A few quotations from A Grander Story: An Invitation to Christian Professors by Rick Hove and Heather Holleman...
Professor George Marsden's "The State of Evangelical Scholarship" outlines a wise path for Christian academics:
"For us as scholars this means that our agenda ought to be directed toward building for our community as solid a place in the pluralistic intellectual life of our civilization as is consistent with our principles. Helping to establish the intellectual viability of our world view and pointing out the shortcomings of alternatives can be an important service to our community and an important dimension of our witness to the world. To perform this task properly requires a delicate combination of modesty and assertivenss. Our intellectual life must display the Christian qualities of self-criticism and generosity to others. Richard Neuhaus puts it well when he says we should have 'reverence for those with whom we disagree.' At the same time, we properly attempt to establish for others the attractiveness of our world view." (p. 50)
And then this one...
Nathan Hatch, however, warns of a common temptation, one inevitable for Christians in a minority position within the academy:
"Like children long rejected, evangelical scholars are still too anxious to be accepted by their peers, too willing to move only in the directions that allow them to be 'relevant.' [The result is that] we have been far more inclined to speak up when our Christian convictions are in tune with the assumptions of modern academic life than when they are at odds. It is much easier, for instance, to set oneself in the vanguard of social progress than it is to defend those Christian assumptions tha the established and fashionable intellectual circles of our day regard as obscurantist and fanciful. Yet it is this tougher mental fight that we must not avoid." (p. 51)
