This Letter to the Editor was written in response to columnist Samuel Krueger’s column, Evangelicals aren’t lost, published in the Oct. 18, 2017 issue of The Clarion.  If you would like to submit a response or an opinion piece of your own, please contact [email protected].

By Ashwani Chumber

I do not believe it is right to let Samuel Krueger write a response to a response if the new rule is that doing so is not allowed. Also, if he is allowed to do so, it doesn’t make sense to stop Kailyn Hill from responding to what he just wrote.

Krueger’s article, in all honesty, was poorly written with the reason being that each point seemed like a shot at the points made in the response to his Sept. 14 column written by Hill. Rather than this being a piece about how Evangelicals aren’t lost, it seems to be one petty reach to have the upper hand in this issue.

Why put a rule in place if each member of the team will not be held up to that standard? Why let Krueger write a response to a response and then not allow Hill to do the same? It’s her first amendment right to be able to do so. Why let him express his right but hold her back from doing the same?

I think The Clarion made a mistake in allowing this piece to be published, because it doesn’t give the editor or the Clarion a good name. Controversy isn’t a bad thing, but allowing a passive-aggressive attack on Hill to be published is.  I think the editor is very capable of knowing what should be published and what shouldn’t, and this article falls into the latter category.

I would encourage The Clarion to reevaluate the rules put in place and how to enforce them fairly for everyone. If the rules are different for contributing writers versus staff columnists, then what’s the point? No one is going to want to contribute to a biased paper.

Hill began her article with the words “Although Samuel Krueger’s article in the Sept. 14 issue was written with good intentions, we must honor the Bible and the expectations set for us by God.” The points that Hill made in her article were not passive-aggressive attacks about what Krueger had said. What Jesus said is not up for debate. It is clear what Christ calls us to do and how he wants us to act. Hill wrote that if we are to follow Christ, we must love our neighbors rather than bar them out. Krueger seems to have missed the points that she made or he seems to have taken it personally. Either way, this isn’t an article that should have come out.