The New York Times on My Alma Mater's Food: And You Thought People Chose Bowdoin for the Academics

Actually, title of this blog aside, most people have no idea what Bowdoin College is, let alone why anyone would choose to go to this tiny school in Maine. But I, fair friends, am here to attempt to correct this cruel imbalance of perception by the ultimate stroke of modern agency: blogging.

The reason I got to thinking about my alma mater was this story by Michael Sanders in yesterday's New York Times. Titled "Latest College Reading Lists: Menus With Pho and Lobster", the piece profiles two schools, Bowdoin and Virginia Tech, that emphasize excellence in on-campus dining. There's an accompanying slideshow that is itself a visual feast. In an age of hypercompetition between schools that share many features, every aspect of the school becomes important. Bowdoin has seen that food is a huge part of college life and has prioritized excellent dining in its budget and general philosophy. The result is that, as the piece notes, students often come to dinner and stay for an hour and a half. When I sent this piece to another alumnus, he remarked that this assessment was woefully inadequate. My friends and I would regularly stretch the dinner hour into two. Several years after graduation, those meandering conversations, punctuated by visits from a variety of folks, are some of my fondest memories. The Bowdoin philosophy is, I think, worthwhile.

But this is to say nothing of the food. The food was tremendous! Dining at Bowdoin was an indulgence, really, and one sometimes felt a little silly at the choices before one each night. Of course, when students are paying over $40k per year for an education, what do you expect? I can easily recall the smell of the omelet bar each Saturday morning, the aroma of steak or chicken parm or pad thai wafting through the dining hall. The dining hall mentioned in the piece, Thorne Hall, is itself a marvel to behold. For thousands of dollars, the school had lights that change color installed overhead. Though that may sound weird, the effect was impressive, as were the hardwood floors and stainless steel counters.

Thinking about food at Bowdoin makes one think about Bowdoin in general. I would encourage people to check the school out, and I would encourage young Christian people to think about attending the school. There is a great need for Christian witness at this and many other Northeastern schools of its ilk. If you're a Christian in high school, don't automatically assume that you'll go to a Christian college or university. Think hard about whether your faith can withstand the test of an unbelieving university. Also, realize that many of these schools are not quite as menacing as they can sometimes be made out by well-meaning Christians. Students who are not well-grounded in their faith, who have not been trained to plug into a solid church and participate meaningfully in it, may very well struggle. I certainly saw that at Bowdoin. At a school of this type, where professors and students alike are intellectually able and generally averse to Christianity, believers will encounter significant challenges at times, and some who are weak to begin with will tragically fall away. But it was my experience that a student who was connected to a local church and in regular, enriching fellowship with non-believers could not only survive in a secular environment but thrive in it, and have countless opportunities to share the gospel and be an instrument of redemption.

We ought not to abandon bastions of secular thought, then. Bowdoin has a gay and lesbian studies department, but that does not mean that Christians cannot go to such a school and be a witness to the very students who would be inclined to such a "discipline". On the contrary, such places are rife with witnessing opportunities. I personally did far more evangelism in college than I have done since, primarily because I was surrounded by intellectually curious young people who were often quite open to conversation about spiritual things. Some thinkers today paint a portrait of the average intellectual twentysomething unbeliever as if he walks around just ready to conversationally cut down any Christian he can find. My friends and I encountered some of this type, to be sure, but we met far more students who were confused, honest, and open to conversation about religion and the higher questions of life. Beware of easy stereotypes that lump widely divergent groups of people into a single mass of clearly defined qualities.

The food at Bowdoin was great. So were the academics. It's a very tough little college that provides its students with exceptionally small classes taught by teachers who love to teach. It's in a beautiful spot in Maine (can you tell I was a tour guide?). But for a Christian, it not only offers a great education, but a great opportunity. If you're considering schools yourself, or if you're raising young minds, don't automatically write off a college like Bowdoin. Pray about it, and see if you--or your charge--might be part of a gospel movement at such a place, an undertaking more significant than even the most exhilarating educational experience.

When the Bell Fell Silent: The Church, the Parachurch, and Christian Witness to the American University, Pt. 3

So here we are. We've got an overdeveloped parachurch and an underdeveloped local church in relation to the college campus. Where do we go from here?

Well, I'm not the answer-man, but I will take a crack at this. I would suggest that the primary need we have is for a pastoral corps that has been trained to love people, to preach the Word faithfully and powerfully, and to engage the thought and practice of the culture. If our local churches are going to reclaim the college campus as a place of considerable investment, they must be led by men who are equipped to reach out to students and to engage their questions. Though this may not be ideal, college students, often in the flower of youthful hubris and pride, tend to blow off people who they sense don't really "get" them. Our pastors do not need to be professors. But they do need to reject the anti-intellectualism of the twentieth-century model, and they need to be able to engage sophisticated theological, moral, and philosophical questions. Again, they don't need to be professorial as they do so. Pastors, when they are gifted in both personality and intellect, are uniquely suited to reach students, because students generally enjoy both a lively, warm personality and a strong, nimble mind. Pastors should seek to love students through their engaging personalities and should couple this love with an awareness of the questions that confront the particular generation to which they are ministering. For example, it is great to know all about Francis Schaeffer and what he said, but the questions Schaeffer confronted in his day, while still quite relevant to ours, are nonetheless not the same as those that our students face. Thus we should take it upon ourselves to read up, to honestly engage the intellectual questions of our day.

Some pastors who read this will think, "But even then, I won't be able to refute the highest level of intellectual scholarship." Well, you don't need to. You will go a long way to connecting with students simply by trying. In addition, if you can be in touch with books and people that do refute anti-Christian thought with considerable facility, then you can refer students to those resources, and they will be stimulated.

Why am I spending so much time on intellectual matters? Because that's where many students are--figuring out the big questions. Groups like Campus Crusade know this, and that is one reason why they are so successful in reaching students--they ask, and answer, the big questions.

Beyond this, churches must develop strong discipleship programs which they can plug students into. This is huge. We cannot simply hold a meal once in a while if we expect to reclaim the rightful place of the local church in relation to the college campus. We need to plug students into discipling relationships, hold events that they can come to, bring in speakers, integrate students into the family lives of our members, and so much more. Students have--despite what they may think--lots of free time, and parachurch groups know this and plan accordingly. So should we. We must not assume that we will fill the role of the parachurch simply by holding a solitary event once in a while. We will not. This is difficult for seminarians to hear, because we so want to reach out to students, and yet there is so little time to do so. For example, when I was leading college ministry at my church, I was painfully aware of how little I was actually doing to reach students in the ways I've just listed.

I very much hope in the future to be able to focus more time and energy in these areas, because unless the local church considerably ramps up its outreach to students, the parachurch will continue to be seen as their primary place of discipleship. This should not be so. We need tons of local churches to commit themselves to considerable investment in the college campuses in their communities. We need young men to get a bold and ambitious vision for the college campus and to attain training and personal development so that they can minister effectively to students. We need our average church member to see the college campus as a mission field, not an enemy training base. We need families to get a heart for students and to invite them into their homes for meals and meaningful fellowship. I do not hold myself out as the exemplar of such activity. But I do think that I am talking about one of the serious deficiencies of the local church in America, and I want in the future to be a part of the solution. I want to be a man who plots strategically, ambitiously, and prayerfully to make a significant impact on a college campus. I hope that some out there will catch the same vision if they have not already.

Perhaps in days to come the bell will ring once more.