LEARNING FOR FREEDOM’S SAKE

By Dr. Peter Frank ’95, Provost & Vice President for Academic Affairs

Grove City College has long valued freedom and the liberal arts as central to our institutional vision. As a Christian college, we want to raise up more wise and thoughtful citizens for this unique time in our collective history. We see our purpose here as forming free citizens steeped in Christian wisdom, ready to serve their communities by promoting and protecting freedom for all.

For the past couple of years, I have been working with the faculty at Grove City College to assess and review the core curriculum. While the culture at large, and higher education in particular, have been pushing greater and greater specialization

and a focus on job-skill training alone, we at Grove City College are expanding our commitment to the liberal arts as the foundation of the student experience.

Rather than abandoning our rich heritage centered on the classical liberal arts, we are safeguarding it and strengthening it.

Perhaps a better name for these subjects of study would be the liberating arts. Throughout history this kind of education — focused on the great books of literature, history, philosophy, and theology; the great works of music and art; and exploration in science and mathematics — has been a way to liberate people. It has been a way to equip free people to strengthen democracy and promote freedom as wise advocates for liberty, justice, and virtue. Over the last millennium, these liberating arts have provided freedom to those who would otherwise have remained uneducated, unequipped, and unskilled.

As an economist, I have seen over and over again the importance of a free citizenry. Data repeatedly demonstrate that when personal liberties diminish, the well-being of the entire society suffers. What’s more, freedom always leads to a more hopeful and flourishing life by numerous measures beyond material well-being alone. Educational attainment, improved healthcare, protection under the law, access to the basic needs of food and water, expanded life expectancy, and improved infant mortality are a few of the factors that improve significantly where freedom expands in society.

Combining an education rooted in the liberal arts, with major programs that then build upon this essential foundation, is the raison d’être of a liberal arts college. The Christian liberal arts provide a framework to help students attain the wisdom necessary to use their education for purposes that help build a more just and virtuous society.

We talk a lot at Grove City College about imparting what is good, true, and beautiful to our students. These transcendental concepts are what shape us as people, not just as workers. We are not here to just pass on information; we are more concerned with the formation of souls. The liberating arts are full of these good, true, and beautiful elements: from momentous historical events to perplexing philosophical questions, from stunning literary passages to exhilarating orchestral harmonies, from the complex structure of atoms to the profound truths in the word of God, there is gift after gift for the student to unwrap.

Regardless of a student’s future career, we want them to go forth with a greater appreciation for God, his world, and the people around them. Practically speaking, our students are likely to have several different careers throughout a lifetime, many of which are unknow today. While skill development is an important element of an education, there is much more life preparation that takes place in pursuit of a college degree.

The liberating arts cultivate virtue. While students are exposed to things that are good, true, and beautiful, and also shown the contrast to things that are not, they are shaping their appetites. They are developing wisdom, and keener senses of other virtues like courage, diligence, and love.

As their worlds expand, they see examples of those who have gone before them and alongside them, whether in history or literature, and they can learn from those examples. As they are exposed to new, challenging ideas, they flex new muscles and grow in beneficial ways. Ultimately, because our entire curriculum centers around Christ revealed to us in the Bible, our hope is that as students see more of Him, they will become more like Him.

In addition to all the content, conversations, and cultivation of virtue that a liberal arts education provides, it also prepares students for their roles in this world, as restorers. The Christian liberal arts, grounded in Biblical orthodoxy, is necessary for wise orthopraxy. This is our hope for all Grove City College graduates: that they will go forth in greater knowledge and wisdom to be light and salt in the world that so desperately needs both.

It is often said that with education comes responsibility, and studying the liberating arts points students toward how to rightly use this responsibility.

FREEDOM FROM AND FREEDOM TO

Grove City College’s historic commitment to freedom is purposely conveyed to students through the core curriculum. We believe that a populace well versed in the classical liberal arts will be one that not only understands the value of freedom, but also uses that freedom well. There are two aspects of freedom, and one of them—often overlooked—can be powerfully impacted by a strong, Christcentered liberal arts education. We think of these two sides of freedom as “freedom from” and “freedom to.” Both are necessary for a well-ordered civil society.

Staunch defenders of freedom tend to focus on “freedom from,” which emphasizes political freedoms as outlined in the U.S. Constitution or other charters that form the core of a liberal society and protect free people from governmental oppression and suppression of ideas and beliefs.

“Freedom from” focuses on ensuring that no government, no group, and no person can infringe upon individual liberty.

Government “of the people” clearly plays an important role in this aspect of freedom, but political freedom—or “freedom from”— is not alone sufficient for a well-ordered flourishing society.

