If classical Christian education is to survive, it has to reject the foolishness of our age and embrace Christ’s way alone. Christ’s church favors neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free…We are Christ’s. We are classical. Those who want to be loved by the spirit of our age will become intoxicated by it, and slowly die of its poison.

It’s been a good year for classical Christian education. New school starts are up threefold, a book on classical education became No. 1 on The New York Times bestseller list, and on Jan. 26, Fox Nation will release season two of a popular series on classical Christian education, “The Miseducation of America.” Of course, with growth comes attention. What is unusual this time is that someone with ties to our movement — one of our own — draws focus to a growing divide.
On Jan. 12, in the online journal Current, Jessica Hooten Wilson asked, “Is White Supremacy a Bug or a Feature of Classical Christian Education?” It should come as no surprise that, within her mainstream academic ecosphere as a scholar at Pepperdine University, she gets pressure. “I experience regular pushback from those who perceive [classical Christian education] as white, Western-only, and male-dominated.” Her thesis is: “If the classical Christian school movement is to survive — let alone flourish — we must oppose all forms of racism and misogyny and stand with the beauty, goodness, and truth that we hold up for our students.” I’ll take her up on that charge.
Hooten Wilson is a staccato note at the end of a new tune within our circles. Her article praises those groups she believes are taking the right steps. So far, I’ve heard no one publicly state the thesis so clearly as she does: “We should peruse the authors of the works and, if applicable, the editors or introductory writers to ensure an assortment of voices … as well as an equality of both sexes. If we look at the table of contents of a textbook or a reading list for a semester and find not a single woman or person of color in that list, then that curriculum is misrepresenting the classical Christian tradition.”
Choosing the Classical Canon
For the better part of three millennia, philosophical, theological, and literary authors labored to create the classical canon, representing countless cultural influences. Over much of this same time period, learned scholars have made lists of those that deserve “canon” status. It is unclear if there are minorities or women in Cassiodorus’ list of authors (400 A.D.), or Leonardo Bruni or Battista Guarino’s lists (humanists from the 1400s) — they don’t use those categories. Mortimer Adler and his team of about 40 renowned scholars chose the most widely recognized list of books in our time based upon their contribution to “the great conversation.” Adler’s merit-based criteria required a work to have changed the course of history and to have developed the collective Western mind. What Adler’s team did not do is look to race or sex as criteria.
The Western classical tradition has long included people of every race and sex in a particular way: The tradition deals with a body of texts that address the universal truths about the human condition, rising above our culture’s current quest to silo everyone into an intersection of identity.
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Hard conversations are not easy and certainly take thoughtful consideration to be meaningful and effective. Understanding the art and science of having hard conversations begins with the conviction and motivation to have it in the first place.

One of the most common crossroads I encounter when counseling those dealing with anticipating a hard conversation is helping them “want to want” to have the conversation. Of course, I empathize—you would have to be spiritually masochistic to enjoy the possibility of an uncomfortable conversation. Hard conversations range the spectrum from awkward moments to unwelcomed confrontations. However, there is a crossroad of conviction that we must navigate to compel ourselves to pursue something unlovely with genuine love.[1] Let’s consider a few of the compelling reasons and practical considerations for having the hard conversation.
1. We Have a Responsibility to One Another (1 Cor. 12:16; Heb. 3:12-14)
A foundational motivation towards having a hard conversation is a sincere concern about the wellbeing of our brothers and sisters in Christ. The belonging we share in Christ compels our love to move towards those in need of insight or care. These moments are not always welcomed or easy. The difference between immaturity and immorality can be difficult to discern in understanding people and their problems. The motivation to move toward one another is a familial-based motivation moving beyond friendship and collegial niceties. Belonging that is mutually dependent and interrelated is the blessing of the redeemed household of God.
2. We Have the Ability to Live in the Truth (Col. 3:1-4, 16-17; Rom. 12:1-3)
The defining characteristic of the transformational work of the gospel is our ability to live in the truth. Our hearts are prone to deception because of our sin, but the renewing of our minds, according to the Word and the Spirt, brings the capacity to both understand and live in the truth. The recognition of reality is a sobering task, but the gospel reframes and always gives pathways with eternal hope. Living in the truth of the gospel (as applied to the realities of the human experience) does not remove the harsh realities of life. Still, it does categorically and practically give perspective and pathways to living rightly with confidence and hope. Having a hard conversation is not simply addressing hardships but pursuing hope and help to live rightly in the truth.
3. We Have a Calling of Gospel Witness (1 John 4:11-12; John 13:35)
How we live matters. The truth of Scripture is visible not only in the pages of God’s Word but in the actions of our lives. Pursuing one another through the challenges of hard conversations to live rightly before God and others is counter-cultural. When the church displays unity within an immense diversity of cultures, personalities, and life experiences, it proclaims the transforming work of our reconciliation with God and one another. Moving towards one another through hard conversations is motivated not primarily by interpersonal health but the testimony of the gospel.
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Luther famously had his Ninety-Five Theses. While not having quite as many, Wycliffe had his own theses (that is, arguments) against the church. One thesis declares, “There is one universal church, and outside of it there is no salvation. Its head is Christ. No pope may say that he is the head.” For this and other ideas, Pope Gregory XI condemned Wycliffe. But Wycliffe had friends in high places, and his condemnation had little effect. The mother of the boy king Richard II favored Wycliffe, as did John of Gaunt, the young king’s uncle, who wielded significant influence. These supporters swayed Parliament against the pope and for Wycliffe. At Oxford, the students and faculty rallied to his support.

