Graduated in Faithfulness
Four Alumnae Reflect on Life in Christ at UVa Introduction by Ashley Mejias Director of Women's Ministires
INSIDE A Hidden Joy Move-In Day Lunch: Aug. 23
Praxis V12 N2
Summer 2008
Pr a xi s
The Kingdom and the Workplace
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truth of Jesus Christ to the campus, community, and world. A student-led ministry, Impact has no campus pastor; we do, however, have our relationship with Derek and Sue. The Mondeaus’ care for the members of Impact grew, not out of obligation or pity, but because they were compelled by the love of Christ. In the process, Impact members
f you’ve walked through the wooden front doorway of the Center for Christian Study, you might know the welcoming sounds of the building’s history that announce each visitor. Often, as I study, read, or wait for appointments in the bookstore lounge, I catch myself looking up to see who is coming into the building each time I hear the symphony of creakings and footsteps. I look because each individual who walks through our doorway is of great value to the larger story of Kingdom work. The Center’s vision, “to foster serious consideration in the university environment of a biblical worldview” and “to facilitate wise discussion of the Truth in light of the challenges of contemporary culture,” becomes incarnate in the Charlene Brown, left, with Leatrice Woods and Ifunanya Agbim at May graduation ceremonies. courage, strength, particularities, and pecu(photo courtesy of Charlene Brown) liarities of each person who is in and around began meeting with Derek and Sue at the this place. Center for discipleship and book studies. In these essays, you will meet four Then, last fall, I was also fortunate to extraordinary women who have frequently cross paths with Ashley Mejias, Director crossed the threshold of the Study Center of Women’s Ministries at the Study Center. and have headed out into the wider world. What is fascinating about Ashley is the We hope you find their stories illuminating depth of her interest in the lives of students. and encouraging. Ashley invests in students by discipling and encouraging them in their walks with Christ. When we started meeting, she challenged me By Charlene Brown in my perspective of Christian leadership and (A&S, B.A., Religious Studies, ’08) community, and the lifestyle that accompanies it. Our discussions have ranged from student am astonished at how God operates in life to racial reconciliation and community. our community. My experiences have Most important to me, however, is how I have greatly influenced the way I see God and been able to witness Ashley and many others think about the world as part of my story. at the Center really walk out their relationAs a May 2008 graduate, I often ships with Christ while walking alongside reflect on my undergrad experience at the students. The Center has shown me what it University of Virginia. This fall, I will be at Duke Divinity School in North Carolina, well means to be compelled by Christ’s love and to serve my community. Now I am challenged to aware of the great impact of my experience do the same. at the Study Center, where I was cared for, encouraged, and challenged in my walk with Christ. By Johanna Cluver The Study Center became a part of my (A&S, B.A., Religious Studies, ’08) story when I joined a Bible study at the Center on evangelism led by InterVarsity n May, as I packed up to leave the Christian Fellowship staff Sue and Derek University of Virginia, I stumbled upon Mondeau. During this time, I was President a long list of first-year undergraduate of the Impact Movement, a Christian felstudents who had attended a very hot wellowship whose mission is to equip Africancoming lunch four years ago at the Center for American and minority students to take the
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Johanna Cluver, continued from front Christian Study. When I gazed over the list, I quickly discovered that, since that day, I have come to know almost every person found on those pieces of paper. Be it within the Study Center itself, through one of the on-Grounds ministries, or even in a dorm or a class, the Study Center was an incredible facilitator of relationships throughout my college career.
