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I don't even know why I'm writing this.  It's not that big of a deal, I had a long talk about it yesterday, just dealt with it this morning, and most of you probably can't even relate, but here it is anyway:

Why are students so compelled to cheat?  It doesn't get them anywhere.  They still fail their tests (unless the find a hidden way to cheat on that too).  Worse, why is it often the students who make plays on your sympathy, their personal struggle with the subject, the ones you give extra opportunities to gain credit to, why is it those students who cheat?  Do they not recognize extra grace when they see it, so they are compelled to abuse it?  Still, they won't earn a degree.  So why pay for it?  When they get a job, it will be clear that "college degree" means nothing in their case (except maybe for a politician).  Cheating's not even usually easy.  It's often harder than actually studying, at least if you want to do it in such a way as to not get caught.  Then again, maybe we don't catch the cheaters who put that much work into it, and they're just learning a "different" set of skills in the process of attaining a college degree.  What's worst of all, why an ORU student?  Seriously, the honor code is about as explicit as possible against dishonest work.  Now, I know many don't follow it to the letter, but that rule at least doesn't seem to be morally irrelevant.

In the end, I guess I say, whatever; we'll probably never run out of cheaters in the world, the Christian bubble of a world or outside it.

Well, I was leaving class today, pulling out by the Mabee Center, and this big white SUV was flying by really fast, going a little crazy and definitely taking up too much of the road (i.e. in the middle of the road, in both lanes).  Anytime I see crazy drivers like this, I always check to see who they are, you know, just so I can start profiling bad drivers...  slow ones are usually old, on their cell phone, or 30-something mothers, etc.  Really fast ones that are a little crazy are often teenage girls, college-looking guys, or occasionally middle-aged business men in their mid-life car (though they usually stay within the lines pretty well).

Anyway, so I check this guy out, and it's none other than:  Richard Roberts!  Going crazy in his own parking lot.  Now, at first you think it's kinda funny, but then you think, "wait a second, I bet he'd never get a ticket for that either, although I did one time (for going over 15 mph in their parking lot)."  Then I think to myself, "there's probably a lot of rules he doesn't follow."  For one, I don't know where it started so I'm not sure it's fact, but it seems pretty well known that the Roberts' are a big fan of good wine.  So am I, so I don't blame them for that simple fact, I'd almost honor it, if it weren't for the fact that their Honor Code, the one they make every student and every faculty member sign and pledge to adhere to, condemns any and all acohol drinks.  Personally, I got out of that this most recent signing (to become adjunct faculty) because they e-mailed the honor code to me in a rewriteable word document form, so I took out the word "NOT" from the sentence, "I pledge that I WILL NOT drink alcoholic beverages of any kind", printed it, signed it, and turned it in to the appropriate department. 

Anyway, if the rumor of the Roberts' and their wine is true, then why have everyone sign it?  Maybe they don't want it on campus... OK, be more specific.  Maybe they're like the parent who assumes they're wiser at making smart decisions with alcohol.  Surely they can't assume they're wiser than their entire faculty, whom they require to sign the same Honor Code as the students.  If they believe there's a dividing line (which they should), then they should make more effort at defining it rather than putting up a sham, a façade, as if alcohol had nothing or could have nothing to do with Christianity. 

Anyway, what if the rumors are wrong?  P. Rob. shouldn't be speeding through parking lots in a big massive SUV.  He could've hit a pedestrian student or something... he was flying around a corner, over the parking lot speed limit, taking up both lanes.  So what puts him above his own rules?  If it's ok to drive like that, he should notify the security so I wouldn't have gotten a speeding ticket from them when I was driving fast with a wide range of visibility on both sides.

Now, if it was some other charismatic figure, I wouldn't even ask this question.  Too many of them are real hypocrites and I've already written many off.  "Don't judge" and all that, I know; that's why I don't ask questions about many of them; I just decide they have nothing to do with me or anything I want to be in any way involved in.  But, I think P. Rob's different.  In my understanding, much of what he does is good, if somewhat misguided, surely honest.  A bit like W. Bush possibly.  So where do all these leaders get ideas that they should impose rules but not follow them?  My principle at the high school last year was definitely like that.  He repeatedly warned students not to cuss on the intercom, yet in several office visits I had with him and students, he cussed "to make a point".  The only point he made was that the neither did students have to refrain from cussing, or more than that, listen to anything he said about the rules.  It definitely bit him in the butt, whether he's figured it out by now or not, I don't know.

Anyway, the few good examples we have are that "Jesus was tempted at all points as we are".  If anyone should be above the rules, it'd be him.  But he followed his own to the "T".  The Bible even says, "teachers will be judged more harshly".  So where does the idea that rules can be given by someone, and expect compliance of all they're given to, but not followed by that person themself?