• Searching for God

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SEARCHING FOR GOD
Students follow diverse spiritual paths to the source of their beings

Founded by Presbyterians to school white Protestant males in morality and academics, Princeton has become a more secular institution that offers its diverse student body a smorgasbord of religious communities to choose from. Today, it is a place where Muslims and evangelical Christians are friends and attend each other's worship services. Where Hindus and Jews share a meal at the Center for Jewish Life (CJL) and learn about their respective world views. Where Mormons, Quakers, Baha'is, and Zen Buddhists, though few in number, gather for prayer, worship, and meditation. Where Christians can choose from, among other organizations, mainline churches, evangelical groups, and a congregation of Gospel singers.
On almost any day of the week, some religious group meets for worship, "sharing," scripture study, prayer, service work, or song. And in any given part of the day or night, students are pausing from their hectic lives to pray. They do it in a variety of ways: some communicate with their higher power while strolling across campus, taking showers, resting in their rooms, or gathering with fellow believers.
The religious landscape at Princeton has changed dramatically since the 1960s, when Protestantism still appeared to be the university's sanctioned religion. After the freshman Chapel requirement was dropped in 1964, "the Chapel cleared out" for a while, says Episcopal chaplain Frank C. Strasburger '67, and religious activity shifted to denominations and organizations such as the Campus Crusade for Christ. Today, the Office of Religious Life oversees a mosaic of religious offerings. The deans of religious life are "pluralistic Protestant Christians," says Dean of Religious Life and of the Chapel Joseph C. Williamson. "We don't regard non-Protestant students as second-class citizens."
Williamson estimates that one-third of Princeton students have "some kind of relationship with a religious organization on campus." The two largest groups are the Roman Catholic Aquinas Institute, with 400 active students, and the CJL, which attracts about 300 Jewish students to its activities.
The other two-thirds of Princeton students are not affiliated with a religious organization. They may be agnostics, atheists, or secularists. Some are still searching for a spiritual home or fulfilling their spiritual needs through channels other than established religions. Some divorce organized religion from spirituality, says Williamson, whose office ministers to the churched as well as the unchurched. "Students commonly say to us, 'I'm not very religious, but I'm very interested in spiritual matters.' That's a relatively new way of phrasing it. It points to a disaffection with institutionalized religion, but a certain yearning and longing for some sense of spiritual source."
Catherine Eubanks '96, a Southern Baptist who attends Presbyterian services, believes "a lot of people are really searching to fulfill their spiritual needs" but don't know where to go to talk about their faith and how it affects their lives. Mark Orten, the Presbyterian chaplain, finds that "many students come here with almost no religious background." He senses in them "a general frustration and disillusionment about religion and disorientation about religious things."
Princeton may also be a place where students don't always feel comfortable voicing their religious convictions. Professor of English John V. Fleming *63 believes this may be due to Princeton's increasing secularization, which "often seems to take anti-religious overtones. And I think this makes a lot of students feel bifurcated, that an important part of their lives has to be underground or apologized for."
Williamson, however, says he doesn't view secularism as "an evil," but advocates a tension, albeit a messy one, between the secular and the sacred. He wants the relationship between the two to be "healthy, vital, energetic, and dynamic." Religion, he says, "helps to keep science honest, and science helps to keep religion honest. The head and the heart need each other. And a healthy integration of those is part of what brings a sense of fulfillment and purpose to our lives."
Does Princeton-a secular institution that opens its major ceremonies with prayers-merely tolerate spiritual inquiry and religious expression, or does it encourage them? It depends on who you talk to.
In the course of surveying the religious landscape on campus, I came across students from a variety of religious traditions and some with no religious background. The six students and one alumnus profiled in this story are all on spiritual journeys. Each is practicing a particular religion. In so doing, they are trying to better "know" God and integrate faith with living. These individuals aren't representative of the student body at large; they tell only their own stories. And each story is unique.