it also provided me with the opportunity to give back to a community that has given so much to me. It offered me the chance to invite students into this community, where they are met not only with the hospitality that a warm house provides, but also by a thoughtful and engaging staff who genuinely care about the students here. My friendships with Shelly, Wes, Amy, and fellow fourth-year student Sarah Flint shaped my perception of the reality of Christ’s incarnation — and, in so doing, challenged me to live in light of that truth in this world. Thinking back to that welcoming lunch four years ago, with the Study Center decorated with balloons and filled with incoming first-year students, I then had no idea what role the Center and its staff would play in my college experience; now, I am thankful that it was such an integral part. By Sarah Flint (A&S, B.A., Art History, ’08)
Johanna Cluver, right, with Sarah Flint, center, and Shelly Pellish (photo courtesy of Johanna Cluver)
What began, through slightly awkward exchanges, as attempts to find a friend, progressed to deepening relationships with dear friends, friends with whom I have shared countless conversations, endless hours within and around the building, and, even, a dance party in the library when studying for exams became simply too tiresome. These friends took the form of both students and staff alike. My fiancé and I began our relationship on the Study Center balcony overlooking Chancellor Street. The following year, when he lived in a downstairs apartment in the Men’s Undergraduate Residential Program, I met and became friends with Wes Zell, Director of Undergraduate Ministries and the residential program. I grew closer to him and his wife, Amy, Director of Counseling Resources, as, among other shared interests, the Zells and I have an affection for the writings of author Flannery O’Connor, which supplied us with many a conversation and aided me as I wrote my thesis. Now we occasionally discuss O’Connor, but our focus has shifted to marriage as they help my fiancé and me prepare for that union through pre-marital counseling sessions. Also during the past year, the Center for Christian Study had another form of influence on my day-today life at UVa. Through the encouragement of Shelly Pellish, Director of Development, Alumni, and Parent Relations, I interned at the Study Center. Volunteering at the Center for Christian Study provided me with a view into non-profit work and left me hoping that I would again have opportunity to work in such an environment;
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came to the University of Virginia with the preconceived notion that it would be the ultimate high; a four-year stint of ultimate pleasure, fun, and joy. Instead, the past four years have been some of the most excruciatingly painful, excitingly eventful, utterly humbling, and all-around engaging moments, which together have given me a better sense of myself. I first found out about the Study Center during the spring semester of my third year, when I attended a seminar on Beauty & the Body and met Shelly Pellish, who was sitting next to me. I struck up a conversation with Shelly, who is the Center's Director of Development, Alumni, and Parent Relations, and later that semester she and I began meeting for coffee. During one of those conversations, I told her about my interest in learning about nonprofit work, and she offered me a fourth-year internship organized through the UVa Internship Program. It was
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Move-In Day Lunch 2008 for incoming first-years and their families
Saturday, August 23, 2008, 12 noon at the Center for Christian Study Unload the U-Haul and then come enjoy lunch and conversation with Grounds ministers, University faculty, and other incoming students.
RSVP: Shelly Pellish, shelly@studycenter.net or 434.817.1050
For directions and parking information, visit our website, www.studycenter.net.
Pursuing the Kingdom in the Workplace Darden Students Hear from Leading Laypeople By Justin Holcomb Director of Graduate Ministries
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edge funds, NASA, microcredit, and chicken sandwiches usually have nothing in common. But students in Darden Christian Fellowship (DCF) see Christian witness throughout James B. “Buck” the marketplace; this past year they again learned from business leaders McCabe of Chickwho practice their faith in a wide range of vocations. fil-A spoke at Darden Christian Fellowship Students and others heard in November from Craig Colberg, a hedge (photos by Carl Briggs) fund manager with Rivanna Capital in Charlottesville, who spoke to about 100 people on “The Supernaturally Changed Heart.” In February, about as many people listened to James B. “Buck” McCabe, senior vice president of finance and chief financial officer for Chick-fil-A, Inc. McCabe, a 30-year veteran of the restaurant chain headquartered in Atlanta, spoke on “More Than Profit.” (The company's official statement of corporate purpose says that the business exists “to glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that is entrusted to us, and to have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A.”) Also