1899: E. Y. Mullins elected president of SBTS
On June 29, 1899, 36 members of the Southern Seminary board of trustees gathered in Atlanta, Ga., for the purpose of electing a new seminary president. William H. Whitsitt had resigned as president earlier that year amid controversy surrounding his published views regarding the history of baptism by immersion. The effects of that controversy and the decision by J. P. Greene of William Jewel College to decline the seminary presidency left the seminary in urgent need of a new president. That leader was chosen in Atlanta as the trustees unanimously voted to elect E. Y. Mullins to the presidency.
Mullins was serving as pastor of Newton Centre Church in Massachusetts as the seminary trustees gathered in Atlanta. According to his wife, Isla May Mullins, the first telegram that was received regarding his election as president provided for more confusion that clarity. That telegram from the editor of the Baptist Argus simply read “Congratulations. Send your photograph.”[1]
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Evolution and the empty nest syndrome
Michael Shermer publishes Skeptic magazine, teaches at Claremont Graduate University, and writes a regular column for Scientific American. He is an ardent defender of evolutionary theory and a well-known critic of all supernatural claims. In today’s edition of USA Today, Shermer writes about the “empty nest syndrome” — the difficulty many parents face when their offspring go off to college.
While this has always been a difficult time for parents, in recent years many parents seem to be having a more difficult time than usual. Some colleges report that parents have to be told to go home. One college reported about a mother who slept in her daughter’s dorm room for a couple of nights until the girl’s roommate complained to school authorities.
Shermer has now experienced the “empty nest syndrome” for himself, as his daughter began her college studies just over a month ago. He clearly misses his daughter. And yet, how does he explain this experience?
He writes: “Why does it hurt so bad? Science has an answer: We are social mammals who experience deep attachment to our fellow friends and family, an evolutionary throwback to our Paleolithic hunter-gatherer days of living in small bands.”
You read that right. Shermer reduces the love of a parent for a child to “an evolutionary throwback.” He adds to this a physiological theory:
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