Encountering God
A Quaker surrenders herself to His will
At a place where many of her classmates are preoccupied with earning good grades, landing great jobs, getting into the best graduate schools, and At At a place where many classmates are preoccupied with earning good grades, landing great jobs, getting into the best graduate schools, and finding mates, Carey Wallace '96 stands out as contemplative. She doesn't obsess over such things, but trusts that God will point her in the right direction. Wallace is a Quaker, one of only 10 or so at Princeton, and as a freshman she started the first Quaker meeting on campus. She also attends Westerly Road Church, which is nondenominational and evangelical.
Wallace, a resident adviser and an English major whose creative thesis is a novel about children and prayer, dresses simply. For our interview, she wore a white-and-purple checkered dress and black tights, and her light brown hair was pulled up in a bun. She wears a silver cross and no makeup. Throughout the day she tries to listen to what God wants her to do: Sometimes she'll feel an urge to walk a certain way across campus and will come upon a friend whom she needed to talk to. Quakerism emphasizes individual experiences of God, which can happen anywhere at any time, not just in meeting. Although she hasn't had any "prophetic visions," she has several times felt a sense of God in her presence. "I knew at the time that there was another person in the room besides me, a mind higher than my own." Wallace, who is from Chelsea, Michigan, went to Quaker meeting and later to a United Methodist Church before coming to Princeton, but she considers herself a Christian above all else.
She had a dramatic experience of a higher power during her freshman year, in what she describes as "a darker period" of her life, "when I was doing absolutely everything wrong." She had lost her key chain somewhere beyond Poe Field, at the southern end of campus, and had asked God to help her locate it. She felt directed to walk to the middle of the field, near the Lenz Tennis Center. She stopped and looked down. Her keys were at her feet. Wallace hesitates to talk about these kinds of experiences, because "none of it's provable."
It was during this "dark period" that she went through a spiritual turning point. To make God the center of her life, she realized, she had to surrender her will to Him. She became aware of her dependency on God for "absolutely everything." Since then, she feels she's a better person, less selfish, and happier. But that's not to say she likes everything that transpires in her life. God is "unpredictable," says Wallace, whose mother has had three heart attacks and has suffered from lung cancer and lupus.
Since becoming aware of her dependency on God, she has increased the time she spends in prayer. Now, for an hour every day, Wallace prays in her room. Afterward, she sometimes gets a sense of what God wants her to do next-to call someone, for instance. "A lot of times I'll have an overwhelming feeling that I'm loved, or I'll just be really happy."
Intellectually, Wallace finds Christianity "extremely defensible," although she doesn't think of it in rational terms. For her it is about individual experiences of God. "You have to totally surrender yourself to someone besides yourself."

Seeking Enlightenment
A Hindu is disillusioned with the Ivory Tower
Tarun Mital '97 came to Princeton thinking that he would find a strong religious atmosphere on campus. It's part of what attracted him to the university. Instead, he found Princeton lacking in religious fervor. "There's no respect for religious belief," he says. "Religion is almost embarrassing to talk about" unless you know someone really well. Part of the problem, he says, is "we just don't have the vocabulary" to talk about religion, faith, and values.
A second-generation Indian raised in Houston, Texas, Mital is a past president of the Hindu Students Council (HSC), an organization started three years ago which attracts about 10 students to its meetings. HSC students study the Bhagavad Gita, listen to talks by swamis (religious teachers), and engage in interfaith discussions with students from other religious traditions.
Mital wears glasses and has a gentle presence. A physics major, he is working toward a certificate in Spanish. He also finds time to play bassoon in the orchestra, lead Outdoor Action trips, and play intramural soccer. Mital likes talking about religion. Hinduism, he explains, doesn't encompass a certain set of beliefs or doctrine. "Hindu" means simply "beyond the Indus River," he notes. Hindus are monotheistic, polytheistic, and even atheistic, says Mital, who considers himself a monotheist. "We believe in one supreme consciousness," one universal spirit, called Brahman. The gods and goddesses are manifestations of the universal spirit. "We recognize that everyone has their own God to worship." And he believes that "all religions have very important values to pass on to everyone."
Hindus may follow the path of knowledge, the path of action, or the path of devotion to gain the ultimate goal of enlightenment, says Mital, who is focused on the path of knowledge. (He took nine courses last semester, five more than required.) But he also spends time on devotion. Lately, he's been praying to Rama and Krishna, who are incarnations of the god Vishnu. Rama, who has been compared to Abraham, lived around 8000 B.C. and Krishna, who has been compared to Christ, around 3000 B.C., says Mital.
He prays at various times during the day, before meals and before studying and during his hour-long showers. Time spent in prayer brings him "tranquillity of mind," he says. While standing under the running water Mital chants, sings devotional songs, and recites poems, including "Seek God, seek God, you fool. In the end grammar rules will not save you."
Students at Princeton, in his view, focus on academics to the exclusion of God. "Academia is good, but you won't reach the ultimate goal without turning to God in some way." Some of the courses taught here, he believes, add to the ignorance about religion, because their language obfuscates meaning. The aim of religion, he says, is "to reduce things to very basic, day-to-day experiences."

