Mass. School Alumni Seek to Block Gift of Campus to Liberty U.
March 7, 2012 | Read Time: 1 minute
Graduates of a Massachusetts prep school are attempting to prevent the donation of the school’s former campus to Liberty University, the private Virginia college founded by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell, reports the Religion News Service.
In a petition sent March 5 to trustees of the Northfield Mount Hermon School in Gill, Mass., more than 570 alumni branded Liberty a “homophobic and intellectually narrow institution” whose presence on the campus would be “fundamentally incompatible” with the prep school’s principles.
The Greens, a billionaire Oklahoma City family that has supported Christian higher education, purchased the 217-acre, 43-building property in 2009 and made $5-million in improvements with the intention of giving it to a faith-affiliated institution. Northfield Mount Hermon now operates on a separate campus nearby.
Liberty, bases in Lynchburg, Va., has emerged from among about a dozen applicants as a leading contender for the gift. University President Jerry Falwell Jr. said the university wants to open a satellite campus, not proselytize in largely secular northwestern Massachusetts.
