“I do all things through Christ who strengtheneth me,” Dr. Benjamin S. Carson said during the question and answer session following his forum address at 11 a.m. Tuesday. “He didn’t do it so I could kick back and put my feet up.”
Dr. Carson is a busy man. The director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University, a husband and father, book author and public speaker has many demands on his time. If anyone deserved to relax, it would be him. But Carson told students he’d been given a platform in the attention he’s received for his “once-in-a-lifetime cases,” and he’s been using it to spread his message – THINK BIG.
Thinking big was one of many themes in Carson’s address, one he expounded on by encouraging students to recognize the importance of really learning, not just accepting superficial, cram-for-the-test-and-forget-everything-later knowledge. His personal story is the embodiment of the ideological American dream; success built on hard work, overcoming challenges and learning from mistakes. First Carson’s mother, then his life, taught him to value education.
[pullquote]”We’ve reached an age where people are afraid to say Merry Christmas – we’ve been allowing the people with the microphones to tell us what we can say and think.”[/pullquote]
It’s the lacking emphasis on education and respect for others in the United States that concerns him now.
“I’m not a fan of political correctness. I think the emphasis should be on being respectful of others. … I always say, if two people think the same about everything, one of them isn’t necessary,” he said. “You have to speak up for what you believe in. … We’ve reached an age where people are afraid to say Merry Christmas – we’ve been allowing the people with the microphones to tell us what we can say and think.”
