Chaplaincy and Religious Life on College Campuses

The presence of chaplains on college campuses may seem unnecesary at a time when college student religiosity is declining. A report by the Pew Research Center in 2010 found that a quarter of Americans from ages 18-29 described themselves as unaffiliated with any religion, compared to 16% in the 1990s and 12% in both the 1970s and 1980s.1 Data from the long-running General Social Surveys showed that 18% of Millennial adults attended religious services weekly or near weekly in the late 2000s, a smaller percentage than previous generations reported at similar times in their lives, around college age.2 This suggests that college students are generally becoming less religious and thus might imply that the functional role of a college chaplain should be waning on college campuses.

Rev. Carolyn Fure-Slocum, College Chaplain of Carleton in Northfield, disagrees with this conclusion. She said that, while the number of religious students at Carleton has dipped slightly over the years, those who already identify as religious deepen their faith in college and gain important exposure to other religions, which Rev. Fure-Slocum often assists with.

I've seen a big shift in student religiosity over my years, and of course what everybody writes about is the falling numbers of religiously affiliated people but . . . while [I do see] the numbers slightly edging down on religious preference here at Carleton, the biggest shift for me is that the people who are religious are more religious and [have a greater] understand[ing of] their tradition than I've seen ever in my time [as a chaplain]. At the same time, they're more open to thinking about the possibility of truth in other religions and wanting to understand other religions. I think that combination of being religiously grounded in their own tradition and yet open to dialogue with other traditions is perhaps unique in history, or at least American history, and I think that's just an amazing combination of being able to speak particularly about their own faith but then listen deeply to other traditions and maybe even being shaped by them. I think that's pretty amazing. I think that's [a trend] being born out nationally… so I don’t think that this is just [happening at] Carleton.
—Rev. Carolyn Fure-Slocum

  1. Pew Research Center, "Religion Among the Millennials," February 17, 2010, https://www.pewforum.org/2010/02/17/religion-among-the-millennials/.↩

  2. Pew Research Center, "Religion Among the Millennials," February 17, 2010, https://www.pewforum.org/2010/02/17/religion-among-the-millennials/.↩

Carleton College Chaplain Fure-Slocum discusses seeing her role as primarily a facilitator of service and inter-religious dialogue.

Show Transcription

Well, I really see the role of the chaplain here [at Carleton] is to, I always say this, there's three parts to it. The first is to help people of all religious backgrounds to practice in whatever way is appropriate to them. So we have, I have a different way of doing services here so, well actually let me talk through the three and I'll come back to that. So it's to help people of a particular faith to practice in appropriate ways. The second is to help people to learn about other traditions, both for the sake of their own spriritual search but also for the sake of cross-cultural communcation and understanding. And the third is really to explore meaning in their lives whether they have a religious background or not. So, you know, 'Why and how are we here?' and 'What am I to do with my life?' kinds of big questions. So, everything we do is surrounding one of those three things if not all three at once. That said, I'd say my major emphasis has been on interfaith dialogue, so we have a very strong interfaith dialogue group on campus and then also on social justice work. So we have a social justice internship program for people to do internships during the summer within the U.S. that I helped launch. Then we have an interfaith social action group that's much like the Chicago Interfaith Youth Core work except we started it separately, that works on immigration issues primarily. So I'd say my, out of, out of those three huge topic areas I'd say my major emphasis has been on interfaith dialogue and social justice, big base social justice.

This exploration of other traditions is a valuable education for religious and non-religious students alike. In fact, Rev. Fure-Slocum has viewed her role as primarily a facilitator of service and inter-religious dialogue.

Well, I really see the role of the chaplain here [at Carleton] is to, I always say this, there's three parts to it. The first is to help people of all religious backgrounds to practice in whatever way is appropriate to them . . . The second is to help people to learn about other traditions, both for the sake of their own spriritual search but also for the sake of cross-cultural communcation and understanding. And the third is really to explore meaning in their lives whether they have a religious background or not. So, you know, 'Why and how are we here?' and 'What am I to do with my life?' kinds of big questions.
—Rev. Carolyn Fure-Slocum

Despite the work that Rev. Fure-Slocum and the Carleton Office of the Chaplain do to engage in cross-religious dialogue and to support the needs of the religious community, she admitted it is impossible to reach everyone. Even though the office hosts a plethora of events with other secular organizations on campus, there are some students and faculty who, as she said, "[have] no idea we even exist." She added that the Office of the Chaplain does "a huge amount of advertising . . . We're sort of a well-oiled machine when it comes to advertising but that doesn't mean people see it.” And since chaplains do not aspire to force religion but rather hope to foster dialogue, Rev. Fure-Slocum acknowledged that on Carleton’s campus there will always be "some people [who] think [that] I just send out death notices."