He had been dead and buried for a few decades, but the church wanted to make a point. His remains were exhumed and burned, a fitting end for the “heretic” John Wycliffe. Wycliffe once explained what the letters in the title CARDINAL really mean: “Captain of the Apostates of the Realm of the Devil, Impudent and Nefarious Ally of Lucifer.” And with that, Wycliffe was only getting started.
Wycliffe rejected the doctrine of transubstantiation, which states that the elements of the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper become the actual body and blood of Christ. He was against priestly absolution, he spoke out against indulgences, and he denied the doctrine of purgatory. He rejected papal authority. Instead, he asserted that Christ is the head of the church. And he had a profound belief in the inerrancy and absolute authority of Scripture. He fully believed that the church of his day had lost its way. Scripture alone provided the only way back. Now we see why the medieval Roman Church wanted to make a statement against Wycliffe.
John Wycliffe has often been called “the Morning Star of the Reformation.” Jan Hus, another pre-Reformation reformer, felt obliged to express his supreme debt to Wycliffe. And though he lived long after Wycliffe’s death, Martin Luther, too, felt an obligation to recognize the pioneering reforms of John Wycliffe. Luther stood on the shoulders of Hus, who stood on the shoulders of Wycliffe. Hus, Luther, and the other Reformers were indebted to him. So are we. Wycliffe was indeed “the Morning Star of the Reformation.”
The term morning star has been used alternately to refer to either the star Sirius or the planet Venus. It appears brightest in the predawn, the time when darkness still dominates, but also the time of promise—the time of the promise of the dawn and the rising sun. So John Wycliffe is situated historically between the darkness and the morning light.
John Wycliffe was born around 1330 and died on December 30, 1384. His century was one of growing disillusionment with the medieval Roman church. There was disillusionment with the church hierarchy and also with the church’s piety (or lack thereof). These were times of unrest. The long reign of the night, of the darkness, had taken its toll, especially on the laity. They bore the brunt of a wayward church. And perhaps none was more acutely aware of this than John Wycliffe.
Wycliffe’s Studies
Oxford University became Wycliffe’s home in 1346, during his teen years. As soon as Wycliffe arrived at Oxford, he witnessed all the pomp and circumstance of convocation, which included a Mass in honor of the royal family and the scholars at Oxford. Wycliffe then settled into the academic routines of attending lectures and disputations. Wycliffe would sit under and be profoundly influenced by the theologian Thomas Bradwardine and the philosopher William of Ockham. He studied broadly, learning science and mathematics; law and history; and, of course, philosophy. At Oxford, Wycliffe soon moved from the rank of student to that of scholar, later becoming master at Balliol College. Wycliffe’s first writings would be in the field of philosophy.
Biblical studies, and later theology, however, captured his attention and piqued his interest the most. Wycliffe qualified as a doctor of theology, allowing him to lecture on the subject.
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