My daughter, Alyson, took a semester away from her nominally Christian university to study abroad. Emails describing the first few days of classes had a common theme.  "I'm the only conservative and they hate Christians."  One professor says 'Jihad is tame compared to 13^th century Christians.' There's the obligatory Sarah Palin bashing complete with sexual innuendo.  Another prof was... "totally ripping on Columbus."

She issued a request (and I quote) "Conservative articles and accounts would be very helpful since I'm learning liberal ones."

Alyson has not previously encountered this level of America and Christian-bashing ...but she's been warned of it.  So, apparently has Julea Ward, until recently, a graduate student in counseling at Eastern Michigan University. I recently heard Julea, a stately and poised young black woman tell her story of campus discrimination. Discrimination... not for her color, but for her Christianity. 

Julea is a year away from completing an advanced degree in counseling and was seeing patients under the guidance of a supervising professor.  Early on, she informed that supervisor of her Christian faith      and of the fact that she would not, because of that faith, be able to affirm patients in their sinful behavior.      No big surprise that it didn't take long until she was presented with a homosexual client.  Reading the file ahead of the appointment, Julea realized that there would be no fudging.  She discerned that the patient's distress was due, at least in part, to his sexual orientation. The counseling program at Eastern Michigan clearly forbids counseling students from telling gay patients their sexual orientation can be changed.  On the contrary, students are to affirm such patients in their homosexuality. Julia knew she couldn't do it.

At the advice of her supervisor, Julea had the client referred to another counselor.  But that was not the end of it.       She received a letter from the University stating she had violated the American Counseling Association's code of conduct that prohibits counselors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation.  Julea was given three choices:  Retract her stance, undergo "remediation," or face a formal review.  Julea chose the review. At a hearing the faculty relentlessly questioned and denigrated her Christian views and ultimately dismissed her from the counseling program.

Julea sought help from the Alliance Defense Fund's Center for Academic Freedom.  ADF is suing the university asking that Julea be reinstated into the counseling program and for compensatory damages. Senior Counsel David French says the Center has a 100 percent win record when it confronts universities for violations of students' religious freedom. He maintains that the university is supposed to be a 'free marketplace if ideas." ADF aims to change this attitude that students have to believe what university elites believe.

 The liberal university is the intellectual engine of the left in this country. Kudos to brave students, like Julea, and to ADF for standing up to it.