A Struggling Religious College Finds an Angel

A $70-million gift stirs hopes and fears at Oral Roberts U.

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By BEN GOSE

Tulsa, Okla.

You would think a philanthropist offering $70-million to a university that has struggled financially for more than two decades would be welcomed with open arms.

But when Mart Green and his family offered that sum to Oral Roberts University in November — at a time when the university was teetering toward bankruptcy and its president had just resigned amid allegations of misspending — the Greens were met by skepticism from the highest levels on down. Oral Roberts is part of the charismatic Christian movement, and its students embrace miracles, prophesy, and spiritual healing. Many on the campus were worried about the newcomers' plans.

Mr. Green says the university's founder, 90-year-old Oral Roberts, asked him in their first meeting if he wanted to turn the university into an "Assemblies of God school," referring to the Green family's denomination.

Most students here can recite the mandate that Oral Roberts claims he received from God, which led to the founding of the university: "Raise up your students to hear My voice, to go where My light is dim, where My voice is heard small, and My healing power is not known, even to the uttermost bounds of the earth." And students are quick to dismiss other universities that they describe as "Christian in name only."

Mr. Roberts's "biggest concern was the future of the university — that it retain its Christian standards and heart and purpose," says Ron Luce, a new board member at the university, and president of Teen Mania Ministries, which organizes rallies for Christian young people. "He was thinking, 'Here are these new people — how do I know what's going to happen?'"

Mr. Green, whose father, David, founded the Hobby Lobby chain of arts-and-crafts stores and has amassed, according to Forbes, a fortune of $1.8-billion, says he has no interest in changing the university's mission. He simply wants to right the course of the university, which has been limping along financially since the 1980s, in part because of decisions by the founder to add a medical center and professional schools that eventually failed.

The Greens agreed to make the $70-million gift only after the university's Board of Regents voted to dissolve itself and replace an unusual system of governance that concentrated power in the "spiritual regents" — Oral Roberts and his son Richard, the former president who resigned amid scandal in November, and their wives. The Robertses also agreed to separate the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association, the family's ministry arm, from the university.

Mart Green, whose family had no relationship with Oral Roberts University, says the family made the gift despite what he calls the recent "bad stewardship" of the university because they were impressed with Oral Roberts alumni and students they had met through work and church.

"We were going, Whoa, whoa, whoa — there's good fruit that comes from this tree," Mr. Green says. "This tree can't fall."

Challenges Ahead

Oral Roberts, who will be a lifetime trustee (though no longer a "spiritual regent"), eventually endorsed the Greens, saying the gift would make the university "better and stronger and larger." Some students and alumni are calling the gift a miracle.

But while the gift from the Green family helps stabilize the 45-year-old institution, hard work remains. The university is still $25-million in debt, and its buildings suffer from an estimated $60-million in deferred maintenance. The university must improve a woeful giving rate among alumni and rebuild morale among faculty members, whose no-confidence vote in President Roberts helped lead to his resignation.

The university also needs to find new students to generate revenue and fill 600 empty dormitory beds (counting the mothballed Braxton Hall). Since 2000, enrollment of undergraduate and graduate students has dropped about 13 percent, to 3,390, according to the university, even as enrollment has increased nationally. While many current students come from nondenominational, charismatic churches, including so-called megachurches, recruiters are planning to reach out more aggressively to students in established denominations — although doing so inevitably raises fears that the university is straying from its charismatic focus.

Mr. Green says that he didn't expect to take a top leadership role at the university, but that as he began to assemble the Board of Trustees, his new recruits insisted he become chairman. He makes the two-hour drive to the campus from his home in Oklahoma City once a week. He will play a key role for at least another 18 months. The university hopes to hire a permanent president for the 2009-10 academic year.

Richard Fenimore, one of five members from the old Board of Regents chosen to serve on the new Board of Trustees, says Mr. Green only fully grasped the gravity of his new role after Oral Roberts laid hands on him and other members of his family at the January meeting where the old board accepted the family's plan for reviving the university.

"It wasn't just the money, the ideas, and the governance anymore," Mr. Fenimore says. "There was a spiritual change that took place. It was the passing of the torch."

A Leader's Roots

Mr. Green only made it through a year of college himself. In 1981, near the end of his freshman year at now-defunct Tomlinson College, in Tennessee, his father called him with the idea of starting a chain of Christian bookstores. Mart Green returned home and built Mardel Christian and Educational Supply from scratch into a regional chain of 28 stores.