in February, DCF organized the forum “Faith in the World View.” Dr. Cyprian Ejiasa, the chief financial officer of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center near Washington, D.C., spoke about the intersection of career, family, and faith. After his presentation, he led a discussion with 60 students and faculty members on religion in various business settings. And in April, Craig Cole of Vienna, Va., spoke to 65 students and faculty on “Microcredit: Fighting Poverty, Creating Jobs, and Transforming Lives.” Cole is executive director of Five Talents International, a non-profit organization that fights poverty using small loans and business training. Jennifer Chick, who served this year as DCF president and graduated in May, said, “Part of the reason that I chose to come to Darden was because of the presence of Darden Christian Fellowship. I wanted to be able to share this life-changing experience with other believers, and DCF provided a home for me to share my fears, to explore what God has in store for my future and to help me grow in my faith.” DCF’s regular weekly meetings on Tuesday afternoons draw about 25 Darden students, faculty, and staff for lunch, fellowship, and presentations on timely issues facing the Christian in the business world today. Among this year's topics were “Keeping it in Perspective,” “The Art of Influence,” “Risking Your Life for the Lord in Your Career and Workplace,” and “Opportunities and Strategies for Christian Business People to Impact the Kingdom of God.” DCF seeks to serve the Darden community and to explore the intersection of business and faith in Jesus
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2008 F all P rograms 008 2 l Fa l g ra m s Pro -> -
Courses
Lecture Series
Christian Worldview: Living the Story
What is the Bible, and Where Did It Come From? Instructor: Drew Trotter; Oct. 20, Nov. 3, 10, 17
Apologists, Fathers, Monks, Scholastics: The History of the Church to 1500 A Story in Search of an Ending: Interpreting the Old Testament within History and Scripture The first two courses will begin September 11; the third will begin September 12. Courses meet weekly for 12 weeks. Seminary credit is available, and is optional.
Violence Against Women Instructor: Lindsey Holcomb; Oct. 22, Nov. 5, 12, 19
Saturday Seminars Understanding the Bible, September 27 Understanding Theology, October 22
Registration opens July 15 at the website of the Center for Christian Study, www.studycenter.net.
Sarah Flint, continued from left inside page through this program at the Center that I found the space, finally, to explore some profound truths about myself and the reality of the experience I was having in college. At the Center, I met once a week with Ashley Mejias, Director of Women’s Ministries, for fellowship and directed readings. Ashley gave me a safe space to uncover some of my deepest fears, weighted questions, and haunting vulnerabilities. My struggle to understand my own spirituality in comparison with the faith of others was softened and reassured by her teachings that I have to be who God has made me to be. I cannot tell you whether I am a Christian; I don’t have a definitive answer to that for certain yet. I can tell you that I have prayed in Ashley's office, desiring of God to be known and loved by Him. My deepest fear is that I will never know my purpose in life. But my worth is not in what I do, but in who I am. I intellectually understand that statement and its value to my life; if only I could perfectly embody it. To take that from my head, to combat my ego and wrap that statement of worth tightly around my heart, opening myself to what God has yet to uncover within me — that demands a great deal of letting go, some mistake making, and a little hurt. However, those moments of freedom have brought me tremendous peace and joy, as well as the ability to give, love, and serve others. I pray now that I will remember the feelings of my four years, constantly uncover the greatness that I often fear, and sharing my sensitivity to and compassion over these things with others. My experience at the Study Center has been undoubtedly founded and reflected in its mission: I have been provided a space for “individual investigation of truths” in a university setting pulsing with “questions raised by contemporary society,” and I have been “transformed by the Truth, which is [here] reflected in [my] thoughts and actions.” By Betsy Hutson (A&S, B.A., Political Philosophy, Policy, and Law; and Religious Studies, ’08)
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fter interning with International Justice Mission last summer, I felt God leading me to launch a campus chapter for the organization upon my return to the University of Virginia last fall. I have witnessed how students are often the most effective agents of change; I began envisioning the amazing ways God could work through a chapter whose members were from Christian fellowships and social justice organizations. One year later, I can now look back and see the ways that God did indeed work through the IJM campus chapter. Over the past year, chapter members gathered for weekly meetings in the Chapel to pray over IJM’s casework overseas.
