More Boldly Articles
by Campus Ministry Staff

THE PROBLEM AND POSSIBILITY - EVANGELIZATION AT THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA.

Christus Rex Lutheran Campus Center at the University of North Dakota

A year has been spent with a capital improvement project. we affirmed the gift of a strong center - located in the middle of a campus of 12,500 students, a place you pass by regularly, if awake, going to class or attending an athletic event. In 1956, foresighted folk raised money - melted "ice" and built a building that would welcome UND strangers. It has worked well over the years but now needed brown arrows on the hallway walls white washed and furniture replaced. Hospitality was a regular theme of our dreaming. How can this place welcome people who enter and give voice to the ministry we are about? So we opened up some space, established a commons area, and made it impossible to not encounter flesh and blood upon entrance into the center. We freshened up office areas, a wonderful lounge, refurbished a chapel, gave new light to our worship center and wrapped the project in a new paint job inside and out. When you pass by these days there is evidence of life - new life - welcoming life - we believe. A new sign also brings security to our front yard at night and identity to our center at all times. A ministry of the ELCA, a National Lutheran Campus Ministry logo, and a reader board beneath where birthdays can be proclaimed and programs highlighted, and worship schedules presented. Colored banners that flutter in the wind and flank our front door, give evidence to the liturgical church year. I'm not sure if many realize why the colors change. Dave Hetland, an artist at Concordia College, is about designing four seasonal banners that will hang over the fireplace in the lounge, spotlighted at night, visible to those who pass, what they will give symbol to is yet to be determined - but we believe it is an important billboard.

So, how we look and what home is like is a part of the evangelism formula. Mary has studied at Christus Rex for the past two weeks and was at worship for the first time this weekend We have also redesigned our leadership system to enable creative conversation between students and community leaders focused around ministry concerns. Our Board and Student Council simply spent too much time doing business and too little time envisioning and for ministry. The new system is designed to welcome strangers soon after they arrive at Christus Rex. "So, what kind of things are you interested in?" we ask. And before long they might be-involved in a strategic planning ministry group.

And we surveyed our worshiping community and discovered that either one was worship leader/deacon, visitor, with little identity in between. We have established and associate membership that has a different sense of belonging to it and offers "forum" to talk with each other about stewardship of time/talent. The importance of spiritual growth and nurture through education, and an invitation to service.

We have recently written a mission statement for Christus Rex and used its theme of "Being a People of Promise, Purpose, and Hope,, as a headline for our community life this year. The Mission Statement has become the focus for a new brochure that attempts to snapshot the ministry of Christus Rex. I highlight these recent changes not sure how they have influenced our identity within the university or refocused our mission, but yet aware that hospitality has become the recurring theme of our consideration, both programmatically and in terms of our physical space. We want to look welcoming, we want to be inviting, we want to function respectful of where students are in their journey and what their needs seem to be. We know students seek different levels of intimacy when connecting with Christus Rex and we attempt to design programs and social activities that respect boundaries and recognize need for both closeness and distance. Henry Nouwen has written a wonderful little piece in Weavings entitled "Spirituality and the Family". "A mature family life is therefore a hospitable life. The mystery of love is that love creates space, not just for the immediate family members, but for strangers as well.

When a family is deprived of solitude and intimacy, there is no space for strangers. You know how uncomfortable it is to be guest in a family where members are living in tension with each other. There is no space for you ... But, when there is love, an unlimited space opens for others. The love between family members is greater than they themselves can contain. In their solitude and intimacy, they evoke a love that transcends the limits of human togetherness, they evoke a divine love of which they have become visible witnesses. Solitude creates the inner rootedness which allows for intimacy. Intimacy creates the space when our solitude can salute each other and be deepened and affirmed. Without solitude, intimacy degenerates into possessiveness; without intimacy, solitude degenerates into loneliness. Therefore, both solitude and intimacy are essential parts of the witness of the Christian family, a witness that points beyond the family members to God, from whom all love comes." (Weavings, Jan., Feb., 1988, p. 12). Nouwen causes me to wonder about the broader family of Christus Rex and its ability to welcome strangers into the community. North Dakota and Minnesota Lutheran students at UND are a somewhat humble lot. They are also uncertain of their gifts and wonder if their perceptions and insights warrant articulation, let alone memory.

Further; it is a community that deals with intimacy somewhat halting ways. Neighborhoods remain apart of the social fabric, but yet rugged individualism still models the preferred "image of self". The church has been center of community life for many of these folks, but through University education, they recognize their future vocational destinations will take them to less civilized places. They value their roots but recognize that prairie life" is at best an endangered system.

Evangelism at UND might pay attention to our student's sense of identity. Christus Rex can be a place of belonging but also a vehicle for serving. It can be a place that invites balance in university living in a unique way. Study and reflection, work and play, rest and silence, prayer and praise, word and sacrament, support and service, are all components of mature and faithful living. It is what we welcome people for, involve them in, and pay attention to.

I wonder if our invitation to those who pass by, those we study with, and to those we have around us, might be more engaging if we had a clearer sense of our own identity as individual and as a community. So that when we welcome the stranger we know what we welcome then to and what it is that we invite them to associate with and what it means to be a part of faithful community.

In Nouwen's terms, we need to be more confident in our love, for from that love springs solitude and intimacy and room for others to belong. The family is strong enough to expand its boundaries, the table is large enough to feed many more. Inclusiveness and diversity within the community does not endanger our sense of self but rather highlights the vastness of God's gracious gifts, and gives dimension to the blessings that make up community.

A baptismal story was told recently at Christus Rex - a Laurie Natwick story sifted through the proclamation head and heart of Kathy Fick. Years ago, a family stood around a baptismal font, celebrating the naming and new life of their daughter and sister. Mom and Dad, twin brothers three years of age, and sponsors representing extended family. Ordinary things happened that day - faith was affirmed, promises made, candle lighted, and the splashing of water with Trinitarian words. And in the quiet of family returning to their seats, one three year old could be heard saying to the other, "that was absolutely amazing". That three year old twin now turned 19 is a freshman at UND and was in worship the day the story was told. How might we invite Chris and so many friends like him to continue to be that kind of proclaimer and witness to God's work among us in this university.

What would be the impact of Chris' words to a neighbor, "You know I was at worship on Sunday at Christus Rex, fed with Word and hope, bread and wine, and it was absolutely amazing." Will you come with me next week?

Chris and many more know and believe that. They are wonderfully rooted in the heart of God and in the community of faith. They are about ministry in daily life all over this campus. We need to be better caretakers of solitude and intimacy and more courageous with our expression of self. But, most of all, we need to regularly say to those around us in word and work, in baptism, I'm a child of God and it is an absolutely amazing gift.

Buildings and signs can create welcome space, brochures and mission statements can reflect identities or at least priorities, but only faithful folk and a present Spirit can craft Christian community that embodies, and gives voice to that absolutely amazing gift. Immanuel - God with us - I wish I was better at this Advent stuff.