Being stewards of young lives is an awesome responsibility. Recently at Riverside we have worked through the issue of what is / isn’t acceptable to read at a Christian School. The Selection Policy for the Library’s General Collection is found here in the ivault.
Our librarian invited interested staff to a series of meetings to ‘nut this out’. I started the process off with a journey through the ‘Million $ Question’ (is God confused when it comes to book selection). Cameron Nunn’s article is the basis for the talk. This and the handout are both found here in the ivault.
The continuum in the handout ranges from (on the LHS) a closed Brethren school which uses an intermediary to liaise with government departments to a Christian school (on the RHS) that entertains the idea of maintaining the employment of a teacher who declares an alternate lifestyle to that of the Christian. At each point along the continuum we find good people assuming a ‘position’, digging their trenches and declaring “and God agrees with me on this one”.
Swearing, blasphemy, violence, sexual references, witches, wizards and the like are ‘hot spots’ for many Christians. This is the debate that has caused tempers to flare at every school I’ve been at. The only way through the mire is to avoid the proof-text and to approach the Word with an appreciation of it as an unfolding, Gospel-centred revelation. You’ll find an old assignment on ‘Unfolding Revelation’ here in the ivault.
Leading Schools 