MADISON, WI – (ANS)- A call for prayer in
support of religious freedom at a top university has been made by a leader of
InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.

Jim Lundgren, Senior Vice President and Director of Collegiate Ministries
for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA has sent a letter to InterVarsity’s
Vanderbilt University chapter alumni, and others with a special interest in
InterVarsity’s campus ministry, asking for prayer in support of religious
freedom at Vanderbilt University.

This special request has been made in response to the decision by
Vanderbilt’s leadership to place on provisional status InterVarsity’s Graduate
Christian Fellowship and three other campus Christian groups for non-compliance
with Vanderbilt’s anti-discrimination policy, according to a media release from
IVCF.

The media release says the University policy, as it currently stands, would
prohibit a Christian organization from using any religious criteria when
selecting leaders.

InterVarsity believes such a policy not only flies in the face of common
sense but is contrary to the spirit of the Freedom of Religion protections in
the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

“We love the university environment and we welcome all students and
faculty into our chapter activities at Vanderbilt,” Lundgren said in the
letter.

“However, it is essential that InterVarsity student leaders be
committed Christians who understand their faith as they seek to lead their
peers. No organization of any kind can survive without leaders committed to its
basic beliefs.”

Lundgren is asking for prayers that Vanderbilt will change its position and
allow religious organizations to choose leaders who believe in the principles
and beliefs of those organizations.

A Town Hall meeting was slated to take place on the Vanderbilt campus on
Tuesday evening, January 31, 2012. University officials said they would explain
how the anti-discrimination policy will be applied to student groups at that
time.

IVCF’s purpose is to establish and advance witnessing communities at
colleges and universities. Its vision is to see students and faculty
transformed, campuses renewed and world changers developed.

For more background on the Vanderbilt situation check IVCF’s Campus Access
Concerns page. Links to statements by Vanderbilt’s leadership, a response from
an InterVarsity Campus Staff Member at Vanderbilt, and an open letter to
Vanderbilt Chancellor Nicholas Zeppos from the Foundation for Individual Rights
in Education are posted at that site.

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About Michael Ireland

Michael Ireland, Chief Correspondent of ANS, is an international British freelance journalist who was formerly a reporter with a London (United Kingdom) newspaper and has been a frequent contributor to UCB Europe, a British Christian radio station. While in the UK, Michael traveled to Canada and the United States, Albania,Yugoslavia, Holland, Germany,and Czechoslovakia.

Michael has reported for ANS from Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Israel, Jordan, China,and Russia. Michael’s volunteer involvement with ASSIST News Service is a sponsored ministry department — ‘Michael Ireland Media Missionary’ (MIMM) — of A.C.T.
International of P.O.Box 1649, Brentwood, TN 37024-1649,at: Artists in Christian Testimony (A.C.T.) International
where you can donate online to support his stated mission of ‘Truth Through Christian Journalism.’ If you have a news or feature story idea for Michael, please contact him at: ANS Chief Reporter

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