"Repairing the World"
Judaism colors Alona Thal '97's world view
Alona Thal '97 seems comfortable with the elusiveness of religion. She admits that she doesn't fully understand Judaism and that she has yet to figure out her own place in it. She accepts this, knowing that in time she will discover the right way for her to practice Judaism.
Realizing her Jewish faith has been a gradual process. Born and raised in Los Angeles, she grew up in a Reform family that kept the Sabbath and observed traditional Jewish holidays. As a teenager, she had doubts about God. "I don't think that you can go through any religious faith . . . without having some questions about God," she says. At Princeton, Thal has found a comfortable place to further explore her faith. An active member of the Center for Jewish Life (CJL), she has attended both Reform and Conservative services and hasn't settled on a particular branch of Judaism. For now, she's discovering which traditions and rituals feel right to her. Sometimes "I really appreciate the strictness and the laws and the rules. There have been other times when I really like my cheeseburgers," she says, laughing. Although she doesn't keep kosher now, she intends to do so at some point.
Thal has long, dark hair that falls in curls, and dark red lips. Her vocabulary is peppered with Hebrew words. A religion major, she's not a member of an eating club and doesn't socialize at the clubs.
Judaism to Thal isn't an "isolated and enclosed experience," but one, she says, that should be shared with people of other religious traditions. Last year, she and another Jewish student led a multicultural Passover Seder in Murray-Dodge Hall. Jews and non-Jews who gathered listened to readings related to freedom and liberation, the central themes of the holiday, from non-Jewish cultures, including a passage by Martin Luther King, Jr. Her purpose in organizing the event was to show that "moving from slavery into freedom, moving from an individual to peoplehood, is a story that is understood" by many different cultures.
Judaism isn't something Thal thinks about once a week at Sabbath services. Rather, "Judaism and the values found in Judaism" color everything she sees. Her Jewishness has made her accepting of other people, and it has taught her to be sensitive to injustice, homelessness, and racial prejudice. Though she's not sure what career she'll eventually pursue, she is motivated by tikkun olam, a concept in Judaism that means repairing the world. We're in an imperfect state, and each of us is obligated to help fix it, says Thal, who spent last summer at the Los Angeles housing department, working to improve housing and landlord-tenant relations.
She's not sure what purpose God plays in her life, but from time to time she feels His presence, particularly during CJL services in autumn. While praying, she'll look out a window onto the field between the CJL and Fine Hall. In those moments, gazing on the array of fall colors, she feels a higher power. "My sense of God present," she says, "is seeing really beautiful things."

Questioning the Pope
A Catholic struggles to make sense of doctrine
The oldest of nine children, Tim Reidy '97 was an altar boy and attended a Jesuit high school. When he lived at home in Riverdale, New York, he was surrounded by family members and classmates who shared his Catholic faith. Going to church was as much a social event as a religious one. But at college, he is faced with discovering for himself why he believes in God and making sense of the Catholic doctrine he grew up with.
Dressed for our interview in ripped jeans and a blue-and-white striped shirt, Reidy calls himself a "shy, quiet person." He got involved with the Roman Catholic Aquinas Institute in his freshman year. "It was one thing I could identify with right away," he says. He also joined the Student Volunteers Council and now serves on its board of directors. His faith, he feels, has deepened more through service work than through attending Mass.
Some people would label Reidy a "cafeteria Catholic," because he doesn't hold the official viewpoint on several issues, including women's role in the church, homosexuality, birth control, and abortion. Moreover, he doesn't believe the Catholic Church or Christianity is the only way to find God.
Reidy is sympathetic with those who feel alienated from the Catholic Church. "Sometimes I don't want to go to Mass, because I'm so upset with some of the issues in the church," he says. It also saddens him that some of his friends who were raised Catholic have turned away from the church. "They've just given it up, and I can understand that." Although he's struggling with making sense of what he views as out-of-date doctrine, he says his membership in the church "has been a very positive experience in my life." He attributes this to his parents' reluctance to "force-feed" him the Gospel message and also, in part, to his being a white male in a patriarchal institution and "always somebody whom priests liked."
Reidy is majoring in religion to learn, among other things, how church doctrine has been shaped over time. Meanwhile, he's also spent time thinking about the meaning of faith and spirituality. To Reidy, faith is the "belief that God works in weird ways and that you're encountering God when you encounter other people." And spirituality is "searching for a reason and purpose to my life" and "approaching life with a certain faith that things will work out."
Although Reidy believes that at Princeton he has become more spiritual (as he defines it), he finds himself less vocal than he was in high school about his religious convictions. Though he's firm in his faith, what he sees as Princeton's anti-religious, anti-spiritual atmosphere undermines his self-confidence, he says, and makes him reluctant to express his religious views. "Maybe I'm caving in under pressure," he says. "Maybe it's a test I'm not passing."

