Congressman calls for students to get off the couch
Jonathan Coelho, Assistant Editor
North Greenville University was paid a visit from a member of The United States Congress on
Monday, September 22, 2014 as Congressman Trey Gowdy stopped by to speak to NGU’s
students.
The Congressman from the fourth district of South Carolina was named as the Chairman of the “House Select Committee on the Events Surrounding the 2012 Terrorists Attack in Benghazi,” in May of 2014. Representative Gowdy also serves on the House Committees on Ethics, Oversight and Government Reform, and Judiciary, where he also serves as Chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security, according to his website.
Photo Courtesy of Student Services
Congressman Trey Gowdy speaks to students at NGU in a recent chapel service about getting active in politics.
When asked about what college students should be doing to be more politically active, Gowdy encouraged college students to continue fighting as the percentage of voters of the college age is declining according to the census.gov.
“For college kids, just get over the apathy. Most college kids say, well that has nothing to do with me and my vote doesn’t make any difference and my perspective doesn’t make any difference so I’m going to go watch the Simpsons or whatever young people do and stay out of politics.”
When asked how Christians should deal with the seeming decline of religious freedom the
Congressman responded, “Be really grateful that you are in a country where you can even have that debate because a lot of people do not, so you should thank God for the circumstances of your birth whether you were born here or came over here.”
Gowdy suggested that students education themselves about religious liberty. “When you say religious liberty nobody believes that you should have the right to deny medical treatment to your children even though there is a religious group that believes that. Nobody believes that you have the right to smoke marijuana even though there is a religious group that says you should be able to do that. So you have to understand the issue of religious liberty enough to know there is a difference between what your belief is and what your conduct is and this interplay between the role of the state and the role of religion,” he said.
Finally, Gowdy called upon the church to step up and assume the call of Christ
and go out and make a difference saying, “Here is what we really need to be concerned about not politics and not Congress. The role of the church is diminishing in our culture,” said
Gowdy. “That is what we really should be concerned about. I hear preachers
talking about Congress a whole lot more than I hear members of Congress talk about preachers.”
“If ministers would do what they were called to do that would be great,” said the Congressman “because frankly, young people are tuning out of church just as much as they are tuning out of politics.”
