FORT WORTH, Texas (ABP) — Trustees of Southwestern Theological Seminary elected a controversial Muslim convert to Christianity as dean of the seminary's new undergraduate school, the College at Southwestern.
Emir Caner, 34, was brought up to be a devout Sunni Muslim. His father, a leader of the Islamic Center in Columbus, Ohio, disowned Caner after he became a Christian.
Caner earned his undergraduate degree at Criswell College in Dallas, his master of divinity degree from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., and his doctor of philosophy degree from the University of Texas at Arlington.
He currently is associate professor of church history and Anabaptist studies at Southeastern Seminary and associate dean of that seminary's undergraduate college.
Caner and his brother, Ergun Caner, who recently was elected dean of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., have written several books on Islam, including Unveiling Islam.
In a sermon at the 2002 Southern Baptist Pastors' Conference, Florida pastor Jerry Vines cited that book as his source when he declared Muhammad was a “demon-possessed pedophile” and claimed Islam promotes the killing of non-Muslims.
Caner's latest book, co-authored with missiologist Edward Pruitt, is The Costly Call, which recounts stories of 19 Muslims who converted to Christianity in the face of beating, imprisonment, exile or death.
Caner was one of three deans and 17 faculty members elected by trustees at their April meeting.
Trustees elected Keith Eitel as the first dean of the Roy Fish School of Evangelism and Missions. Eitel, 50, is a former career international missionary who has been a missions professor at Southeastern Seminary since 1992. He earned his undergraduate degree from Dallas Baptist University and his master's degree from Baylor University. He holds doctorates from the University of South Africa and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Ill. He is the author of Paradigm Wars: The Southern Baptist International Mission Board Faces the Third Millennium.
Stephen Johnson, 29, was elected dean and associate professor of music in the seminary's school of church music. Johnson is currently assistant professor of composition at the Master's College in Santa Clara, Calif. He is a graduate of the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and holds a master's degree from DePaul University in Chicago and a doctorate from the University of Southern California.
The remainder of the new faculty members will fill posts at the seminary's Fort Worth campus, at the Havard School for Theological Studies in Houston and in the College at Southwestern.
— Based on reporting by Greg Tomlin of Southwestern Seminary