'Grow Up!' Oklahoma Wesleyan University President Strikes Chord With Blog

The president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University is getting a lot of attention on social media thanks to a blog entry he posted on the university's web site last week.

The post is titled, "This is Not a Day Care. It's a University!"

Dr. Piper wrote the blog post after a student told him he had felt “victimized” by a sermon on the topic of 1 Corinthians 13.

"It appears that this young scholar felt offended because a homily on love made him feel bad for not showing love! In his mind, the speaker was wrong for making him, and his peers, feel uncomfortable," wrote Dr. Piper.

Read the blog post.

Dr. Piper told News On 6 he posted it on Monday, November 23, 2015. Since then it's been discussed by several national media outlets including Fox News and Glenn Beck. A week later it's going viral on social media.

"I'm pleased that people care to have the debate," he told News On 6. "This is more of a challenge of our culture, not a critique of our students."

He asked, "Do we want ideological fascism or intellectual freedom?" He said the liberal arts academy was founded on the robust exchange of ideas, not the suppression of them and not "trigger warnings." He said truth is the goal of the academy and truth sets us free. 

"Oklahoma Wesleyan is not a 'safe place', but rather, a place to learn: to learn that life isn’t about you, but about others; that the bad feeling you have while listening to a sermon is called guilt; that the way to address it is to repent of everything that’s wrong with you rather than blame others for everything that’s wrong with them. This is a place where you will quickly learn that you need to grow up!" Dr. Piper wrote.

He said the reaction to his post has been positive and affirming and that while he's sure some people disagree with the message he has yet to hear about it. He said that if a person can throw the "hate" card on a sermon about love, then the academy has failed us.