Ergun Caner joins Arlington Baptist College

Arlington Baptist College yesterday announced that Ergun Caner will be joining their faculty as Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs [link]. As a graduate of Liberty University I can only say I’m glad he’s no longer affiliated with my alma mater.

The press release is mostly standard press release boilerplate sprinkled with occasional Christianese; Caner’s biography has been trimmed down to just the following:

Raised as the son of a devout Muslim, Caner converted to Christianity along with his two brothers. His younger brother, Dr. Emir Caner, is president of the Truett-McConnell Baptist College in Cleveland, Georgia.

Please note that Caner no longer claims to have been raised a devout Sunni Muslim himself, but rather is now claiming to have been raised the son of a devout Muslim. Perhaps the first sentence here is the final revised version of Caner’s once-sensational conversion story. I hope some day he will set the record straight once and for all.

I wish the folks at Arlington Baptist College well; I hope for their sake Caner won’t be dealing with any issues regarding academic fraud.

it’s called staying on message

If I had to offer two helpful hints for someone who wants to be in the world and of the world in the day of the soundbite-driven twenty-four-hour news cycle, I might offer the following:

1. In a crisis always blame your enemies.
2. Always stay on message.

I’d offer this as an explanation for e.g. Jerry Falwell’s comments on the 700 Club after 9/11 [link], and of course the flap surrounding it.

And it’s about all I can offer as an explanation for Emir Caner’s recent comment on Twitter (I can’t quite bring myself to type “Emir Caner’s tweet” as if it means anything):

The military discovered a large stash of pornography in bin Laden’s compound. I was unaware that Islam had its own Acts 29 Network. [link]

See also [link], which adds some helpful analysis.

What can I say about this? I’m embarrassed for Dr Caner. I have to wonder if this is yet another example of Send Button Syndrome, or whether he tried this material out in front of some Truett-McConnell College buddies first.