Although I’ve been away from the school almost twice as long
as I was there, this was only my second Homecoming since graduation. That might
not seem unusual for most. After all, I’ve rarely personally known adults who
return to their alma maters for homecomings unless it’s for a major reunion
year, and even rarely then. My bond with my college was different, though, and
if going to Homecoming meant seeing beloved professors and dear friends again,
then I imagined that I’d be there as often as I could.
But then spring semester of senior year happened, and the
school was shaken to its core. I won’t go into details here (although I have
written some about it in earlier posts), because it would take an entire book
to explain everything that happened. But the result of it all was that by graduation,
we knew many of our professors were leaving, and within a year, dozens of
faculty and staff who were our teachers, mentors, and friends were no longer
there. And many of them left severely hurting. It felt as if the school was
left with a giant, gaping hole, and the ones who remained were left to try to
hold things together all while dealing with their own grief.
The gut-wrenching, mind-boggling, exasperating, infuriating
circumstances of that semester led many in my graduating class to feel like
washing their hands of the school forever. The deep love that many of us had
for the school persisted, but the pain of seeing it as a shell of what it had
been during “the best years of our lives” was just too deep for us to willingly
subject ourselves to it again. And yet there were some dear faculty and staff
who remained, and it was the prospect of seeing them again—and a few close
friends who were going—that led me to go back for Homecoming a year and a half
after I graduated.
The emotional and physical reaction of just walking around
campus again knowing that there was so much that was unresolved, so much hurt
that was being ignored, so many people who should have still been there but
weren’t—it was almost overwhelming sometimes, and I left thinking, “Well, I can
say I’ve been to Homecoming. I don’t think I’ll be doing that again.” And over
the next several years, I didn’t.
But my affection for the school remained, and I couldn’t
quite stay away completely, so when I was invited to guest lecture in a class
two different years, I gladly accepted, and when I made solo road-trips in
summertime, I would make a pit-stop at the home of a professor whose family had
become a sort of adopted family for me while I was in school. Each visit was
marked by joy that was tainted by pain. Reuniting with loved ones was always
joyful, but there was no escaping the ache and sadness.
It wasn’t the nostalgic sadness that any graduated student from
any school can expect to feel when they see changes in their alma mater—new buildings,
face-lifted facilities, repurposed rooms, etc. Those types of changes are a
sign of life. But with each visit in my years as a young alumna, the change I
had to confront was the reality that the rippling effects of my senior year
were resulting in life being sucked out of the campus, and it felt as if that
type of change couldn’t and shouldn’t be accepted as merely part of the normal
passage of time.
During my last semester, we often described the once
vibrant, sunny campus as being covered by a proverbial thick, dark cloud. You
could feel the heaviness in the atmosphere that spring. And when I returned
each time after graduation, it was as if the cloud was slowly rolling away only
to have a vacuum fill its place instead of the crisp, fresh air of an engaged, invigorated
student body and campus community that was a hallmark of most of my time there.
When I returned and taught in classes, ate in the cafeteria, walked through the
heart of campus, and drove around its perimeter, the vibrancy that had
characterized my student experience was missing. Even as new classes of
students arrived who had no idea about what had happened a few years before, it
seemed as if the deep sense of community (a buzz-word at the college during my
time there), of togetherness, of family was gone.
So when we found out we would be able to attend Homecoming
this year, I had to emotionally prepare myself to go back. The driving force behind
our decision to visit was so that my husband could meet those faculty and
friends who are still there and, secondly, so that he could see the campus itself
just as I had seen my husband’s a couple of years earlier. Making the decision easier
was the knowledge that a much-needed first step toward change in leadership had
taken place since my last visit.
This change had prompted alumni of all ages to start discussing
re-engaging with the school, with people having differing opinions about whether
it was the right time to restart, or in the case of younger alumni, to begin their
support. The topic of attending Homecoming was part of that discussion, and
again people had mixed feelings. With so much still needing to be addressed,
would reinstating financial giving or returning physically to campus convey an acceptance
of the wrongs that had been done? Would it give the impression of turning a
blind eye to the hurt that so many are still living with four, six, seven years
later? These were all legitimate questions, as was the question one friend
asked me upon seeing me visibly happy and excited to be on campus, knowing that
we both still had so many issues with things that had gone on.
Her question about that weird dichotomy of being happy to be
in a place but still deeply saddened by its unresolved issues got me thinking
about the importance of balance when it comes to my relationship with my alma
mater, which in turn got me thinking about how that balance can be applied to
any part of life. It is certainly not healthy to paste on a smile in order to
plaster over the serious issues, the legitimate grievances, the deep-seated
pain that are prevalent in a given situation. Ignoring a problem doesn’t make
it go away, nor does the mere passage of time, and it can compound the problem
to pretend otherwise. But neither is it healthy to have a laser-focus only on
the bad to the point of ignoring the glimpses of hope, the legitimate growth,
the deep-seated joy that can be found. Acknowledging the existence of problems
doesn’t necessitate refusal to celebrate the good, and there is no point in
robbing ourselves of the opportunities to find and give joy even amid suffering.
Living in this dichotomous state can be challenging at times,
since we are essentially being pulled between the two extremes of response—in
this example, throwing in the towel and walking away forever or pretending the
last seven to ten years never happened. But my last visit to campus helped me
see that this middle ground is perhaps the healthiest, albeit most difficult, place
to be. It is the only ground which honors both our brothers and sisters in
Christ who have left and our brothers and sisters in Christ who remain.
It is the only ground which gives us space to fully stand up for what is right,
which includes both lauding the good and calling out the bad. And it is the
only ground from which we can join with those working to rebuild that thriving
atmosphere for students by encouraging them to keep up the difficult task of
striving for excellence and honoring Christ above all.
My four years at that tiny hilltop school shaped me in ways
I am still coming to realize, and I think one of those ways was training me to evaluate
the merits of all possible responses to a given situation to arrive at a conclusion
that is well-rounded and thoughtful. Ironically, or perhaps fittingly, the very
training I received at the college is what helped me arrive at this
middle-ground position regarding the school itself, and it is my fervent hope
that it can continue to be a place where students can have that intellectually
stimulating, socially developing, personally shaping, spiritually deepening,
generally invigorating experience that I did.
That’s why I will continue to encourage current faculty and
staff by enjoying and not neglecting our friendships. That’s why I will
continue to pray for leadership to be filled with godly wisdom, humility, and
love for both students and faculty. That’s why I will continue to expectantly
watch for the time when I can with a completely clear conscience give financially.
That’s why I will continue to pray for healing and for restoration of broken
relationships. That’s why I will continue to look forward to the day when young
alumni can be fully engaged. Because current students deserve to have all the benefits
and resources we had as they prepare themselves to make a difference in the
world.
For those of you readers who are part of the college’s
family, I pray you will join me in asking God to continue His work to bring
redemption and restoration not only for the sake of the many who are hurting but
also for the sake of the current student body. And for those who don’t have any
connection to the school, I pray you will give thought to areas in your own
life where you might be tempted to either sugar-coat the bad or overlook the
good and that you’ll seek to find that balanced middle ground where you can honestly
acknowledge the pains and the joys and move forward with them both in hand.
The awesome thing about God is that He knows all the bad and
all the good of every single situation, and He freely gives His wisdom to those
who ask (see James 1:5). So will you join me in asking Him to give us wisdom as
we seek to respond to situations from our limited perspective? May He help us learn
to see things increasingly as He sees them, and may our posture be one that
reflects the goodness and grace of God in Christ Jesus.