Morally Challenged
A Muslim avoids the sins of college life
Last winter during Ramadan, the sacred month in the Islamic year observed with prayer and daily fasting, Rizwan Arastu '98 ducked into the locker room during crew practice to pray and break his fast. "This raised some moral concerns," says Arastu, "because a locker room is dirty, and I was sweaty, but spiritually I was pure." Following the disciplined life of a Muslim, he finds, can be challenging at college. Muslims are expected to pray five times a day, abstain from alcohol and certain types of meat, dress modestly, and donate 2.5 percent of their income to the poor. Arastu has had to adapt his religious practice to fit his life at Princeton.
He usually prays in his room. If he has a class during one of the five designated times when Muslims are supposed to pray, he'll praise Allah before or after the class. Because Princeton doesn't have a separate cafeteria for Muslims (as it does for Jews), fulfilling Islam's dietary rules can also pose problems. To avoid eating food that hasn't been cooked or served properly, Arastu will ask the members of the dining staff at Mathey College how they prepared it and what utensils they used. Abstaining from alcohol, on the other hand, doesn't impinge on his college experience, because Arastu and most of his friends don't drink.
Certain aspects of campus life morally challenge Arastu, particularly the scene on Prospect Avenue. There, he sees "lots of things I disagree with," including "drinking, sex, certain aspects of partying." Observing the social mores of the street convinced him that he didn't want to join an eating club.
Attentive and reserved, Arastu grew up in South Carolina, the youngest child of Indian parents, and he plans to major in molecular biology. He is one of about 20 members of the Muslim Students Association, for which he initiated a Friday evening Koran study session in Murray-Dodge Hall. The students also go to a nearby mosque on Route 1 for Friday afternoon prayers.
With so few Muslims, Princeton doesn't offer the kind of spiritual support it does to Jewish or Christian groups. Still, Arastu feels that his faith and consciousness have grown since he arrived on campus. He has learned about morality, faith, Allah, and Islam, not only through reading the Koran but through interactions with friends of other faiths. Classmates with different spiritual viewpoints help him to reexamine his own life and beliefs. He and his roommate, a member of the Princeton Evangelical Fellowship, learn from one another and attend each other's religious gatherings. He has also taken several religion courses to better understand Islam and other religions.
Although Arastu is steadfast in his faith in Islam, much still remains a mystery to him. "Most everything" puzzles him about Allah, he says, including "Why He's created a life in general and people specifically, because He doesn't need us in any way." Arastu wonders about the purpose of life, and he resists describing God or answering the question "Who is Allah?" because "in Islam, we're discouraged from putting personal characteristics on Him." That, he adds, would bring God down to our level. He has no doubts that Islam is "the right way for me," but he's not sure that "it's the only way for everyone."

