Opening the Red Door: The Inside Story of Russia’s First Christian Liberal Arts University
Overview
After the Berlin Wall fell, a group of Christian colleges in the U.S. seized the opportunity to begin strategic faculty and student exchanges with universities inside the Soviet Union. They could not have foreseen the doors that would open next. During a 1990 visit to Russia, John Bernbaum and his colleagues received a surprising invitation from a Russian government official: come help build a faith-based university in Moscow. Thus, after seventy years of fierce religious persecution under communism, the Russian-American Christian University (RACU) was born.
In Opening the Red Door, Bernbaum presents an insider’s account of the rise and fall of a Russian-American partnership. As a founder and later president of RACU, Bernbaum offers a ground-level perspective on Russia’s post-communist transition and the construction of a cultural-educational bridge between the two superpowers. He describes how American RACU staff worked to understand Russian history and culture—including the nation's rich spiritual heritage—so they could support their new Russian friends in rebuilding an educational system and a society. He documents the story of the first private Christian liberal arts university to be accredited in Russia's history, from its first steps, through its major successes, to its facing increasing opposition during the Putin era.
Opening the Red Door offers unique insight not only into Russian culture and post–Cold War history but also traces the dynamics within international educational institutions and partnerships. When he first traveled to Russia, Bernbaum writes, he thought of it as a nation of mystery. But after more than twenty-five years of work there, he believes Russia can be understood. His journey of understanding will prove instructive to educators, administrators, students, missionaries, and anyone interested in international relations.
- Offers insight into Russian culture and post–Cold War history
- Traces the dynamics within international educational institutions and partnerships
- Provides helpful lessons for educators, administrators, students, and missionaries
- The Red Door Slowly Opens
- The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming!
- Entering the Soviet Heartland
- Getting Started
- Surviving the Coup
- Meeting with Gorbachev and the KGB
- Reading Russia Right
- Seizing the Initiative
- Laying the Foundation in Russia
- Learning Together and Telling the Truth
- A New Way to Educate
- Russia's Generation Nyet
- Assembling RACU’s Building Blocks
- Birthing in Chaos: The First Five Years
- Stability Bears Fruit
- Terrorism, Economic Collapse, and Growing Opposition
- The Struggle for Survival
- Changing Course
- Lessons and Legacies
This book recounts an amazing opportunity: an invitation from Russian reformers at the end of the Cold War to found a Christian liberal arts university in Moscow. John Bernbaum was at the center of that adventure, and in Opening the Red Door he shows, in frank and colorful prose, what made this enterprise possible and what brought it down in the end. Christian higher education today is a global endeavor, but it is not just about growth and success. It is a risky business, and we can learn much from our struggles and failures. I commend this highly instructive account to all who engage in Christian higher education.
—Joel Carpenter, Nagel Institute for the Study of World Christianity, Calvin College
Although the Russian-American Christian University has now closed, its history as told by its president John Bernbaum is both important and fascinating—and a riveting read. The university’s twenty-five-year existence is a story of Russia’s fraught transition out of communism and of extraordinary feats of international cooperation, a nearly unbelievable record of perseverance through official roadblocks and of unanticipated achievement by Russian students, and a moving account of deep person-to-person friendships. It is hard to imagine a more illuminating narrative of recent Russian history and Christian-inspired cooperation.
—Mark Noll, author of A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada
- Title: Opening the Red Door: The Inside Story of Russia’s First Christian Liberal Arts University
- Author: John A. Bernbaum
- Publisher: IVP
- Publication Date: 2019
- Pages: 260
- Resource Type: History
- Topic: Modern History