Keeping Cool with Christ at College

Going to a small college can be a blessing or a curse. It is all about what you choose to make of it. It’s about how you strive to keep up with the faith. Or do you keep up? The choice is up to you.

Personally, I made the choice to not only keep up with my faith, but I strive daily to dive deeper into my faith. Fortunately for me, there is a great Newman (Catholic student) Center in Kirksville, so I am able to go to a church service along the lines of the Cletus 12:00 masses. Just the lively masses with good music are a great way to keep me interested in my faith.

Secondly, if you thought St. Cletus had an active youth ministry, you have never been to an excellent Newman Center like ours. We have bible study, a combined “youth group” style thing that meets somewhat regularly, we have Newman Council, which helps run the Center, and is a great way to get involved in your faith. We also have a men’s group (Peter’s Pyros) and a women’s group (Mary’s Girls). Additionally, upperclassmen can live in a house owned by Newman, if you want that total immersion. We also have a couple of different retreats monthly.

Personally, I don’t have time for any of those things. It’s kind of sad, but that is what happens when you have one of the most difficult and time-consuming majors, and are pledging a fraternity at the same time. There are ways that you can keep up with your faith without being in all of these different organizations. Just be a good person. That’s all it takes, really. If you go to parties with your friends, but chose not to partake in adult beverages, be a sober driver. Take care of your friends. I have some friends who are normally upstanding Christians, but under the influence become wild. I help them keep their morals by keeping tabs on them at the parties.

This isn’t limited to the party scene, by the way. If one of your friends is having a bad day, be there for them. If they are sick, help them get to the Student Health Center or Doctor. There are a million little things that you can do during the day to be an active Christian.

College can be scary at first, but once you realize that with God, you can conquer all things, including the urges for immoral things with all of your newfound freedom. Just remember to be a Christian (not just in name only), and all things will fall in to place. Be a good person, and college life will be good to you!

If you have any questions about religious life at college (Truman or in general), or have anything else that you would like to ask me/talk about, feel free to email me at jxdalton@truman.edu.

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Whew, where or where should I even start?!?

First off, I am now a full pledged Catholic, WOO HOOO!!!!! It was such a great and rewarding journey. The journey has not stopped but as I pause today to reflect on the past 2 weeks I am awe struck at how far I have come and at the same time how much more road lies ahead for me to journey. I have never been so happy in my life than to have all my family ( blood and Christian) there to welcome me into the family. I was so moved that I think it is just now starting to sink in. I have no way to express the fullness of the love and grace I felt in that Church last night and the how wonderful and filling it was to finally partake in the Body and Blood of our Savior with my brothers and sisters in Christ.

Starting with Palm Sunday, I must say I grew and loved and learned more than I might ever have in all my life. To truly experience the celebration of Easter with all focus on Jesus and his loving sacrifice was, is and (god willing) will always be a truly blessed celebration.

On Holy Thursday, we celebrated the Last Supper and the washing of the Feet. The beauty of the mass was when in an act of symbology the priest and deacons washed the feet of some of the parishioners. Now in the past I used to say “what an honor it must be to have your feet washed by the clergy” I strangely and (now gladly) was thinking to myself “How wonderful and blessed is it to wash those feet!”. I thought of how wonderful it was that the clergy did not just stand behind a pulpit and preach service but instead, lived it. I am not sure what happened to make that switch but I am ever thankful. Thankful that my heart may be starting to see the beauty in service. Thankful that I am beginning to look for ways to serve rather than looking for ways to be served. I can only pray that God will complete the transformation of my heart to that of a servants and allow me to never cease my desires to serve and that when an opportunity presents itself that I will humbly acknowledge the need and do all that I can with God to serve that need.

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So, the question posed to me was: what is the difference between high school and college, both school wise and spiritually. It is totally different in both respects. You get to choose the times you go to class. So you can do like me and only go to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Or, you could do like some of my friends and have shorter days but go Monday, Wednesday and Friday. While this is nice because you can choose the schedule that is right for you, there are some downsides to it. Like my friends that go MWF, I don’t get to see as often, because we aren’t there at the same time. In high school when you wanted to hang out with friends it was usually “I’ll meet you after school.” Now, you might be ending classes for the day as someone else is starting classes for the day.

Another big difference that I have experienced is the people. In high school, even after one semester, you had one good friend that you could count on, and in my case, like 5 good friends. And most likely, you would have at least one class with them (in most cases, many classes with them) through out your years there. Out of all the classes I had first semester, and all the students I had classes with, I really only made one friend that I’ve seen since last semester. You are lucky if you run into people you know. Now, my experiences may be a bit different because I’m going to St. Charles Community College. And while it’s still college, it’s not the full college experience.

My classes have been pretty easy. Although after talking with people, I got lucky and got the easy teachers. I’ve found that there is a lot less homework and tests in college. Technically, you should have homework every night studying up for those tests that are few and far between. But, there is not much that you do for credit.

