The campus community is home to a wide variety of faith traditions. Here's an inside look at a few.
Christian groups 'love people where they are'
"I promise I'm not going to steal anything," said the
visitor, standing in the middle of a room of friends from Campus
Crusade for Christ. "I promise."
Hindu: Tradition points to tolerance for other faiths
If any examination of American religions writ large (or
Virginia Tech's religions writ small) it would be easy, though a
serious oversight, to look over the Eastern traditions that inform the
worldviews of many international students.
Islam: Diversity, education hallmarks of local Muslims
Goma Makhlouf sits quietly at his computer, a tablet of
Christian writing in Arabic script perched to his right. An Egyptian,
Makhlouf received his religious education at arguably the world's
greatest Islamic university, Al-Azhar in Cairo, and is now completing
his Ph.D. in translation and comparative religion at an Egyptian
university. He's a full-fledged Imam, a Muslim spiritual adviser and
scholar. Except, he's not taking on his craft from the crowded crush of
Cairo. Rather, you can find Imam Makhlouf right next to Kids' Heaven:
His new mosque, Masjid al-Hadaya (Mosque of Guidance), is adjoined to a
child daycare center in Blacksburg.
Judaism: For Blacksburg's Jews, life is 'Israel-ly good'
When associate professor of Judaic Studies Ben Sax
moved his wife and newborn child to Blacksburg from Chicago in the fall
of 2008, he was a bit daunted about relocating from a thriving Jewish
community to Southwest Virginia. And then he went to the DMV.
'Detectors' in hand, Freethinkers discuss tough issues
Jonathan Graf is not afraid of complexity. A Ph.D.
student in computer engineering, Graf works predominantly with IT
security. But there's a much simpler tool he's honed during his time as
a Freethinker.
Baha'i: Small group works for 'unity of mankind'
On a quiet Sunday afternoon in Baha'i youth education,
retired Tech professor Cosby Rogers is calmly encouraging five-year-old
Amelia Lester to offer her interpretation of the day's Baha'i prayer.
After several false starts, Amelia sings: "Oh my Lord, oh my Lord," and
then, with a broad smile, "I love everybody!"
Religious studies professors strike balance
Some of Blacksburg's most notable religious scholars aren't leading the
faithful in prayer on Friday afternoons, reading from the Torah on
Saturdays or standing at pulpits on Sundays. Their sacred space is the
second floor of Major Williams, their crumbling cathedral, Newman
Library. The six religious studies faculty members at Virginia Tech
provide a particular service to the university community in maintaining
the careful classroom balance necessary for contending with some of the
day's most heady questions.
Jennings: Getting personal with Christianity, senior leaned on faith in tough times
I've lived in Virginia Beach my entire life in a family
where my parents were always together. I didn't have a lot of
responsibilities or do many chores or anything, and we were always
financially stable, but I was always asked to perform well in school.
Up to middle school I hung out with the guys in my neighborhood whom I
had grown up with. I went to church maybe a couple of times when I was
younger, but I have no knowledge as to why we went. I was always
fidgety on the hard, wooden benches, and I hated it. I remember vaguely
saying that I was a Christian, but I wasn't in any sense of the word.
Belief: Dealing with evangelical upbringing through research
I grew up in a very conservative home, evangelical
charismatic, my mother, father and sister. Growing up speaking in
tongues was expected of me if I was a spiritually healthy practitioner
of our faith. We were also very politically conservative - my parents
taught me to not trust homosexuals. We voted Republican. I was in the
pro-Life club in high school where we took a public stance against the
Gay-Straight Alliance. That was me. I was Bible Boy.
The Hindu faith - what it holds for you and me
Hinduism is easily the oldest existing organized form of religion on
the face of the earth. The Hindu faith has about a billion adherents
around the world, migration from India having taken it to almost every
country on the planet. Hindus are known to be strongly attached to
their native social culture and traditional faith; research by the
Trinity College, Hartford, in 2008 indicated that a majority of Indian
scientists are believers, even with their rocket science and atomic
exploits. The number of Hindu gods and men of piety, and the volume of
Hindu religious texts would possibly far outnumber the corresponding
numbers of all other religions put together, at times even seeming
comical.
Religion provides life's foundation
Religion is a topic that can bring people close to form
unusually strong bonds and could, as well, result in hatred and
animosity beyond limits. So, writing this column is like stepping into
a minefield... With that in mind, let me "step in."
'He plays by his own rules': Belief in the face of uncertainty
I think I can say I get it. Christians seem bent on
taking a happy marshmallow-Peeps-filled Sunday and instead making it
about some grisly execution 2,000 years ago. I think I get the
confusion of those outside the church because for the bulk of my life I
was not a follower of Jesus and had no interest in it. To me it seemed
like a bunch of angry and boring male chauvinists protesting things I
had nothing against. Add to that the fact that they hung everything on
this very old book that seemed like it had an awful lot of holes.
'Invent the future' through discussion of faith traditions on campus
Virginia Tech, in its mission statement, values
"discovery and dissemination of new knowledge" and emphasizes "teaching
and learning, research and discovery." Perhaps that's what brought many
of us here in the first place, the promise of a university that fosters
a sort of marketplace of ideas among its students and faculty.
The outlook that is Freethinking
"Truth springs from argument amongst friends." - David Hume
Baha'i: Keeping the 'oneness of mankind' at the forefront of religious thought
In our lives, we are constantly encountering people
from different religious backgrounds. Some say that the confusion and
conflict in the world stems from the differences in religion. If we
look at religion in a positive light, seeing that they all come from
the same source, religion could have the opposite effect on the world,
bringing unity and oneness to our planet. Unity is the fundamental
teaching of the Baha'i Faith. We believe that all the world's religions
come from one God and that the religions are spreading one common
message. We seek to unite all the races and peoples in one universal
cause, one common faith. The Baha'i Faith is based on the concept of
progressive revelation, which suggests that God reveals religious truth
progressively throughout time. Baha'is follow Baha'u'llah and believe
that he is the promised one of our time whose teachings will enable
humanity to build a new world.
