A History of the Chaplaincy at Depauw University

History of the Chaplaincy at DePauw A History of the Chaplaincy at DePauw University Katherine E. Smanik Conversations about the spiritual lives of college students continue to grow within the student affairs profession. However, one area that has received little attention in this conversation is the role of chaplaincy in helping students explore their religious identities and providing spiritual care for the campus community. This paper traces the history of the chaplaincy at DePauw University as a way to look at shifts in perception of the role of religion in higher education. These shifts are significant because in a span of 70 years understandings of how one should engage religion have moved dramatically from a focus on Christian evangelism to a focus on engagement with religious pluralism. Chaplains have done this work for decades and offer a unique perspective on how to support college student religious and spiritual development in a rapidly changing environment. In 1985 the president of Carleton but the most religiously conservative of College, Robert Edwards, called a institutions, with each institution engaging committee to review the role of the these shifts in its own way. Considering the chaplaincy at that institution. In his charge way that the role of the chaplain was defined he asked, “Why does a non-sectarian at one institution, in light of the outside institution concerned with the intellectual forces that shaped that work, offers insight development of students enter the domain of for student affairs professionals as they religion - beyond that embraced by its consider how to meet the needs for religious Department of Religion?” (Colwell, 2016, p. and spiritual development in their students, 92). Using Edwards’ question as a starting and more broadly on the campus. point this paper will trace the history of the chaplaincy at DePauw University and apply The Early Religious Landscape a framework for understanding religious life at DePauw created by a DePauw faculty member to assist in understanding the shifts that Founded in 1837 by Methodists in occurred in this work. In a 1960s review of Indiana, DePauw University has remained the DePauw Council of Religious Life, affiliated with Methodism for the entirety of faculty member David A. Crocker created a its history. DePauw University was framework for understanding religious life established with the notion that it would be, in higher education by identifying a series of “forever to be conducted on the most liberal shifts from support for religious particularity principles, accessible to all religious to engagement with religious pluralism. This denominations, and designed for the benefit framework, though never published, and of our citizens in general” (DePauw thus not universally acknowledged, is useful University, n.d.) For the first 125 years the for the way it describes a move made by campus had no chaplain. Prior to the many institutions as they engaged with creation of the position many individuals increasing cultural secularism. The shift held responsibility for the ongoing religious from religious particularity to engagement life of the campus from the religious with religious pluralism was embraced by all leadership of the local Methodist church, 17 History of the Chaplaincy at DePauw Gobin Memorial United Methodist Church little remembered the religious dimensions to the University’s Council on Religious of Buckley’s argument were just forty years Life. The council, founded in 1948, later, writing that “[i]t seems almost consisted of representatives of a wide inconceivable that there could have been a variety of Christian denomination-based national controversy involving the question groups as well as representatives from of whether a major university was Unitarian and Jewish student organizations sufficiently Christian” (1994, p. 10). (Council on Religious Life, 1960) and was Marsden suggested that by the 1990s no responsible for a wide array of religious major university would want to be programming. considered Christian at all. This change Like many small, religiously affiliated came about as a result of enlightenment liberal arts colleges DePauw wrestled with thinking which proposed that, “religious the role of religion on campus. Many of viewpoints... were... unscientific and these institutions were founded in the mid- socially disruptive” and liberal to-late 1800s at a moment when there was a Protestantism, which allowed the exclusion strong voice for the protestant evangelism of of religious viewpoints “on the grounds that the Midwest. This notion held that by simply traditional Christian beliefs were planting Protestant Christian colleges the unscientific…[and]... that cultural Protestant Christian viewpoint would remain development advanced the Kingdom of dominant over Catholic voices, which had God” (Marsden, 1994, p. 429). increased with immigration. However, these DePauw’s chaplaincy, like many others, institutions could not afford to identify only was born into this debate and the beginning with the denominations that founded them. of this chaplaincy must be read in light of In order to remain viable they had to educate responses like Buckley’s to shifts in the all students who were able to attend, religious identity of higher education. As regardless of the religious affiliations of higher education lost its distinctly Protestant those students (Marsden, 1994). The rise of Christian character, institutions responded to new forms of scholarship also forced critiques that they were not properly changes in theological understanding about attending to the religious needs of their the role and authority of Christian teachings. students by hiring chaplains. The chaplain Just as the structure of the curriculum was to ensure that young men and women changed from a prescribed model designed remained connected to their religious to educate clergy to a broader curriculum identity, or obtained the correct Protestant designed to elevate new forms of Christian identity, while they were in scholarship and scientific research so, too, college. In addition, these positions relieved did the role and understanding of religious the university president of the burden of identity change. In his history, The Soul of planning chapel services and often took on the American University, George M. teaching responsibilities. Marsden argues that this gradual change In the 1954-1955 academic year came to a head in the 1950s with William F. DePauw University received a grant from Buckley, Jr.’s publication, God and Man at the Board of Education of the Methodist Yale. In this publication Buckley contended Church to study the religious attitudes and that Yale had become a, “hotbed of atheism backgrounds of DePauw students (Riggs, and collectivism” (Marsden, 1994, p. 10) 1956). This report utilized four separate playing on fears of communism. Marsden survey types to consider the religious contends that what is most surprising is how identity of students, their religious 18 History of the Chaplaincy at DePauw education, the way that they understood address religious life on campus. In the first religious and social concepts, and how they model, religious life was Protestant and spent their time with regard to engagement Christian in character. This model with religious activities. While the author represented the early stages of chaplaincy in indicated that the results of each section higher education with its focus on the were given without analysis, the format and perpetuation of Protestant Christianity. This questions contained within the document model was commonplace into the 1950s but show a bias that responds to Buckley’s was slowly being unsettled. In the second challenge to Yale in 1951. Little to no model religious life expanded, remaining attention was given to non-Christian Christian but broadly so by including students and the focus of the results was on Catholic voices. The second model reflected the largest percentage of respondents in any the transition in chaplaincy in the 1960s and category: mainline Protestants. The 1970s, which was perceived as broadly document affirms DePauw’s continued Christian and sometimes attended to other commitment to mainline Protestant religious traditions in an effort to engage Christianity and seems to assuage any campus pluralism. The third model concern that this college, which still embraced interfaith engagement and identified publicly as a Christian institution, transformed the Council to an interfaith was at risk of walking away from that council. The third model was a truly heritage. However, this image of what type interfaith chaplaincy which allows for of religious life was most important was students, faculty and staff to grow in their already shifting on campus. As DePauw particular religious convictions while also began to consider adding a chaplain to its encouraging them to learn about how to staff, the Council on Religious Life was build healthy communities in a religiously trying to assess its purpose in an pluralistic environment. In this model increasingly secular institution. chaplains cared for all faculty, staff and students through programming designed to Crocker’s Framework for engage religious literacy, attend to the ritual Understanding Religious Life needs of the community, encourage the faith development of individuals in the religious In 1960, David A. Crocker wrote a identity of their choosing, and support the review of DePauw’s Council on Religious right of individuals to identify with

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