Gordon College President D. Michael Lindsay poses for a photo on campus in Wenham, Mass., in this Sept. 10, 2014, photo.WENHAM, Mass. – D. Michael Lindsay thought he was on safe political ground when he signed the letter.
President Barack Obama was about to expand job protection for gays employed by federal contractors. Under the proposed changes, faith-based charities with federal grants worried they could lose the right to hire and fire according to their religious beliefs. Religious leaders flooded the White House with pleas to maintain or broaden the exemption.
Among them was one endorsed by Lindsay, president of Gordon College, a small evangelical school, and 13 evangelical and Roman Catholic leaders.
In the end, Obama left the existing exemption in place. But it was no victory for Lindsay.
His stand last July came at a cost – to him and the school – that he never anticipated: broken relationships with nearby cities, the loss of a key backer for a federal grant, a review by the regional college accrediting agency, and campus protest and alumni pushback over whether the school should maintain its ban on “homosexual practice” as part of its life and conduct standards.