The Things You Can’t Teach in Evangelical Literature Classes

I deconstructed my faith completely while teaching English at an evangelical school, and while the school is not the main reason I left the faith, it is absolutely the reason I came to loathe evangelicalism. I considered myself to be a progressive evangelical when I started teaching at Azusa Pacific University as a twenty-eight-year-old in 1998. At that point on my journey out of faith, I was hoping the academic arm of the evangelical world would help my devolving faith find a place to take root, but I quickly discovered that evangelical academics at schools like APU, at best, did not have answers to basic questions of faith, and at worst simply subscribed to the dull-minded racism, patriarchy, purity culture, and xenophobia of the larger evangelical world. Under these parameters, literature cannot be adequately taught because it cannot be adequately learned.

If we accept the idea that teaching literature in a liberal arts setting should attempt to explore all parts of the human condition, or at least what we know of it, as mediated through authorial perspectives, then teaching literature is a tough proposition in an evangelical setting. Through a liberal arts lens, the scope of teaching can be a wide, amazing view into the human condition. Through an evangelical lens, that view has blinders installed to limit whatever a given generation of evangelicals deems taboo or verboten. Granted, schools like APU, which are considered moderately fundamentalist in the evangelical world, don't go so far as to systemically forbid books or topics that might cause discomfort in the largely white conservative student population, but there seems to be a direct line between the hyper-puritanical lens through which evangelicals read literature and the proliferation of Republican-enacted laws forbidding books that might make white children uncomfortable. While schools like APU pay lip service to diversity in their mission statements, the reality is that discussion of social justice, racism, sexuality and gender are third rails in such institutional contexts — as I will show in this piece.1 One of the many problems evangelical schools face, particularly the accredited ones, is that they proclaim a "top-notch" academic experience and a fundamentalist evangelical experience in the same mission statements. They are trying to serve two masters, as it were, and the two masters don't get along.

For context, at APU science professors teach about evolution, but are quick to declare they do not believe in it. Film professors do not allow viewing of R-rated movies. History professors downplay and even ignore civil rights, slavery, and the genocide of Native Americans in favor of celebrating manifest destiny, white nationalism, anti-feminism, and anti-LGBTQIA views. Art professors do not allow the very basic drawing of the nude human form for fear of causing lust in the students, making sure the models are covered with nipple pasties and thongs. No chance for lusting there. The English department, due to lack of interest from the students and the faculty, almost never offers courses on ethnic or feminist literature or anything that might be considered "counter-cultural," no matter how significant in history. Psychology professors decry the American Psychological Association as being overrun by liberals and homosexuals, and are free to express views that being gay is akin to being a child molester. An alarming number of professors of every discipline give fiery sermons about the evils of the "gay agenda," "feminism," and "Catholicism," and "liberals." I know all this from the accounts of students and from spending fifteen years sitting in hallways between my classes listening to my colleagues who left their doors open. But even if evangelical professors did teach all the things in an acceptable academic manner, the evangelical students would not accept the things because, well, they are evangelical. Students will proudly proclaim that they enrolled at a school like APU to get away from the "worldly" teachings at non-evangelical colleges and universities.

Granted, teaching literature is not just about exploring the lascivious or rebellious characteristics of this world and the people in it, but teaching literature while ignoring those components of the human condition is counter-productive. If exploring the human condition is central to both the writing and analysis of literature, one could argue that teaching only the parts that don't offend delicate evangelical sensibilities might be, let's just say it, pointless.

As much as I hate to say it, most of my dear colleagues in the English department at APU were unable and/or unwilling to teach literature beyond the level of high school because they were unwilling to discuss race and sexuality. They mentioned it. Vaguely. But they would not or could not provide many insights to ideas and concepts that might possibly offend their students and by extension, their paying parents. Whether this was due to the practical matter of fearing for their jobs or to their own closely held values that criminalized any "liberal" or "sexual" ideas, the result was the same: students who took literature classes at APU were getting censored literature classes because that's what they were paying for. I pause to salute the precious few colleagues who dared to get into all the things in their literature classes. Most of them, like myself, are no longer there.