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THE STAFF & CENTER . . . Ashley Mejias spoke June 19 at the Annual Atlanta Regional Dinner & Conversation to UVa alumni, families and other supporters on Grace & Imagination at the home of Hyland and Hal Justice. . . Bill Wilder taught the Circle Teaching Fellowship at Trinity Presbyterian Church, Charlottesville, April 13 and 20, and June 1, 8, and 15. . . Shelly Pellish met with alumni, friends, and other supporters of the Center for Christian Study in the Atlanta area June 17 - 19. . . Drew Trotter spoke twice at a National Faculty Leadership Conference, The Heart of the University, sponsored by Faculty Commons, in Washington, D.C., June 26 - 27. He spoke on The Five Academy Award Nominees for Best Picture and What They Tell Us About Ourselves and How to View a Movie Responsibly. . . Drew will be attending the Consortium of Christian Study Centers meetings in Minneapolis July 25 - 27. . . He also will be the featured speaker Sept. 13 at The Gathering, a dinner in Philadelphia for professionals, sponsored by Dave Balch.
August 8 - 9 Anniversary Canceled The 40th Anniversary Celebration for the Center for Christian Study, previously scheduled for August 8 - 9, has been canceled. DCF, continued from center page Christ, encouraging students, partners, faculty, and staff through teaching, prayer, and Bible study. As a community of believers from various churches, it fosters mutual support, fellowship, and spiritual growth for students at Darden. In addition to weekly meetings and large events, DCF holds a twice-monthly Friday Bible study and a Wednesday night Bible study group for spouses of students. Recent graduate Itosedehi Ojo, who served on the DCF leadership team, summed up the ministry of Darden Christian Fellowship this way: “DCF provided an avenue for me to maintain my connection with God and fellow Christians in the midst of the challenges of Darden and the busyness of the school and what seemed like an isolated environment. Through the guest speakers and fellowship with fellow Christians I was reminded constantly of my walk with God and to see the intersection of my studies and business endeavors in the light of God’s calling.”
F r o m photo by Eric Kelley
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P r e s i d e n t
A Hidden Joy
wo marks of a human being seem to me indisputable: our finitude and our fallibility. My mother used to say that there was one doctrine she never had to have proved for her because she saw it from the very beginning of each of her children’s lives: original sin. She never had to teach us how to sin; we knew that one instinctively! Just as clear, it seems to me, is the finitude of man. I can remember thinking when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon and delivered his famous line, “One small step for man; one giant leap for mankind,” how silly that seemed. What was so giant about it? It took all that time and money to get to the moon, and look how far away still we are from even the next planet in our solar system, not to mention the stars. And yet, we don’t seem comfortable with our finitude. Some of our great artists have blindly pursued the infinite creation. Composer Richard Wagner aspired to create the ultimate work of art in the Ring Cycle, combining all the art forms — music, painting, singing, theatre, poetry — into one great artistic work, doing so just 22 years before the creation of a new form of art that was to dominate the 20th century: Film. How ironic. Wagner sought to bring all art together and create the final “answer”, and does so just in time to become essentially irrelevant. Only a few ever experience what really is an amazing piece of art any more. The world has moved on. And the aspiration to perfect mankind is not unknown in our lifetime either; in fact, it seems to be common among those who reject God’s sovereignty in human affairs. Richard Dawkins, the famous microbiologist and atheist, predicts that evolution will eventually create a humankind able to control the universe and eradicate every evil from the face of the earth. William Faulkner declared in his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize: “I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail.” Dawkins claims to represent the scientific community, but he could not be making such predictions based on evidence. Humankind has done much but is far from any sense of control over our destiny; every one of us dies, and always will. Faulkner, the romantic artist, is hoping, but in what? Mankind? In his defense, Faulkner delivered his speech a mere five years after the defeat of Hitler. The future of the world looked rosy. A lot of water has gone under the bridge since then.
