Sunday, April 23, 2006 | 7:26 a.m.
As the university system regents last month debated a proposed campus ban on rap music that promotes violence, a UNR student offered an additional suggestion.
Why not also ban street preachers who harangue homosexuals?
The point graduate student Erick Dubuque made: Evangelical preachers who frequent UNLV and UNR's campuses often push a message that borders on hate speech, which he said violated the university's anti-discrimination policy.
That kind of speech can incite violence too, said Dubuque, who two days earlier had organized a counterprotest to challenge the preachers' teachings.
In the end, Nevada System of Higher Education lawyers told regents they couldn't legally ban rap acts from campus. Nor could they ban preachers, who have the right to free speech.
As Dubuque noted, however, many people on campus find the preachers offensive as they scream at students that they are going to hell. Even many fellow Christians cringe at their methods.
Which begs the question: Is there a right way and a wrong way to share one's faith?
The answer, say campus religious leaders and national experts on Christian ethics, is yes. There is an ethical code to evangelism. And most agree that the street preachers often cross the line.
Evangelists who frequent university campuses in Nevada and across the nation range in age, denomination and intensity. Some, such as the local Beth Yeshua Messianic Congregation, just politely hand out pamphlets students can accept or reject. Others, such as Greg Stephens, a high school and college minister for Calvary Chapel Spring Valley, shout at students.
The more intense, controversial preachers are the traveling evangelists who come to campus with large banners and doomsday messages aimed at persuading students to change their wicked ways or chance the fires of hell.
Many have been giving open-air sermons for so long, students know them by nicknames such as "Bible Jim" Webber or "Brother Jed" Smock. There are also Ruben Israel and Tom Griner, who lives in Nevada and spends significant time at both UNR and UNLV.
What these traveling preachers, and to a degree Stephens, have in common is that they all practice "confrontational evangelism." The goal is to confront students with their shortcomings or sins and then share the Gospel message, the preachers say.
"Humanity's problem is sin, and until they are convinced that they have this sin problem which is deadly, they are not going to look for a solution," Smock, 63, said.
"That's the weakness of modern evangelism, when churches don't address the sin issue or teach repentance. We teach that Jesus saves, but saves from what? Most students aren't convinced they need saving."
Preachers use jokes, cultural references and sometimes even pick an argument with students to draw crowds. How confrontational they are depends on the preacher.
Griner and Stephens still hit on sin, but they say they are gentler and more conversational.
"If people don't see the love of God in your eyes or hear the love of God in your voice they are going to be unlikely to listen to your message," Stephens, 30, said.
Smock is more aggressive. Often, if a woman brags about sexual escapades or a guy talks about all the beer he drank the night before, Smock said, he will call her a whore or him a drunkard.
Smock met his wife while preaching on a college campus, and his first words to her were, "Repent of your sins, you wicked woman."
Israel, 43, is the most extreme in his preaching, earning the title "eccentric" from even his fellow street preachers. He recently made national news for protesting the White House for allowing families with gay parents to participate in the annual Easter Egg Roll.
Last month, he was protesting the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints conference in Utah and waving LDS undergarments at people as they entered, telling them their religion was a cult.
The preachers said they tend to harp on homosexuality, but they also preach against promiscuous sex and other sins because they believe sin separates people from God. To them, sharing that message is the most loving thing they can do to help spare a person from hell.
"Students have been brainwashed with a culture of political correctness and tolerance," said Griner, 56, who recently moved from Las Vegas to Reno. "We warn them, and they call it hate speech. If you don't agree with everything that they believe, they call you intolerant."
For all of the preachers, their driving principle is obedience to God and a desire for everyone to hear his message.
"If what we are saying is true, it's the greatest message on the planet," Griner said. "If it's not true, we above all people should be pitied for our foolishness."
The preachers said they know their message is unpopular and likely to turn people off from Christianity. But they believe it's a method of preaching God has called them to, and one that dates to Jesus, John the Baptist and the prophets of ancient Israel.
"It's more like the Rodney Dangerfield of Christianity," Israel said. "We get no respect. But it is a vital job."
It's not the open-air preaching that Christians and people of other faiths question per se, it's the way the preachers go about it.
"Gentleness and respect are key ingredients missing in these preachers' message and demeanor," said Michael Nalley, a staff director with UNLV's InterVarsity Rebel Christian Fellowship. "They exhibit bad behavior more akin to what might be seen on a Jerry Springer show than what I see in the character of Christ and his Apostles."
Eighteen religious leaders and Christian ethicists interviewed by the Sun agreed that, in general, ends do not justify all means. Some groups, including the national campus organization InterVarsity, have developed codes of ethics for how to share one's faith.
Christian ethicists Joe E. Trull and James E. Carter say they place limits on evangelism in their ethics code for ministers. Trull is the editor of the journal Christian Ethics Today, and he and Carter have written two books on ethics for ministers.
Religious leaders across the board agree that one's faith must be shared in a way that respects the value and unique personality of the individual. People should also share their faith without disparaging other religions or trying to convert members of other denominations.
Other evangelism "thou shall nots," offered by nationally known evangelist Tony Campolo, include:
Campolo understands the sense of urgency many street preachers feel to share their faith. "It is as though they are on the Titanic and the ship is going down, and in their desperation they need to shout and scream to whomever will listen and say save themselves."
But in the end, their often-hostile manner and focus on sin over grace drive people away, said Campolo, who teachers sociology at Eastern University, a private Baptist college in Pennsylvania.
"Jesus came into the world not to condemn the world, but to save the world," Campolo said. "When we come with condemnation, we are not coming with good news about Jesus but laying the bad news on people."
Jesus made a point of hanging out with sinners without ever treating them that way, Trull and other religious leaders said.
"When they say, 'God hates gays,' I say, 'Show me, prove it to me,' " Trull said. "All I can find is that Jesus loves sinners. Jesus was a friend of sinners It's one thing to say I believe this certain lifestyle is not best or doesn't please God, but if you turn it into hate language, that is wrong."
For the most part, the street preachers tend to do more harm than good, religious leaders said. Today's college students don't react well to "fire and brimstone" messages, said Randall Birk, director of Protestant Campus Ministry at UNLV.
"It kind of sets us back at certain times, because we make strides, the Catholics make strides, and then all of a sudden Christianity is kicked backward," Birk said.
Most local religious leaders, including Jewish, Muslim and B'Hai, said the best way to share one's faith is by developing friendships and engaging in conversations that are mutually respectful. Muslims and B'Hai followers both have a mandate to share their beliefs, but Jews don't proselytize.
As a sociologist, Campolo often polls his church audiences to find out how they came to be Christians. The vast majority always say it is because someone they knew told them about how faith made a difference in his or her life.
But the best way to share one's faith is "through your actions," said David Zeamer, associate director of UNLV's Catholic Newman Center. Several ministers took a page from St. Francis of Assisi, who established the Franciscan order in the early 13th century.
"Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary, use words."
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