This is a picture of the Alumni Board for Trinity Christian College. I'm the one on the left in pink. I'm also the OLDEST member! One month from today I will travel back to Chicago for a board meeting. The same weekend, Trinity will be holding a dedication for the new gymnasium. When I attended TCC, the gym was brand new! I still remember attending the first basketball game that was played there. Back then, we thought our gym was on the cutting edge. Alas, it pales in comparison to the new one. 
Mr. Arthur D. Bishop
A Disheveled Old Man and God’s Divine Plan
When Trinity Christian College celebrated its 50th anniversary, Dr. Daniel Diephouse wrote a book entitled, At the Heart of Community. This book eloquently depicts the unfolding of the decades as seen through the eyes of the students and faculty. In the chapter on diversity, Dr. Diephouse writes, “The measure of a community is reflected in the way in which it respects those who don’t look like the group, who don’t live the way it lives, who because of personal and ethnic reasons see the world in different ways.”
I attended Trinity during the early 1970’s. At that time, there were those that dared to enter our fairly sheltered little community and they didn’t, as Dr. Diephouse wrote, “look like the group”. A friend of mine laughingly recalls her Trinity experience. “I am an Episcopalian. In the 70’s at Trinity, THAT was diversity!” I recently had the joy of interviewing one of those who dared…who dared to enter a predominately white campus and who dared to show us what diversity was all about.
I began the interview with this simple question: Arthur Bishop, how in the world did you end up at Trinity Christian College? This was his answer…
“If you asked me back in 1971 how I ended up at Trinity, my answer would have been completely different from the answer I am able to give you today.”
In 1971, Arthur Bishop was an athletic standout; a star player on the Von Steuben High School basketball team. Despite his popularity on the court, however, few of his family members were ever in the stands to cheer him on. “My biological mother died when I was four. I never knew my dad. My aunt raised my siblings and me.” And so, in 1971, when it was time to make a decision about college, it was made without the help of family support.
Unbeknownst to Bishop, there was someone that was regularly attending his games – someone that Bishop had never met – and this silent observer was keenly interested in the future of this outstanding, young athlete. His name was Ed Erickson. Ed’s son, Terry, was the athletic director at Trinity. Ed had quite a well-developed youth ministry in Arthur’s neighborhood, and he tried his best to invest his time into the lives of the young men he mentored.
“He was an old, disheveled white guy. One day he asked me if he could take me over to Trinity. Back in the day, I seldom traveled much beyond the neighborhood. We only traveled for about 45 minutes in that rickety, old car of his, but it seemed like Ed was taking me to a whole ‘nother country!
I remember being so impressed with the state-of-the-art gym. I also remember thinking that everything looked so green and sprawled out and open! And so, with very little concern as to the details of my decision, I signed up for Trinity. Back then I would have told you I ended up at Trinity because of basketball. Today I can tell you that I attended Trinity Christian College as a result of God’s divine plan.”
Arthur always had an inner calling to help others. It was this desire that helped him make the decision to major in sociology. And while he excelled on the court – TCC defeated both Calvin and Hope when he was playing! – off of the court it was a different story. He will never forget the day he and his friends stopped by a store in Palos Heights for some juice. The nervous store owner was certain the guys were up to no good and called the police. As the ball players innocently paid for their drinks and exited the store, they found themselves surrounded by Palos Heights police officers. Their guns were drawn! Coach Erikson was called to the scene, and the players returned to campus. What added insult to injury was when the store owner sent over a case of pop to the gym in an effort to pacify the situation. Art can laugh about the incident today, but it sent a clear message to him and to his friends about their place in a predominately white community.
When asked about his time spent at Trinity, Bishop smiles. “If it got too bad, we could always jump in a car and drive back home. And Coach was a person I could vent to; during the frustrating times when I wanted to give up, he was a person who seemed to understand where I was coming from. But overall, I enjoyed the comradeship of the team, the times we spent on the bus going to games…yeah, those are some good memories.”
Arthur graduated from Trinity in 1975 and earned his M.A. in Human Services Administration from Spertus College in Chicago. On January 1, 2011, Arthur was appointed by Illinois Governor Pat Quinn to be the Director of the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice.
“This job I have today…well, some people told me that it’s kind of like trying to turn around a battleship in the middle of a bathtub! But my approach has always been to do the best I can in the job I have at the moment. I believe that God will direct my path if I’m being a good steward at what He has planned, and that’s how I approach everything I do. This title means nothing. It can be taken away in a heartbeat. What matters is that I do my work heartily, as unto the Lord! He is the One I want to glorify. It may not have looked like it at the time, but when I was at Trinity, I watched. I observed. I listened. The principles I learned at Trinity have served me well. So has the Christian foundation that I received from my aunt. God has blessed me with the gift of ministry and the gift of counseling. I have always wanted to help those, who for whatever reason, found themselves helpless. It has given me great joy to serve my Savior in the field of social work. Like I said earlier, God has a divine plan!”