One Truth
An evangelical Christian remains firm in her faith
Chiquita White '96 has a quiet confidence about her. Deliberate in answering questions, she looks calmly and steadfastly into my eyes, saying "I'm a Christian because I feel convinced that there's a God . . . and that the only way to be perfect in His eyes is through Jesus." We are sinners, she says, and only through Jesus's dying on the cross for our sins can we be in the right relationship with God.
A politics major, White is one of 80 members of the Princeton Evangelical Fellowship (PEF), an ecumenical group of Christians. She's also a resident adviser in Mathey College and for three years has worked for the Office of Admission, helping to recruit minority students. In White's view, we live in a time in which people tend not to express their religious convictions for fear of offending others. "We have the view that your beliefs are okay and my beliefs are okay. But that doesn't mean that there isn't one truth" and one right path to God. "I don't think that means Christians can be prideful," she says, "or beat people over the head." Two of her closest friends are agnostic and Muslim, and "it's very painful to me to think of my friends as not moving on the path towards God." In the same breath, she says she doesn't claim to understand all things.
White was raised in a devoutly Christian family in Willingboro, New Jersey, and has never doubted her faith. It's important for her to be a church member and have Christian friends, who help her to pursue what she calls her "walk with God." They "are very important to me," she says. "We have a common way of viewing things."
PEF meets on Fridays for scripture study, worship, and "sharing." Once a week, each student also meets one-on-one with a staff member for Bible study. The teachers, she says, take an "intellectual look at the Bible" and apply it to students' lives. In addition to PEF gatherings, she attends Sunday services at the Nassau Christian Center, an Assembly of God church, for charismatic celebrations that feature singing, worship, and a focus on the Holy Spirit. White is one of about 20 African-Americans in PEF. The rest, she says, are Asians and whites. As far as Christian groups on campus go, she believes PEF is relatively integrated. Still, she would like to see it become more racially harmonious. Church, in her view, should be a place that is more integrated than other institutions in society: "We are all Christians first, and that should be much more important than our race."
White says her faith has deepened at Princeton through prayer and Bible study at PEF. Now she's working on developing more trust in God and filtering everything she does and feels through God's eyes. God has a purpose and will for everyone's life, says White, who tries to "listen" to God's call. But "I don't think we can hear perfectly," she adds.
White isn't planning on marrying in the near future, but when she does she will wed a Christian. Religion is so central to her identity, she says, that if her husband didn't share her faith, he couldn't fully understand her.

God's Many Faces
A Christian explores different religions
Religious organizations at Princeton aren't restricted to current students, and it's not unusual to see alumni, townspeople, and faculty members at religious gatherings. For Roberto Cordon '88, who returned to the Princeton area last fall and resumed attending campus Episcopal services as well as occasional Jewish ones, the university is his spiritual haven.
Cordon, a cheerful man with an easy smile, isn't easy to categorize. Although his mother is Jewish, he was raised a Catholic in his native Guatemala. Now he calls himself simply a Christian, who expresses his Christianity through the Episcopal Church. When he was a student, the religious offerings seemed to him like a buffet. He explored different traditions and felt accepted and welcomed wherever he went, whether to Catholic Mass or to Jewish, Southern Baptist, or Episcopal services. "I discovered a whole part of my religiousness" at Princeton, says Cordon, who is pursuing a doctorate in international business at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School.
Cordon attended Catholic masses in his sophomore and junior years. An Aquinas Institute priest, Father Robert Ferrick, became a sort of shepherd to him. Liberal and Jesuit, Father Ferrick attracted an ecumenical following and had the ability to touch people, says Cordon, who along with 200 other students regularly attended his two-hour Saturday midnight masses in the Chapel. Cordon was drawn to the mystical service that featured candlelight and intimacy. He stopped going to midnight masses when Father Ferrick left Aquinas. The Aquinas Institute, which has its own chapel on Stockton Street, became too conservative for Cordon, largely because of the influence of an Opus Dei priest. Opus Dei is a somewhat secretive and doctrinal organization within the Catholic church. (Today, there are no Opus Dei priests in Aquinas.)
Cordon turned to the Episcopal ministry and found in its chaplain, Frank Strasburger '67, the same warmth and liberalness that he had in Father Ferrick. Strasburger knows how to guide students' religious questioning in "almost an academic way," says Cordon, who believes "there's no one right religion." Instead, he thinks that God reveals Himself in different ways to different peoples.
Spiritual questioning and searching are encouraged at Princeton, says Cordon, who finds the religious atmosphere stimulating. He wanted to join a congregation during the years he was away from campus but never found one that felt right. "I've never been as spiritual as I was at Princeton," he says. "The wonderful thing about Princeton is that it's been seven years since I graduated. I come back, Frank welcomes me, and if Frank wasn't here, some other priest would have. Even though I'm not part of the campus anymore, I feel part of the Princeton religious community."