Here's the deal, a topic has come up at an ASB Senate meeting. And I was asked to write an article about it.

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Aric Wood. I am an ASB Senator for Fraagard. If you are asking yourself “wait, we have a senate?” or “I have no idea what this person is talking about” don’t worry, dear reader, you are the normal one in this conversation. Here’s an overview: the Senate does two things: 1) It gives money to dorms and 2) We advise the ASB Cabinet and the Corban's administration concerning on what would be helpful to the Student Body.

Senators represent the different dorms, the townhouses, and the commuters. Basically, the Senate deals in differences and building unity through those differences. Which brings us to the subject I was asked to write about: cliques on campus.

Please understand: CLIQUES ARE NOT BAD! They are things that exist. But like all things that exist, we are invited to look at them from a Christian worldview. Unity in diversity is one of the defining characteristics of God as seen in the Trinity; as the body of Christ, we are called to look, sound and act as much like him as possible.

In an ideal world, Corban would be a single group and community. Within this group, there would be sub-groups based on living arrangements, majors and interests. Sub-groups are just the way people organize themselves; the trouble comes when you start giving in to the natural, worldly temptation to not interact with or welcome those outside of your group.

This is one of the basic struggles of the Christian world. When reading the book of Acts, it becomes clear that there were sub-groups within the community of believers in the early, early, Church. Conflict was common and no one wanted to leave the comfort of their own communities. Paul was held in near universal contempt with Jewish Christians back east, Jews and Gentiles did not readily interact, and it took great effort on the part of Peter to maintain the Church as one.

It should come as no great surprise then that our Church history is marked by schism upon schism; from the first century Church to the Catholic Church to Easter Orthodox to Protestant and on and on. Unity is not human; it is Godly. Being Godly is hard and we are prone to fail.

In light of this, it is my belief that Corban is in a unique position and has a unique responsibility as a college campus to express that unity in diversity in our everyday interactions. It breaks my heart when we all fail to live up to the standard set for us.

This is not me blowing the lid on a huge problem here in our community. I am not saying “repent or face the wrath of GOD!” However, questions have been raised in ASB and in the Senate. These questions I believe would be better asked and answered by the Student Body as a whole, rather than just its limited leadership.

So if you must consider this as anything, consider it a call to conversation, or at least to awareness and thought. How do you interact with people outside of your normal social group? How is our Christian campus reflective of Christ and how can it be more so in our everyday interactions? How do we find our unity in Christ?

If you have any questions, complaints, suggestions, general musings about the universe, or want to hold down the “A” key for a few minutes, you will find a comment section conveniently located below the Facebook post where you found this article, perfectly suited for that kind of feedback.

I would love to hear what you have to say.