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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 21, 1986)
also be due to a search for something more meaning ful than Yupward mobility. The students of the '60s found their faith in the qua si-religions of the youth Going tack to tta told: Many faiths meet (and sometimes do battle) within the marketplace of ideas that academia traditiona lly provides movement and antiwar activism; in the ’70s self-develop ment was often a fixation. Today there are few unifying causes—and rebellion for its own sake can seem dated or downright silly. Arid so those who seek something other than success to worship say they are, increasingly, look ing to God. The impact of today’s fervor varies from campus to campus. For most students, religion remains a personal matter. "It gives me peace of mind,” says Northwestern freshman Joellen Ruvoli, who attends a weekly Rible study group. "It’s like a rock that helps me escape all the craziness here at school.” For a minority of others, howev er, religion is a militant calling that demands that skeptics be compelled to see the light To put it bluntly, says Dana Strong, a UT junior who heads the evangelical Longhorn < ARUM MUKt SO Christian Fellowship, "we seek to interrupt their lives (Students protest that) religion is an individual thing and [say,) 'What right do you have to tell me how to live?’ They’re offended by what we do, but we want to confront some of [the values) that they brought from a materialistic, hedonistic society Some students and professors see a dark side to this devoutness, fearing that it will lead to intolerance and confrontation In particular they worry that fundamental ists may begin toclamor for the teaching of what they regard as the literal Truth So far, such pressures have come not from students but from the religious establishment As examples, critics cite the effort of the Southern Baptist Convention to impose its fundamentalist views on the cur riculum of Baylor University (page 17* and the Vatican’s silencing of Catholic University theology Prof. Charles Cur ran, who had alarmed the church with his dissident views on sexual morulity (page lHi It may lx- only a matter of time, however, before some religious students adopt the tactics of Accuracy in Academia, the conservative political group that monitors professors for deviations from right-wing ortho doxy "Some fundamentalist people are looking for quick, easy cookbook answers." complains the Rev David Turner, u priest at St. John's Catholic Chapel at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana "|There’s a) sense of accepting a very simplistic kind of solution and teaching. They don’t want to think as they do with academic subjects." BH| questions: To lx- sure, religion has always provider! a palliative for the normal anxieties of students "When you’re at college, you’re struggling with some of the most profound questions humans can ask," says USC’s chaplain Alvin Kudisill, who has heljxxl coordinate the campus roll gious community for 25 years “I think young people to day along with the rest of society- are stymied by life’s big questions It’s almost as if they're hedging their bets lor the future, which is very uncertain " And as piety becomes more acceptable, students feel more comfortable about seeking out its solace. It’s hard to live in this crazy world where some peoplesay you're weird when you're religious," says Duke sophomore Klizabeth San ford, who belongs to the Duke Inter-Varsity Chris tian Fellowship "It'sgoodto come here and have others say, 'Yeah, you're doing tin right thing'.” Some find religion fosters u sense of ethnic identity "For us Islam was not just a religion, it was a way of life,” says Washington Uni versity senior Mohammed A R Khan, a founder of the school’s Islamic Society "We wanted to bring that knowledge to students on campus who hardly knew anything about Islam.” At Brown this fall, eight .Jew ish students have congre gated in one section of a dor mitory, calling it Hebrew Those who are seeking meaning beyond the spoils of success are increasingly turning to God :
