Deciding on where to go to school for college is one of the most important processes of being a high school senior. Within the first few months of the year, you’re looking for a school that is within an acceptable price range, which provides decent financial aid, has your desired major, and is a comfortable distance from home. The applications fly out, the anxiety of waiting begins, and usually those are the biggest factors anyone thinks of when applying for higher education. Something people don’t usually have issues with when applying to college is how their religious affiliation will fit in on campus. When I was considering applying to Xavier University, religion was just as important as everything else. I go to a Christian University, but I’m not Christian. I’m a Buddhist in a Jesuit school.
The Jesuits are a branch of Christianity and are usually considered to be on the progressive side. Education is an important cornerstone of their faith, so it’s no surprise that there are many high schools and colleges dedicated to their subdivision of Christianity. They have a model and core values for education; it flies on large banners on one of the residence halls: “We are Xavier Musketeers. We are unique individuals who come together in the spirit of St. Ignatius, to learn together, to serve together, and we will succeed in changing the world together. We act with integrity, justice and generosity. All for one one for all.”
Knowing that this was going to be a religious school was an immediate stop for me as a prospective student, almost like hitting a wall. I liked this university so much because it had a good business school, it was in a large city, and I was pumped to go. A big issue, however, was that my faith didn’t match with theirs and I didn’t know how well I would fit in. My faith is just as much as part of my identity as my personality, and being able to make friends and exist in a community that would accept and encourage me was important. I admit to being scared about it, but I found my school had resources to help the transition.
The Chronicle discusses different faiths on Christian college campus by saying, “On American Catholic campuses, it appears, the clear and proud expression of one faith identity isn’t a barrier that separates people of different faiths, it’s a bridge that invites them in.” This shown true for me when I went to my school’s interfaith section online and they listed locations for Buddhist centers around the city, and even had Buddhist holidays in their multi-faith holiday calendar. I went into my first year feeling confident about how my religious choices would pan out, but didn’t realize the aversion I would actually face.
Theology is a mandatory class for everyone to take. It’s in the core, and from what I heard it generally spent most time going over Christianity but also touched on other world religions at the same time. I was excited for my first ever real theology class and everything was going fine until a few classes into the semester when I realized my teacher and I just weren’t going to work. He asked the classroom what they thought the meaning of life was, and amid the answers of family, community, love, and kindness, I answered, “Life is suffering.”
There was no hiding I wasn’t of Christian faith, it had already come out when I was comparing texts we had read to my different belief system, but after a pause the response I got was, “That is a Buddhist belief, and this is a Christian theology class.” I felt shut down, unwanted in the classroom, and as if my personal experiences didn’t mean anything to the class discussion. This lead to a downhill battle with my teacher, and ended in the mutual agreement after a meeting that it would be best to leave. Almost in an ironic twist, his words were, “It’s obvious that you’re suffering, and you’re making your classmates suffer.” I dropped the class, and began considering transferring schools. Maybe it wasn’t going to work out after all.
The following school year I returned and was ready to tough out another theology class. With one bad experience under my belt, a lack of finding others with a similar faith to mine, and an unsure attitude about what to expect, I jumped back in. I was rewarded with what is now shaping up to be my best year. My new teacher, although focusing on Christianity and Jesuit beliefs, was very open and experienced with other faiths. He was tolerant, understanding, and open to conversation and comparison between beliefs. I got involved with activities through the Interfaith Department on campus and met many other students who are also not Christian, found a support system through faculty, got into a Buddhism class taught on campus, and even found multiple teachers who share the same beliefs as me.
In a study done by UCLA about religion in the college experience, Alexander W. Astin said, “These findings suggest that universities should consider providing more opportunities for students to explore and pursue these interests as part of the college experience, remove barriers to doing so, and help support greater balance in the development of the whole student.” Giving students the option to explore and learn about themselves through their faith is important to their development, and going to a University that bases its education in religion means there are plenty of opportunities to discover myself even if I don’t share the same belief. In the end, it just took a push to find my place as a non-Christian student on a Christian campus.
The Chronicle of High Education