ARPTalk, the blog written by ARP Pastor Chuck Wilson, reported over the weekend that Professor Bill Crenshaw has been suspended for the fall semester and that his college email account has been taken down.

An email exchange this morning with Cliff Smith, Communications Director at the College revealed very little. Smith wrote:

Don,
I’ll have to give you the same answer I’ve given others. This is a personnel matter and we are not at liberty to discuss it at this time.

Here are the facts I can share with you. Dr. Crenshaw is not teaching this fall. Dr. Christie, dean of the college, has made the necessary arrangements for covering scheduled classes.

At this point, that is all I can say. Dr. Norman is not available for interview on this matter at this time.

Thanks for your interest in Erskine.

A separate email to Dr. Norman, President of the College, went unanswered. A separate email to Dr. Brad Christie, Interim VP and Dean of the College was unanswered and his campus phone mail box was full and could not hold any further messages. Clearly there will be no official word out of the college for some time.

Similar attempts to reach Crenshaw were unsuccessful, although his home phone voice mail did record our message.

The college website has not yet published the class schedule for the fall semester, which would seem highly unusual since classes started on August 31.

Wilson’s assumptions are that that disciplinary action has been started against Crenshaw, who has been an outspoken and public critic of the ARP denomination as well as faculty and administrators at the college who do not share his negative views about the religious connections of the school. The Aqulia Report has carried a number of stories about Crenshaw in the past, including an astounding one this past March directly against President Norman.

If the matter is indeed one of discipline, then the lack of official information makes sense and, thus, gives some credence to Wilson’s assumption. Chuck Wilson, himself a former member of the Erskine Board of Trustees, is still well connected with sources on the board. You can read his entire post here.

Several leaders of the denomination were also contacted this morning. Current Moderator, Andy Putnam, is pointing all questions back to the school. One former commissioner closely involved in studying Erskine on behalf of the denomination last year responded to the did respond, saying,

“If the story is true, it is symbolically important, but strategically minor. Crenshaw was never the problem; he was a symptom. Crenshaw was never the target; the culture of barely-moralistic deism was the target. The danger for the denomination and those on the board committed to a faithful Erskine is that this event causes everyone to declare victory and go home. No, this is a nice trophy for the first hole of the round, but there are seventeen more holes to be played.”

We will update this story as new facts become available.