Finally, the spiritual difference, although I don’t think what I say will make much sense to you. I found out it is possible to grow away and towards my relationship with God at the same time. At first, it was hard because I couldn’t go to life nights. I didn’t have that time that was just with God. There were no talks making me realize what was going on in my life all has meaning. It felt as if there was no one there to keep me grounded, and help me keep my life on track. I had to actually take the time to look at my faith on my own. I realized that I wanted to be that person who was so fired up for God again. I had to set aside a different time with God, have my own little talks in my head. I started prying more than I ever had in the past. And in all this time, I began to look back on my life and realized something. Back when I was going to life teen, I was the one thing I hated most, someone who was so fired up for Christ on Sunday, but an invisible Christian the rest of the week. I didn’t want to go back to that. Since this revelation, I have been working on being a visible Christian (so to say) everyday. And, while I’m not perfect yet, the point is I’m working at it. So I guess, my faith has kinda taken one step back two steps forward. And while it really sucked taking that one step back, it was worth it to get those two steps forward!

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[Note from Chris: A couple weeks ago, I asked a few of last year's seniors to write a little bit about how their college experience is going, or how their faith is going in their new environment, or basically, anything they wanted to write about. Here is the first of those short essays on college life.]
College is a big change from the nice comfortable world we were surrounded by everyday to this totally different realm with new experiences. The change has completely changed every aspect of my life and how I look at the world around me from a different angle. At first being here was very scary and I wasn’t sure what my position on my religion was. It has been an up and down battle with the different people and faiths here it is certainly a struggle to defend where you come from and to stand up for your faith. And to be honest it still is a daily struggle for me to be poised and strong in the decisions I make each day. It’s especially hard for me being away from all the people back home.

When put in a position away from my friends, youth group, my family and other influences I have had, it is hard to keep the same I deals I kept at home. I live with 5 other roommates none of which have the same feelings about religion I had for so long. I still have those same morals and ideals but I am beginning to question them a lot more. It was hard for me at first because it almost made ashamed to call my self a Christian, because those who seemed strong in their faith seemed to never stray and question their faith. But with a lot of discussions with friends and family I have realized that they probably stray and question just as much as me if not more, but it is their choice to keep their strong faith even during their time of uncertainty that makes them such great individuals.

The choices we make at school can change our lives forever, for example, who we choose to be friends with, where we go on the weekends or week nights, whether or not we do our homework, what we want our morals and ideals to be, etc. It’s all these things that make up who we become, what kind of job we will have, how other people see us, and so on. These decisions are not easily made and we can always look to our family, friends, or our faith for the answers. We can even look to those room mates who have different beliefs and talk to them about why their faith is such, and learn from that and maybe bring them towards our faith or embrace their beliefs as our own. I think it’s important to stay strong to what you believe as morally right and correct, but if you don’t think what you are doing is right then it might be a time for discernment. It’s important not to change because someone wants you to be a certain way or thinks your decisions are wrong but rather because you think it is necessary for your life.

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Well today was the third scrutiny and something happened today that has not happened at the past 2 scrutinies. It was a special scrutiny and I think it was because most of the people I know and love from Cletus were at this one. I was sad that I wasn’t able to share it with one of the people I love the most, but he had someone that I think needed him more and I will gladly put others needs before me, at least hope I can always do that. Anyway, as I stood up in front of the Parish I thought back through the week and how it was a great week also but how it was also marked with some low points which I was ashamed of. I thought about the intense struggles I had been through this week and how it was possible for me to be happy with my failures. I had already spent this morning begging God to forgive me and to re-strengthen my resolve. I spent that morning yearning to ease my heart of the guilt and allow it to get back to home with God. Luckily, I didn’t have to wait to long for that to happen.

As I stood up there, in the gaps between prayers, my eyes decided to look up and see what others were doing. The first time I looked up I saw Michelle and quite honestly it wasn’t hard because she had a huge grin on her face and it went straight to my heart. It reached into my heart and let me know that I was loved and welcomed, stains and all. In that moment my shame was gone and I heard God in that smile telling me it was ok and that I would always be loved. The second time that I looked up, I caught a very similar smile but this time it was from Tom. We caught each others eyes and I could feel the joy coming from him. And as I walked past him we had a nice huge manly hug that just said volumes without any words at all. I could feel God saying to me, through Tom, that He was proud of me and that even though I may slip and stumble at times He takes pride in the desire to make progress towards Him. The third time I looked up, I caught the gaze of a woman that I did not even know. Yet, even though I didn’t know her she smiled at me as if she had known me for years. Her smile may have been the greatest of all. Her smile seemed to tell me that, even though she didn’t know me and I didn’t know her, she was happy for me to join her family. I felt that if she were to say something it would have been along the lines of “I don’t know you and you don’t know me, but we both know God and for that you are my family and I love you.”.

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