Nevertheless, belief in man’s potential infinity is more understandable than belief in his moral perfectibility. God has declared us His vice regents on earth, and we demonstrate His gifts to us of intelligent progress in both the arts and the sciences every day. The greater problem is our fallibility. Without it we would joyously embrace our finitude, like the hrossa in C. S. Lewis' book Out of the Silent Planet, but because of it — especially of its core, pride — we labor to “get better”, not for God’s sake, but in order to achieve the status of divinity, a status we will never reach. We even ennoble that quest, as Milton sadly ennobled Satan in Paradise Lost, when there is no nobility to it. We already are, because of His gracious, creative choice, as “like” God as we can ever be, and we are from conception, for we are created imagini deo. This has been the root of sin ever since the Garden: we want not just to be like God. We want to be God. Our finitude can be frustrating. I am short, and I know how exasperating it is just barely not to be able to reach that light bulb, resigning oneself to getting the stepladder. But do I really want to be infinite in power? Logic dictates there can only be one infinite being, and, if God exists, He must be infinite. We believe that He does exist, and for good reason; He reveals Himself in a thousand ways each day, if we are only humble enough to look. If we want to be infinite, too, the only reasonable outcome would be war in heaven, and we would be sure to lose. In fact, our finitude is a hidden joy. When we learn to embrace it, several things result. We can celebrate because, even though we are limited, the Limitless One invites us to the great privilege of contributing to the building of His Kingdom. We were made for that purpose, and nothing can be as enjoyable. Secondly, we can be confident in what striving we do on behalf of the kingdom, because we now have a realistic goal. Everything we do, we do to please Him, the easiest goal to reach of all since He, like any good Father of toddlers, is simply delighted in our striving, not in our achievement. Lastly, we can be at peace in the assurance that, even if we fail to succeed in our efforts, we are protected by the King Who does not fail. He will prevail, and the Kingdom of which He assures us in His word is one of light and joy.
— Drew Trotter
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Visit the Center's Web Site at: www.studycenter.net
The Center for Christian Study is a non-profit education and outreach ministry serving the University of Virginia and Charlottesville-Albemarle region since 1968. Through programs, ministries, and partnerships, we provide opportunities and resources for the corporate and individual investigation of the truths of the historic Christian faith. Some of the ways we do this include courses, lectures, seminars, student-run fellowships, internships, mentoring opportunities, discussion groups, and special events. We proceed believing that men and women will be transformed by the Truth, which will be reflected in their thoughts and actions, both in their private lives before God and in their public lives as members of society, the family, and the Church. Center for Christian Study 128 Chancellor Street Charlottesville, VA 22903 Phone: 434.817.1050 www.studycenter.net Praxis is published quarterly for our friends and supporters. Carl Briggs, Editor carl@studycenter.net University Christian Ministries, Inc. (dba Center for Christian Study) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation EIN 51-0192618.
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Betsy Hutson, continued from inside page We met for a weekly book study on The Good News About Injustice, by IJM founder Gary Haugen. We also organized a threeday awareness campaign on the UVa Lawn called “Faces of Injustice,” and students heard from Sean Litton, vice president of investigations at IJM, about his experiences in the field. More importantly, though, the IJM campus chapter truly came to know, love, and embody God’s heart for justice, and it became an effective catalyst to raise awareness, advocacy, and action among students. None of this could have been done without the support of the Center for Christian Study. From the beginning, Ashley Mejias, Director of Women's Ministries at the Center, provided encouragement to launch the chapter. She committed to pray for the group, and she continued to offer insight and support throughout the year. The Study Center always opened its doors to provide meeting space for book studies, movie screenings, and special events. On a more personal note, the Study
Center helped me process life at UVa and Christian formation in incredible ways. The Study Center has been a place to study, find community, and explore both my academic and vocational passions. In addition to being an invaluable resource, the Study Center truly embodies and understands the truth that has become engraved on my heart and lies behind IJM’s work: our God is a God of justice, and He has called us, as His followers and children, to partake in His work of justice. “Learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow.” Betsy served on a spring break mission trip with the Nicaraguan Orphan (Isaiah Fund ministry, which was begun by a 1:17) UVa student. (photo by Will Bratton)