The second aspect of freedom – “freedom to” – goes hand in hand with “freedom from.” Whereas the latter protects the individual from violations of their freedoms, the former is the freedom to act well. As Galatians 5:13 reminds us, this is the purpose of our striving for liberty: “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”

This is one of the primary building blocks of a free society, that is, structuring the “rules of the game” in such a way that individual free actions benefit others more than if those actions were coerced. The catalyst for innovation and economic development during the past few hundred years began with entrepreneurial decision-making rooted in the incentives to produce what others desire to attain.

Freedom to act is essential to a free and fair society but it also creates an important tension. Freedom to act necessitates the need for boundaries, as action by one person can hinder the freedoms of another. Additionally, it requires moral judgement shaped by personal convictions and a worldview that grounds the individual in a proper understanding of human nature. This is where an institution like Grove City College plays a role. Education must provide a foundation for helping individuals to develop this framework.

– Frederick Douglass, Blessings of Liberty and Education. Speech, 1894.

Freedom to act, and act in a way that maintains a strong civil society, is strengthened by the cultivation of virtue. Policy alone fails to lead individuals to act morally and wisely for the benefit of all, but Christian higher education can and does help shape these virtues.

The Christian liberal arts are central to cultivating virtue in three ways: by building social capital and trust; building an understanding of community; and enhancing the framework for moral choosing.

Education has long played an important role in building trust among individuals, especially strangers. A liberal arts education, in particular, provides students with a much more expansive view of the world, the historical context we live in today, and the vast cultural, social, and religious complexity within society. This expanding knowledge helps students learn about new people, places, and ideas that collectively help shape a more holistic understanding of the world.

All of this builds trust and growth in the social capital that helps establish a strong citizenry. Scholars have shown that social capital is critical for achieving development and for an efficiently functioning economy, but it is difficult to generate through public policy. Education is the driving force that leads to engagement in society, and a strong liberal arts education builds the framework for positive civil discourse and action.

Education provides, arguably, the most impactful means to generate trust and social capital in society. We contend that study of the classical liberal arts in a Christian framework is the most valuable type of education to build a robust civil society. Students study not only the skills of data analysis in a mathematics course or radioactive activity in physics, but also the ethics behind human cloning and the moral choices faced by characters in a Dickens novel. By rooting education in the Christian liberal arts, students are further equipped to act in ways leading to the benefit of others.

A Christian liberal arts education helps to foster a healthy understanding of community. Learning in an environment where students live with the same colleagues with whom they discuss Plato, Rembrandt, and the book of Job helps to continually reshape their perspective on self versus others. That sense of community informs the choices they make and allows them to see beyond the narrow understanding of individualism so prevalent today.

Finally, building a moral foundation via the Christian liberal arts helps students develop a sharper lens to view the world and guide their actions within it. Just as many students may work in jobs that do not yet exist, they will also face ethical questions and dilemmas that are currently unimaginable. These students need to develop a more complete framework from which to operate when confronting these future decisions and actions. A Christian liberal arts educational core helps root students in the virtues that lead to right moral choosing.

Freedom to act is a necessary condition for a prosperous society, but it is not sufficient alone for a virtuous one. The cultivation of a moral framework, enhanced by a Christian liberal arts education, is what will lead to the actions that build a thriving society.

One need only look at the discourse so prevalent in our day, whether via social media or the 24-hour news cycle, to see that our freedom to act is clouded with ad hominem attacks and demagoguery. We need more educated citizens who can speak wisely and eloquently, who can parse through arguments with logic and can discern with good judgment.

“Freedom to” is both an essential aspect of our human agency and an important responsibility. A broad liberal arts education captures the imagination of students with a more complete understanding of what is possible, while also helping to shape a vision for what is right and true. Using this God-given freedom is a responsibility we all have, and educating young people to utilize this responsibility toward virtuous ends is at the heart of a Christian liberal arts core. We are not here to primarily seek freedom from oppression so that we have liberty to do what we want and serve our own pleasure. We desire to use that liberty to love and serve our community well.

For the society to thrive, for our neighbors to thrive, we seek to expand both “freedom from” and “freedom to.” A focus on the rule of law and governmental institutions will help to protect the former, and educating our citizens in the classical liberal arts at a place like Grove City College will help to protect the latter. Building the foundation for how to live in a free society, choosing to act and engage responsibly, requires drawing on a deep well of understanding that is cultivated in a Christian liberal arts education. ■

This article was adapted from two essays published by the Institute for Faith and Freedom in collaboration with Amy (Wray ’95) Frank.