WACO, Texas (ABP) — John Lilley has kept his distance from the ideological battle that has divided Baylor University's constituents into two camps. That distance — 2004 miles to be exact — and Lilley's reputation as a reconciler may be his most valuable assets as he takes the reins of the largest Baptist university.
Baylor's regents surprised many people Nov. 3 by electing Lilley, president of the University of Nevada at Reno, to be the 13th president of the 14,000-student school in Waco, Texas.
Even more surprising perhaps than the unanimity of the vote — both in the search committee and the board of regents — is the fact Lilley is a committed Baylor alum who has not taken sides in the two-plus-year debate that led to the resignation of former president Robert Sloan earlier this year.
The regents, faculty, alumni and students have been divided over Sloan's leadership and particularly the proper balance between vital faith and rigorous academics in a Christian university.
Lilley “is unfettered in leading Baylor to move forward,” said Bill Brian, chair of the search committee. “The fact his assignments have kept him at some distance from the issues that have divided Baylor” is a plus, Brian said.
Regents chair Will Davis of Austin characterized the unanimity surrounding Lilley's selection as “remarkable.” Lilley, who has three degrees from Baylor, is “a consensus builder” who impressed the regents with his “collaborative approach” to leadership and love for Baylor, Davis said.
“He doesn't have a dog in this fight,” insisted David Malone, president of the Baylor Alumni Association, which in January awarded Lilley its Distinguished Alumni Award. He is “the right president for Baylor at this time,” Malone said. “He was able to come in and win the trust of every person on the presidential and advisory search committees.”
Lilley described Baylor as “the crown jewel of Texas Baptists” and said maintaining a strong relationship with the Baptist General Convention of Texas is essential. “I will do everything I can to strengthen that relationship.”
Charles Wade, BGCT executive director, called Lilley's election an answer to prayer. “I believe this signals that the prayers that have been offered for Baylor through this difficult process have been answered, and the future is as bright as it as has ever been for Baylor.”
Lilley takes office Jan. 2. Sloan became university chancellor June 1.
Lilley became president of the University of Nevada at Reno in 2001 after 21 years leading Penn State Erie. He also was assistant dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Kansas State University.
The son of a Louisiana Baptist pastor, Lilley is a licensed Baptist minister who served as a minister of music during his student years. More recently he has been an ordained ruling elder in Presbyterian churches. But he noted, “I was raised a Baptist and always have been a Baptist.” He said he plans to rejoin First Baptist Church in Waco, where he was a member in college.
Stan Allcorn, a regent and pastor in Abilene, insisted Lilley's involvement in the Presbyterian Church was not an issue. “He sounds like he could have been Herschel Hobbs' next door neighbor,” he said, referring to the renowned pastor-theologian who chaired the committee that drafted the pivotal 1963 “Baptist Faith & Message.”
At 66 years old, Lilley will be seen by some as a transitional president who can bring healing without committing the university to ambitious long-term changes.
Lilley said he will build consensus toward fulfilling Baylor 2012, the school's 10-year vision to become a “top-tier” university with a distinctively Christian character.
Taking the Baylor presidency at this late point in his career is something he said he would do “only for Baylor.”
The president-elect showed emotion when he recalled leaving a small-town Louisiana Baptist pastor's home for the “transformative experience” of studying at Baylor in the late 1950s. “To be president of a place where you can give full expression to your faith, where its naturalness is unleashed, already it is a great joy.”
Properly balancing faith and learning has been one of the key flash points in the controversy over Baylor 2012, pitting faculty members against each other, with long-term teachers who excelled in the classroom against newly hired scholars whose emphasis is on research.
Excelling in academics and holding fast to Baylor's reputation as a Christian university in the Baptist tradition will require “balance and touch,” Lilley said. And it means recognizing constituents within the Baylor community will disagree, “as Baptists do,” he added.
Noting he has studied Baylor 2012, Lilley said, “Its fundamental premise is that Christian universities in the Baptist tradition … will remain so through great effort. It's very easy to lose that focus.”
Grappling with either the classroom-versus-research debate or the faith-and-learning debate would be daunting for any school, he said. “To take on … those issues simultaneously is a huge undertaking,” he admitted.
Penn State University at Erie, which he led for 21 years, shifted from being a school noted for its classroom teaching to a research university during his administration. While long-term teaching faculty “can feel diminished” when new research professors arrive, the transition can be made sympathetically, he said. The important factor is “everyone is valued.”
Resolving the faith-and-learning debate is even more difficult, Lilley continued. “I can't resolve it, but I think I can create an environment where reasonable people can come together and work this out.”
Lilley said his father, Baptist pastor Ernest Lilley, led him to faith in Christ at age 6 and his mother, Sibyl, was a schoolteacher and strong Christian influence. From his father, Lilley said, he learned bedrock Baptist principles: “Eternal salvation by faith, not of works; immersion; soul freedom; priesthood of the believer — all those things I learned at my father's knee.”
In recent years, he has attended Presbyterian churches primarily because of the worship, he said. Outside the South, he has not found Baptist churches that provide the kind of worship that touches him spiritually, he added. “…Simply speaking, [contemporary worship] doesn't speak to me.”
Lilley majored in music at Baylor, earning bachelor's degrees in 1961 and 1962 and a master of music degree in 1964. He earned his doctorate in music at the University of Southern California in 1971.
He and his wife, Gerrie, have four grown children and three grandchildren.
— Greg Warner contributed to this story.