We have a meeting with Dean Scott today at 3:30. Pray that goes well.
In as few words as possible here's my rationale for allowing nudity in the hall of Catacombs and other guys hall's.
Somewhere around the age of 11-12 guys begin to get really insecure about their bodies. People begin to hit puberty at random times and suddenly conversation shifts from Saturday morning cartoons to how big their penis is and where hair is growing. We start to mistrust each other. And suddenly there are barriers in our relationships between each other. Our fear and self-doubt begins to creep into the way we see ourselves. This affects a lot.
The advantage of hall nudity is that it forces us to trust each other by conquering a basic insecurity in our life. This helps us by changing us over from defining ourselves by our physical shortcomings (which we do) towards something else, which in a Christian environment will tend to be Christ.
Student Development/Covenant College Administration would have several objections at this point.
"Feel free to be nude within your own room. "
This could maybe work in a place like Carter or Mac. But unfortunately the rooms in Founders are just not large enough for 20 odd guys to be in and not be really uncomfortable. Being nude in the room just doesn't cut it.
"Well you just need to find another way to overcome this insecurity that guys have. Be creative."
I hear you on the creativity issue. However there really isn't any way to overcome the issue of mistrust between guys stemming from nudity without being nude together.
"Well I guess then you just are going to have to trust in the Lord to deal with these things."
If I want someone to be saved to I just pray for them. If I want someone to be comforted in suffering do I just ask for the Holy Spirit to give them peace? Faith and works, is the image of the Bible. It isn't appropriate to just pray for guys to trust each other. It is neccessary to do things to. Which again means being nude together.
"Well we have to deal with new freshmen that are offended by this issue. Plus there are some freshmen that struggle with homosexuality. "
These are real legitimate concerns. However, it is Covenant's general position not to legislate these things. If I have a new room-mate that is offended by my gangster rap then the school does not think it is their job to step in and resolve it. Similarly if my roommate is offended by the fact that I dance around naked to devo songs the school doesn't think its their job to fix it.
"Yes but these are issues between roommates, these examples are private "room" issues. "
Well what about the fact that I blare my gangster rap so loudly that all the halls hear it? What about the fact that I like to dance naked in other people's room? Here the school wouldn't want to step in.
"Also, you haven't talked about the homosexuality issue"
Obviously if a new guy on the hall was struggling with homosexuality, then we would have to be sensitive to that. We would stop.
"But that student would be really unlikely to come to anyone about his struggles."
Already this semester a student has come in confidentiality to student development about his homosexual tendencies. Student development can easily tell the RA of that hall. And behavior can be dealt with accordingly.
What we have to decide then is to what length are we going to go for the extreme circumstances? Are we going to outlaw all nudity in halls for the sake of those young men that struggle with homosexuality but are unwilling to talk to anyone about it? Especially in light of the fact that they will see nudity within their own room and communal showers?
So why then is the school stepping in here. Making the decision to define the hall as a public place? They fear litigation. They want to make guys from other halls feel free to come down. They want girls to like us. Feel comfortable around us. All these remaining reasons seem pretty weak. Especially in regards to what's being lost.
Of particular note is the litigation issue. If some student feels threatened molested by the sight of naked men. The school would have no liability unless they never dealt with it, after it had been brought to their attention. This prevents anything from coming to their attention. It seems to be overkill.
Well we had the meetings, the RA's of Sutherlands, Ghetto, South, Central, 1st Belz, and Catacombs were in attendance. We represented the side that had serious misgivings about the new definition of what counts as public nudity. On the other "side" was John David Bower, the RA of the Five Points, and Emily Gosselink RD of Mac/Rymer. Who, needless to say, didn't have any particular problem with the new rule.
Well Covenant's position is basically this. Covenant does not want to be sued. It regularly and routinely gets complaints and threats from dissafected staff, factulty, students, alumni, parents, trustee members, and company who hear or see instances of nudity that they found offensive. Some of these groups could sue the school. In that event the school would have a hard time arguing that the hallway of a school dorm is not a public place. JD compared the hallway of say Catacombs to the hallway of say a hotel, or one's frontyard. According to JD, the school in its literature speaks of dorm halls in a way that it would have a hard time proving to a judge in court that a dorm hall is anything but private.
