Oh, wow! The silly p*****g contest among Duke Divinity School faculty members reported by the Raleigh News & Observer today reminds me of the contests for power and position that happen in our nation’s capitol.

Except, in the latter instance the contests really matter, and the consequences of who wins  have serious and even lethal and literally destructive consequences; while in the former instance, i.e., in the case of theologians and biblical scholars calling one another time wasters, racists, and ad hominem debaters, the consequences by comparison seem not to matter at all. Indeed the e-mail mudslinging that has gone on at the Div School for several months now among some of the PhD’s there seems more like the behavior of children determined to prove whose is longer or bigger.

I mean what have we got here…at Duke Div, I mean? In the one corner we have a widely published and fairly famous — famous among theological academics, at least — 61-year-old male full professor of Catholic doctrine resenting that he and all other faculty members, I gather, are expected by school administrators to spend two full days attending “racial equity training.” So he emails his faculty colleagues, urging them not to attend. “Don’t lay waste your time,” he says according to the newspaper. The event will be, “I predict with confidence, intellectually flaccid.” Horrors!

In the other corner for the aforementioned “p*****g contest” is a tag team consisting of two women who appear from their photos to be considerably younger than the cranky, old Catholic guy. One of the two is an associate professor of Old Testament (Why do they say that? The truths of the Hebrew Bible aren’t “old” by any means, and certainly not in the sense that they have had to be expanded, enhanced, or replaced by something “new” as in New Testament. But that’s a beef for another day.)

The other “young” woman is, in fact, the dean of the Div School, the paper says. Don’t know whether she’s also “faculty” or even a PhD, but I bet she’s both.

In any case, both women enter the contest with powerful streams of words. The associate Bible prof starts out the whole thing by asserting — at the time the faculty were “invited” — that “those who have participated in the (racial equity) training have described it as transformative, powerful, and life-changing.” (Italics mine.)

Whoa! Can’t you just see the older, longer-lived, longer-experienced Catholic theology guy almost gagging? And, no surprise here, he rises to the occasion and lets her have it with his own blast. He concludes his “waste of time” response to her, which he writes the same day, sending copies to all of his faculty colleagues, by predicting the event will include “bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs in plenty,” and then says, “When (if) it gets beyond that, its illiberal roots and totalitarian tendencies will show. Events of this sort are definitively anti-intellectual.”

“That’s when the trouble escalated,” Jane Stancill, the reporter who wrote this morning’s News & Observer article, says. The also youngish-looking woman dean tags in and lets the crusty, old theology teacher have it right between the eyes. She doesn’t mention his name specifically, we’re told, but, hey, when she mass emails the same faculty “within hours” who wouldn’t know, huh? And she says, “It is inappropriate and unprofessional to use mass emails (Italics mine, again) to make disparaging statements — including arguments ad hominem — in order to humiliate or undermine individual colleagues or groups of colleagues with whom we disagree.”

And she goes on: “The use of mass emails (Mine again) to express racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry is offensive and unacceptable, especially in a Christian institution (And yet again).”

Gaaaak! And double gaaaak! I’m not sure who’s won this contest. The crusty old guy hasn’t, certainly. The paper says he’s now resigned, effective next year (the beginning of the next academic year in the fall, I presume). But I think maybe the two young women tag team and the Div School itself have also not won. The “Old” Testament associate professor may well have come across to some (like me?) as a bit Pollyanna and peaches and cream-ish. I mean, “transformative, powerful, and life-changing?”

Give me a break! Racism and sexism and all the other stuff doesn’t get gone that easily. Maybe the crusty old Catholic theology guy had a point. One would also think that seminary faculty these days would come into their jobs with those particular short-comings fairly well under control. If they haven’t, the process of hiring seminary faculty hasn’t worked.

Which would be the dean’s fault, right? Which brings me back to her. Since when do you use mass emails to criticize someone for using mass emails? And why is bigotry offensive and unacceptable “especially in a Christian institution?” Isn’t it that everywhere? That we should define Christian institutions as places where people engage less in sinful activities suggests why the church simply isn’t relevant to much of anything anymore.

The church isn’t, I’m afraid. But Washington surely is. Which circles me all the way back to where I began. Thanks, as always, for listening.