Talk:Mercer University
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[edit] Baptist Affiliation
Mercer's Baptist affiliation or lack thereof can be confusing. Mercer was affiliated with the Georgia Baptist Convention (and the Southern Baptist Convention; the GBC is part of the SBC) until 2006. Mercer is now independent; formal ties with the GBC no longer exist. Mercer however, remains affiliated with a large number of individual Baptist churches in Georgia who support the university's Baptist Scholars Fund that provides scholarships for Baptist students. In addition, Mercer's McAfee School of Theology is affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. The CBF provides financial support for operating costs, scholarships, etc. Also, the American Baptist Historical Society and the Baptist History and Heritage Society have announced plans, in 2006 and 2007 respectively, to relocate to the Atlanta campus.
Bottomline: Mercer is independent, but is not "unaffiliated" with Baptists. Mercer is affiliated at various levels with various groups. In order to prevent confusion, it is probably best to say that Mercer as a whole is "independent" without mentioning affiliations unless reference is also made to which part of of the university is being discussed.
Future: Mercer's president, William D. Underwood, has announced a desire to make Mercer the first "national" Baptist university much like Notre Dame University and Brigham Young University are for their religious groups. "National" refers to Mercer as a large Baptist university without ties to a "state" Baptist convention. Mercer's goal contrasts with other historically Baptist universities such as Wake Forest University, Furman University, and the University of Richmond that became secular after severing ties with their state conventions, and with Baylor University and Samford University that remain affiliated with the Baptist conventions in their states.
[edit] Candle Lighting
The candle lighting is at the end of freshman orientation. It has become a Mercer tradition where all incoming freshman make a circle on the Quad and light the candles, signifing the start of their journey at Mercer.
~No longer done - at least not this year, although the Freshmen do go up and sign the tower of the administration building.
[edit] Comparable Schools
I removed the Comparable Schools section, as it is uncommon (and inappropriate) to list such subjective comparisons in an objective article on Wikipedia. Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view Krazos 23:55, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
[edit] SGA website Link
Why was the link to the SGA website removed? The site is the offical site for SGA and useful to people looking for information about Mercer.