In addition to this there are male students at Covenant who struggle with homosexuality. These male students are needlessly frustrated and tempted my male nudity.
Also there are certain students at Covenant who are heterosexual but not comfortable with male nudity. They find it offensive and makes them feel isolated from those who do nude activities. This is especially harmful for those who live on a hall (such as ours) that has nude activities (such as hall ball).
In the schools mind these are all good reasons to include the dorm hall as part of the public domain in defining public nudity.
On the flip side, all the good things that come out of nude hall activites the school feels could be just as easily accomplished within the confines of the bedrooms of the hall or with a little bit of creativity.
In their cost benefit analysis the benefits of keeping nudity in the bedroom/bathroom far outweighs the negatives.
Now I find this defense completely unsatisfactory. But I've had a long day that still has more day in it. I'll save my response for some later point.
The hall has decided that at this point obeying or disobeying this rule is not our only option. The 6 guys RA's don't support the definition are going to appeal this all the way to the top. Our next meeting will be with Scott Raymond. After that President Neilson, and then the school board, maybe even eventually the PCA General Assembly. As long as we're in this process, we want to make our case strong as possible by obeying the rules until we get them changed.
For now, I would greatly appreciate it if any person who ever enjoyed the benefits of nude hall activities would email Scott Raymond the Dean of Students at Covenant College talking about what a positive and sanctimonius force nudity was in their life.
A second note, you can make ball-like objects out of things like socks and duck-tape and use them on your hall to your hearts content.
I appreciate your prayers, and would appreciate more of them, over the next weeks and probably months, as this thing is pushed to resolution.
Well. Today at 3 pm est I and several of the other guy RA's are going to have a meeting with John David Bower, the assistant dean of students, over several of the new "more precise definitions" in this years residence life handbook. Among these is a new definition of public nudity. This definition states that public nudity includes anything outside of a dorm room or bathroom 24 hours a day 7 days a week. This means that hall commons are public. Many things that guy halls did out of comraderie and fellowship will now be against the rules of the school.
In addition to this new clarification, their will be no balls allowed in the hall of a dorm hall. Also the rule that "no outdoor sport can be played indoors" will be strictly enforced.
All of these new definitions, and maybe others that I have not even heard about (the new residence life manual has not been published yet), trouble me deeply. For all you that read this blog pray that the meeting this afternoon and the resolution of this conflict will go well, that tempers will not rise, and that nobody loses their job.
Well they're all here. One thing that really struck me as I was helping our 7 odd freshmen is that these guys don't always make Catacombs, sometimes Catacombs makes them. It's the beauty of having a hall that is filled with guys of all sorts of classrank. Because there are going to be upperclassmen on the Catacombs this year (like all others) the freshmen will be pushed to become new personalities. Looking at the person I am now, and the person I was then (when I moved in for the first time) my jaw really drops.
I guess I'm just a little impatient. I really want to see these guys become the potential that I see for them.
Well I haven't posted in weeks, but then again I haven't really had anything to say. I got home to Bham alright. I bummed around for two weeks, and began to feel myseld stagnate in a short period of time. Needless to say I was thrilled to get back to Covenant. This weekend all of us (the RA staff) went on a retreat together to this camp in the mountains of North Carolina. Everything went better than I expected. I think it will really pay off in the long run to spend a lot of time with all the RA's, building relationships from the beginning.
The hall is starting to look like Catacombs. In all likelyhood, it won't get as lively as fast this year because Student Development is charging returning students 70 bucks a day (includes 3 Chartwell's meals) to stay on their hall before the 30th.
I think this is ridiculous for Catacombs. It's a good thing for the freshmen to have the old guys around. I remember eagerly awaiting their presence when I was a freshman. But anyway.