A colleague once asked me to sub for him while he was away at a conference. One of the classes was an American literature class, and I was pleased to see James Baldwin's name on the list of stories to be covered that day. I was fortunate enough to take classes at UC San Diego with Sherley Anne Williams and Quincy Troupe, who once brought his friend, Toni Morrison, to speak to us. Quincy was even a pallbearer at James Baldwin's funeral. I learned to revere Baldwin and his writing, but the idea of teaching his work at APU was both thrilling and terrifying. I wondered if my colleague hated me and had set a trap to have me fired because next to Baldwin's name on the syllabus was title "Going to Meet the Man." It's a story about a white sheriff in bed with his wife who cannot achieve an erection until he thinks about his torture of a Black man in his cell and the brutal lynching of a Black man he witnessed when he was a boy. Complete with gruesome details about castration, torture, hanging, and burning, the story ends with the sheriff's renewed sexual vigor, and we are left to assume he and his penis rose to the occasion.

The fine students had done the readings, but they were largely confused by the story. Some wondered why a man in a Christian marriage would not be able to perform intercourse with his wife. Others twisted their faces at the connection between the violent, gruesome lynching and sexual performance. It just did not make sense to them. How on earth could a man get turned on by . . . that?

I took a deep breath and went in. Before fifteen sets of wide eyes and dropped jaws, I explained about the South, the Southern Gothic, sexual deviance, kink, marital issues, and of course, how a racist white man could get off by thinking about a Black man being lynched. We spent an hour of class time on that one story and only had about twenty minutes to talk about the other one.

Afterwards, a few of the students told me that was the most intense hour of class they had ever had. They had never heard a professor speak this way before, and they weren't even upset. Well, some students who made a mad dash out of the classroom were obviously upset, but I was used to that. When I saw the professor I subbed for, he laughed and said I didn't have to go into the story so much. He liked assigning the story to expose the students to the brutality of racism, but he didn't expect me to explain all the things. The class was, apparently, shell-shocked by my lecture and discussion. I can only imagine the number of prayers and Bible studies that took place after that class.

How can you assign James Baldwin and not teach all the things? Especially with a story like "Going to Meet the Man." You could, as anthologies often do, just expose your students to more gentle, uplifting Baldwin stories like "Sonny's Blues." Even then, there is a whole history of racism, oppression, and violence against Black men contrasted with the beautiful music that must be covered. If you're going to assign "Going to Meet the Man," you have to commit to its raw, unflinching content and historical contexts. Unless you're at an evangelical school. Then you get academic cred points for assigning the story, but you don't get into trouble for actually teaching it. For me, the only conclusion to the story is that racism is so deeply ingrained in some people that it is directly tied to their sexuality, and once a person gets to that point, they are irredeemable. There's no hope for that man. This conclusion is a non-starter at evangelical schools for two reasons:

Almost every white student I taught admitted to having a virulently racist relative or entire branch of the family tree. I asked every class about their families during every semester as we talked about race. And almost every one of them expressed some level of love and respect for that person, or branch. Despite the racism and bigotry, they were family, and they were loved. Baldwin is basically saying those people are despicable, and there is no hope for them. Most evangelicals just don't want to say that or hear someone say that about dear Uncle Ron.

My colleagues would say they didn't want to make their predominantly white students feel bad, and they knew that parents and pastors would call the school to complain. Parents and local pastors often did call to complain. They complained about the children's literature class reading Harry Potter, and they complained about Shakespeare being taught at all.2 One incensed mom even brought me up in her complaint about the Shakespeare class, saying I was promoting the "gay agenda."

So, about that "gay agenda" thing. The mad mom was not the only one to accuse me of that thing. Many APU professors subscribe to the notion that exposing a student to a thing is akin to indoctrinating that student in the thing. In my "Introduction to Literature" class, I assigned a story by Gloria Naylor, one of my favorite writers. It's just a chapter from her acclaimed book, The Women of Brewster Pace, that tells the story of two women in a tenement building who are discovered to be lesbians. In the chapter, Naylor shows what it is like for them to be ostracized by their community for being gay. That's it. There is no talk of sexual politics or queer theory or theology, and no mention of sex. Just two women trying to live their lives under the judgmental eyes of their neighbors.

I didn't lecture about sex or sexuality for this story. I simply asked my evangelical students what kind of neighbor they would be to this couple. The discussions were always heated and always disgusting. Most said they would be civil as long as the women didn't try to convert them or their children to being gay. A few always said they would love being the couple's neighbor, but never more than a few out of the thirty-five students in the class. And some went so far as to say they would ignore or even judge the women. These students expressed disgust at the "depravity" of the "abominations" in the story.

