June 30, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) — A new college that is unapologetically pro-life and pro-family is offering 50 students full and partial scholarships for the academic year starting in fall 2016.
The Virtues Campus gathers 15-25 students at a local church three times a week for two years to study under the guidance of a pastor while taking online classes through an accredited university. The program launched last year and is “a new approach to higher education” that reunites local churches and the university and allows students to avoid excessive debt, The Virtues Campus President David Glesne told LifeSiteNews.
Glesne told LifeSiteNews that The Virtues Campus emphasizes in its courses human dignity and the sanctity of marriage, which come from “the creation of human beings made in the image of God” and God’s creation of humans as male and female with “the command to ‘be fruitful and multiply.’”
“We give students the knowledge to articulate the Biblical worldview in the midst of competing worldviews today,” Glesne wrote in an email. “Equipped and trained in this Judeo-Christian worldview, students are given the tools to advocate for life and marriage in our contemporary world. Human life itself and natural marriage are under severe attack today and this biblical foundation and view of life give our students a firm foundation and motivation to be advocates in the public arena for God’s Truth and His will and desire for human beings.”
“In our worldview courses, the Christian faith is brought to bear on the great social issues of the day: marriage, human sexuality, homosexuality, abortion, [and] euthanasia,” Glesne continued. “We believe the Scriptures speak to these great moral issues and our students are taught to think Christianly about them.”
The Virtues Campus is offering 50 scholarships for the two campuses scheduled to be in operation this fall thanks to a generous Christian businessman, Glesne said.
“We’re bringing education back under the umbrella of the local church,” Glesne said. “In early America, for example, all the great universities … born out of the Church in America … In the 20th century, secularism has swept across the universities and now young people in America are being educated in a different worldview. We think it’s time again to bring education in America under the umbrella of the church by bringing those two back together again. And this is our attempt to disciple the next generation in God’s truth.”
Students in The Virtues Campus program study modules on career readiness, the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and biblical worldview. They are encouraged to work part time in order to avoid debt, Glesne said, and all of the students currently enrolled are on track to graduate debt-free.
The Virtues Campus is non-denominational and uses materials from Summit Ministries to equip students to engage the culture. Its affordability and the pastoral mentoring it provides students make the program distinct, Glesne said.
“There are four courses that are part of [the biblical worldview] module” and The Virtues Campus’ vision is “responding to the call of Christ to disciple the nations,” Glesne told LifeSiteNews.
“High school graduates declare a lack of purpose and sense of drift, the accumulation of college debt delays their choice of when to marry or purchase a home, and repeated studies show many are walking away from their Christian faith,” according to the Virtues Campus website. “The Virtues Campus is here to engage with this generation and reverse these trends.”
“Students are taught that the central calling of the Christ-follower is to live a servant life following the example of Jesus Christ,” Glesne said. “Loving God and then loving one’s neighbor means teaching and living God’s truth with regard to life and marriage. Love for neighbor means speaking the truth in love about the sanctity of life and God’s intention for marriage and working in society for civil laws that are just and righteous. These truths are to be lived out and advocated for in the public arena.”
The Virtues Campus will be operating in two locations in the fall: Lutheran Church of the Master in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, and Redeemer Lutheran Church in Coon Rapids, Minnesota. The latter campus opened in 2015.
In fall 2017, Zion Lutheran Church in Clear Lake, Iowa, will open a campus.
Prospective students can apply for admission and scholarships here.