Texas Christian University student vows to restore Christian values on campus with TPUSA
Texas Christian University's TPUSA chapter has grown significantly following Charlie Kirk's assassination, with hundreds joining the conservative organization.
The president of the Turning Point USA chapter at Texas Christian University told Fox News Digital that she wanted to lead the organization to bring Christian values back to a campus where it is rare to come by.
"This chapter has been around for about seven years and I became president last year," Annie Cellar said.
Cellar, a senior working toward a BS in Mathematics and BFA in Dance, said she was very motivated to push for her beliefs and values on campus.
"Especially at Texas Christian University, where not a lot of Christian beliefs are well portrayed or advocated for," she said. "I know with Turning Point USA—it is a conservative values-supportive organization, but at the end of the day, I just want as many people to be wakened up to the truth as possible and ultimately get to know Jesus, and so, I just went whatever way that I can best glorify God with my life and use Turning Point as a way to do that to help people see the Lord. This is all I could ask for."
TCU, a private school, faced claims that they abandoned Christian values after stopping on-campus baptisms. Tarrant County GOP leader Bo Frenchman, an alumnus of TCU, told Fox News Digital.
"I mean — TCU student ministry — they wanted to do baptisms on campus in a two-foot deep inflatable baby pool. And the committed Marxist that runs the risk management division at TCU said, no, that was too dangerous. We can't do that," Frenchman said.
TCU officials pushed back on these claims.
"For health and safety reasons, baptisms cannot be accommodated in campus fountains or other bodies of water. However, TCU partners with churches adjacent to campus so that baptisms can take place in a safe, appropriate environment," an university official said.
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Ever since TPUSA co-founder Charlie Kirk was assassinated Sept. 10 during an event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, the organization has grown and received massive support.
After Kirk's massive memorial service on Sept. 13, TPUSA announced that it has received more than 120,000 inquiries from people wanting to start new campus chapters.
"We have seen a lot of growth. We've had hundreds of people join our Turning Point chapter in the last few weeks, which is incredible," Cellar said.
She added that TPUSA's tabling activity has been more active as more people have approached to ask questions than in past years.
"I would say tabling on campus has definitely been a lot more active a lot of people coming up asking questions—having some good conversations, but also dealing with a little bit of anger at times, and we do have the police department helping us out when we are tabling they're keeping an eye on us, which we are super grateful for."
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Last month, Cellar had a dust up with TCU over an event featuring activist Chloe Cole to discuss her journey detransitioning, which led to the event being moved to another venue due to logistical issues.
The event was planned for Oct. 7 with Cole being a featured speaker, but the university did not have the space available to support the number of people that was projected to attend the event. The logistical challenge communicated by the university prompted Cole to speak out, accusing the university of anti-Christian discrimination by intentionally making more difficult the process of approving events led by faith-based organizations.
However, TCU flatly denied the notion that it engages in anti-Christian discrimination.
The TCU spokesperson told Fox News Digital that "faith-based student organizations face no additional obstacles to hosting an event at TCU." They pointed to a memorial for Kirk that was held on campus on Sept. 18.
"For the date of Oct. 7, no venue was available for an event open to the public for up to a thousand people, which has since been publicized 2,000. Alternatives and other options were explored and offered to accommodate the request for this date, and we remain open to finding a suitable venue on an available date," a TCU spokesperson said.
Although Cellar agreed with Cole about there being obstacles when faith-based organizations try to host events, she is optimistic about working with the university in the future.
The next events the TCU-TPUSA chapter is hosting will feature Pete Chambers, a candidate for the upcoming Texas gubernatorial election, and actress Leigh-Allyn Baker, best known for "Will & Grace."
"Last week, TCU approved it right away with no further questions, and they approved it immediately, so that kind of proves that there was an issue going on. So the fact that they did that — we might be headed in the right direction," she said. "We would love to have these opportunities to be able to turn around quickly."
"It would be nice if TCU policies could make it happen so that it's not so much of a long process and a lot of work to make opportunities like that not be able to happen on campus," Cellar added.
TCU officials sent the following statement to Fox News Digital about faith-based events and pastors wanting to speak on campus.
"Churches and faith events are a beautiful and important part of our campus life and student experience. There are more than a dozen Christian student organizations on campus, many with pastors and other professional staff that regularly hold worship services, Bible studies and other meetings with our students," the spokesperson said. "For others not affiliated with a student group, they can be invited by our students and are asked to follow our process requiring visiting churches or pastors to be hosted by a campus ministry in collaboration with the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life."
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