I was forced out of my PhD program because of my open faith

[Garland-Green]

By Corey Miller | May 24, 2019

While as an undergrad at Salt Lake Community College in 1991, I gave a presentation in front of my humanities 101 class arguing Jesus Christ is the messiah, citing evidence for his resurrection.

My professor literally cut me off during my presentation and told me it was over, that I couldn’t proceed. He later informed me that I was no longer welcome in the course because of proselytizing.

Here’s the backstory. My professor had been teaching on myth for about six weeks, listing Jesus among them. So after he assigned a project in which students were free to present on virtually anything, I made my move with “when myth became fact, the fulfillment of Messianic Bible prophecy.”

Read more: link  

[Rysabi]

College has been quite a ride for me, juggling three majors. I can certainly say that when people catch wind of your faith they like to try to make life difficult for you. Thankfully the professors at my college will not allow students to pick on others, but still... Other students can still be bullies. There are quite a few professors at my school who are Christians, this is probably because it's a small community college and not a huge university.

One of my friends was a Christian and he was deep into the word, or so I thought. This friend recently graduated with a bachelors. One of his college friends was an atheist and kept challenging him, so due to the constant badgering, he wore my friend down to the point of hating the idea of religion. I've noticed a disturbing trend with students who start gaining knowledge. Now that they are smarter they want to try to poke holes in everything. They want to have an answer for everything and if they don't have an answer then it can't be true. Christianity is a huge target for these kinds of arguments.  

[Midnite Blue Moon 888]

Garland-Green

By Corey Miller | May 24, 2019

While as an undergrad at Salt Lake Community College in 1991, I gave a presentation in front of my humanities 101 class arguing Jesus Christ is the messiah, citing evidence for his resurrection.

My professor literally cut me off during my presentation and told me it was over, that I couldn’t proceed. He later informed me that I was no longer welcome in the course because of proselytizing.

Here’s the backstory. My professor had been teaching on myth for about six weeks, listing Jesus among them. So after he assigned a project in which students were free to present on virtually anything, I made my move with “when myth became fact, the fulfillment of Messianic Bible prophecy.”

Read more: link

Hm.

IMO, I think it would have been more effective to talk to your professor one-on-one respectfully and express how you felt that way rather than do a sermon to the class, making everyone (probably even other Christian students) really uncomfortable.

Or at least talked to him and asked if it would be okay.

I don't know. Stories like this just make my eye twitch. I've worked in countries where the Gospel was met with hostility, and where people really couldn't express their faith out in the open, so when I read stories like this, it just irks me.

Other people expressing their opinions isn't persecution. And there's all kinds of things that can get you kicked out of a PhD program. (As far as I know, it has to be a board decision, not just one by one professor.) That being said, it looks like it was for the best since you ended up becoming a pastor anyways.

Just remember to be humble, and that not everyone has the freedom of expressing their religion free of governmental persecution.