christian campus, with an assortment of Christian student organizations, I am astonished that she could not find more like-minded companions rather than people who oppose her.

But even in the midst of my incredulity concerning the basis of her article, a thought springs to mind: is seeking similar friends the point of going to college? If college were just about a degree, then we’d all just come in, learn, and leave. But part of the college experience, the one we’re paying nearly $30,000 a year for, is to interact with different types of people. I imagine that Miss Seebaugh, though anticipating a change of scenery, was perhaps ill-prepared to deal with the very real actuality that there are people who’ve had different lives and who have different ideas about the world we inhabit, and perhaps confused ugly prejudice with strong criticism. But criticism isn’t prejudice; your convictions are your convictions whether others hold them or not, and criticism can, in fact, strengthen your beliefs. Who knows, Miss Seebaugh; you may come out of college with an even stronger faith than when you entered.

--Jennifer Scott