I began to realise that I didn't qualify as a Christian in the CICCU sense of the word at all - I have sex...I drink (often in excess); and I purposefully try to avoid making my theism a big part of my life. If I was ever going to fit in at CICCU, I'd have to make a lot of uncomfortable life changes.

This suggests that the CICCU is promoting an errant or eccentric version of Christianity. But any careful reader of the New Testament cannot fail to notice that Christian believers are clearly commanded to make their theism 'a big part of their life'. See for example the 'greatest' commandment to God's people articulated by Jesus in Mark 12v30: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength' (NIV). You can't get more 'purposeful' about your theism than that.

The New Testament also commands Christians to avoid drunkenness (eg Ephesians 5v18) and to refrain from sexual activity outside of heterosexual marriage (eg 1 Corinthians 6v18-20 and 7v8-9).

It is therefore clear that Miss Airey's disagreement is with historic Christianity as a world-view and as a moral way of life, not merely with the public teaching of the CICCU, which as a matter of intellectual rigour and honesty she ought to have acknowledged.

Miss Airey then goes on to assert:

Even if I were willing to make concessions and embrace life as a 'born again' Christian, I realised there was one thing I fundamentally disagreed with. CICCU pride themselves on not being exclusive - they encourage anyone and everyone to come along to their events. But there's a catch - once you've been lured in you're encouraged to make your friendship circle as Christian as possible, to maintain links with the damned only so you could try to save them, spam them with the good news and drag them along to talks specifically designed to convert non-believers.

It is up to the CICCU leadership to refute the allegation that members of college Christian unions are being encouraged to relate to non-Christians solely with evangelistic intent. Whilst the New Testament teaches the central importance of evangelism, it does not support the exclusive relational focus that Miss Airey attributes to CICCU members in her social circle. The 'second greatest' commandment as articulated by Jesus in Mark 12v31 - 'Love your neighbour as yourself' - necessitates a range of social interactions with non-believers for altruistic purposes.

In her attack on biblical Christianity as upheld by the CICCU Miss Airey is certainly engaging in a fashionable pursuit. She has earned herself enthusiastic plaudits in the comments below her Tab article and on Twitter. But, despite the popularity of Miss Airey's spiritual and moral presuppositions, ignoring the central text of the Christian faith in her critique of the CICCU is not good journalism.

Would Dundee police have moved so fast over a cannabis complaint? was the question your curate raised in a comment under this article about Tony Miano's arrest on the secular free speech site Spiked Online.

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