Knowing I was tiptoeing through an evangelical minefield, I never told students what to think or believe, but I always made it clear that I, myself, didn't think being queer was wrong or sinful, even when I was still a Christian. I also made it clear that no one was being graded on a worldview or a belief. If students wanted to write about the women in the story in their papers, it would only be to analyze Naylor's techniques of character and theme.

So, naturally, when the chair of the biology department heard that I was teaching this story, he tried to have me fired for "promoting the gay agenda." There's a whole story in my forthcoming book about how APU invites parents to visit the actual classes their children take and how one set of parents heard me list the Gloria Naylor story during a review for a midterm. These parents went directly to a biology department mixer and told the chair what they had just witnessed, and that guy wrote an angry email to my boss and the provost of the school, demanding I be fired. If not for my supportive department chair, a really could have been fired. Professors had been fired for offenses less grave than "promoting the gay agenda." It didn't matter that I wasn't promoting anything other than a Christian hypothetical as to how to interact with people who exist in this world. Simply assigning the story, to many people in high places at APU, was "promoting the gay agenda." I later learned this episode went all the way up to the board of trustees. After asking around, I was one of the only professors granted the opportunity to host three different board members in a "get to know the professors" program. They sat in on my class. I shouted them out. I made two of them laugh out loud. One woman just glared at me as if I were urinating on the floor. If only they had found out about the James Baldwin substitute lecture.

APU is regarded by most of the evangelical higher education world as a "liberal" institution despite the fact that it is solidly conservative by any measure. They do allow dancing, divorce among its faculty, and drinking for students of age. Women can hold leadership positions up to associate provost, but they would never let a woman be president or provost. Professors are allowed to drink alcohol on their own time, and other than claiming a "Wesleyan tradition," there are no creeds or denominational requirements to adhere to.3 And yet, there is no exploration of the human condition outside of criminalizing it as contrary to Christian values. If a professor has a class reading Othello, the academic gymnastics required to explain "the beast with two backs" and the darkly sexual and violent ending, without getting fired, are Olympic-level.

Of course, there is a racial element to all of this I haven't brought up. White professors faced little backlash, if any, for talking about race, either as proponents of social justice or of proponents of white Christian nationalism. They faced pushback from BIPOC and compassionate white students, but nothing from the administration or board of trustees. And here is where we see the connection between the politics of the Christian Right and the manner in which evangelicals approach literature. The fear of the things is all about controlling the behaviors and values of people. Reading about LGBTQIA people or racism in the South could lead a person to conclude that gay people are human and deserving of an abundant life or that white privilege and racism affect our society. And this is what drives the policies we are seeing enacted all over the country, whether the "Don't Say Gay" bill in Florida or the recent spate of "anti-CRT" policies and bills.

The issue of teaching literature is just one of many issues that APU is confronting right now. Following a visit from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges in April of 2022, the WASC Senior College and University Commission outlined an extensive set of shortcomings to be addressed in the next two years, including issues of "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and Campus Climate." Further recommendations included an "Academic Program Assessment and Review" to "ensure quality of the academic programs."4 My experience tracks with the summation of the accreditation report in that the evangelical approach to the liberal arts, while aligning with the values of the Christian Right, falls short of the outcomes and objectives of academic accreditation standards.

Outside of all the things there is plenty to teach from the Bible to Jane Eyre to C.S. Lewis. In fact, I would estimate those three make up a huge chunk of literature classes at evangelical schools. I suppose one could argue that a censored, Anglocentric, high school version of literature is better than no literature, but I spent my youth and early adult life trying to shield my eyes from all the things that make this world what it is. From the beautiful to the grotesque, observing and interacting with redemption and brokenness makes for a life filled with awe and wonder, joy and horror, and a deeper empathy for those who share this earth with us. So, for me, along with most respectable accrediting commissions, reading and exploring all the things make humanity better. That's one of the objectives of a liberal arts education. Just don't do it at an evangelical school.  

(And, if you went to an evangelical school, the "beast with two backs" is not a demon or a reference to the Book of Revelation.)

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Scott Okamoto (@rsokamoto) is a writer with a forthcoming book from Lake Drive Books about his 15-years of teaching at Azusa Pacific University that became the backdrop for deconstructing his faith and exploring his identity as a Japanese American man. He is also the creator of the Chapel Probation Podcast that tells the stories of survivors of evangelical colleges and universities.

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