He works at the corporate headquarters for Mardel and Hobby Lobby, in Oklahoma City. The cookie-cutter buildings with red-tiled roofs, totaling 3.5 million square feet, are immaculately kept. It's pretty much the exact opposite of the Oral Roberts campus, where the architecture is "futuristic" — some say in a Jetsons sort of way — and many of the 23 buildings are in bad need of repair.

"I took my son, who's 23, to campus, and he thought it was the coolest thing," Mart Green says. "I'm going, 'You're kidding me!' It's so 70s-ish to me."

The university's biggest albatross, what was once a center combining medicine and spirituality, features a 60-story tower that dominates the southern end of campus. The center opened in 1981, at a cost of $150-million, but failed within a decade. (University officials rent out the building and envision a day when that cash will help cover university operations.) Professional schools in law, medicine, and dentistry also closed in the 1980s, saddling the university with more debt.

"Oral was a dreamer," says Ralph Fagin, the university's interim president. "If he didn't launch out, we wouldn't have ORU."

Then came the day last fall that many people here refer to as "10/2." On October 2, three former professors who claimed they were wrongfully dismissed filed a lawsuit alleging financial mismanagement and questionable expenditures by Mr. Roberts and his wife, Lindsay. (Both have denied any wrongdoing.)

A second wrongful-termination suit, filed by a former senior accountant at Oral Roberts, alleges that more than $1-billion per year was funneled through the university, possibly to regents. Most people here laugh off that claim. "If we knew about a billion dollars," Mr. Fagin says, "this roof would look a lot better."

Looking Ahead

Many people on the campus believe that the Green family's due diligence — Mr. Green sent a team of accountants to review the university's books — is the most promising sign that no more major financial scandals will erupt.

"Sometimes things are in a gray area, whether you book it this way or that way, and some of those things were not done in as clean a way as we would like to see," Mr. Green says. "Richard is committed to cleaning up the issues that are out there." (Richard Roberts is not on the Board of Trustees, but he was given the honorary title of president emeritus by the old Board of Regents.)

The Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools renewed the university's accreditation late last year amid the campus turmoil, but it required the university to complete a self-study by April 2009 in the areas of finances, governance, and leadership.

The new Board of Trustees is fully empowered to oversee the university. On the old Board of Regents, according to Mr. Fenimore, who has served on both, it was "one person directing."

The new trustees used $30-million from the Greens to pay down more than half of the university's $55-million in debt. The rest of the money will go to campus renovations, technology upgrades, financial aid, and marketing, among other uses. Trustees worry that alumni will assume the $70-million gift solves the university's financial woes. In February the trustees started a new campaign in which they pledged to match donations to the university dollar for dollar, up to $25-million, through the end of the year, and use the matching money to pay down the debt. A full trustee match would eliminate the remaining $25-million in debt.

"It's a big, hairy, audacious goal," Mr. Fagin says. Last year only 6 percent of the university's graduates donated directly to the university, and their gifts amount to just $763,000. That may be understating the true rate of giving, though, because some alumni donate to the university through the Robertses' ministry. Following its split with the university, the Oral Roberts Evangelical Association agreed, for the first time, to provide the university's development office with names of donors to the ministry who designated their gifts for the university.

"It's like finding an address book that you've lost," says David Wagner, vice president for university relations and development. "We're anxious to get those addresses and start our relationship building with those donors."

He sees some positive signs. An older alumnus called Mr. Green just hours after the matching campaign was approved and said he and 20 other alums wanted to give the university $1-million. And other alumni are open to making donations, too, says Joey Odom, a 2003 graduate who serves on the university's alumni board.

"People who have vowed never to give to ORU are now giving," he says. "It's not that they didn't love the experience there, but they just weren't sure what was going to happen to their money. Now they know that their money is going to be used wisely."

The negative headlines from last fall have also taken a toll on recruiting. As of the end of February, the university had received only 200 new-student deposits for the fall, down from 300 at the same time in 2007.

"Our customers have developed a wait-and-see attitude," says Nancy Brainard, vice provost for student services. She notes that the departure of Richard Roberts — who was very much in the charismatic mold — could open the door for a greater variety of students to come here.

Recruiters say the university's twice-weekly chapel services have always been a draw. On a recent morning at the mandatory services here, a 10-member Christian rock band belts out five songs before a single word is said from the pulpit. More than 1,000 students sway to the music, with eyes closed and beatific smiles, lifting their hands heavenward.

About 40 percent of prospective students who visit the campus end up enrolling, according to Chris Belcher, director of admissions.

"If we can get more denominationally related students to come to campus, they'll find we're not that scary," he says.

But Ms. Brainard quickly adds: "No one's talking about changing our founding purpose."