NICOLE MILLER/Daily Bruin Diana Chapman
Walsh speaks about "College and the Search for Meaning in
a Contentious World" on Thursday.
By Christina Jenkins
Daily Bruin Contributor
Teaching spirituality on campus is appropriate claims one
leading lecturer on education, but some students question whether
it’s possible to divorce spirituality from religion.
Quoting the Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama, Diana Chapman Walsh,
president of Wellesley College, defined spirituality as love,
compassion and forgiveness ““ everything that brings happiness
and health to others.
And because 20 percent of American adults say they are spiritual
but not religious, Chapman Walsh said spirituality does not
necessarily involve faith.
“Religion is something we can perhaps do without,”
Chapman Walsh said to the 75 students and faculty at
Thursday’s “College and the Search for Meaning in a
Contentious World” lecture in the Faculty Center.
Some students, however, are concerned by the distinction between
religion and spirituality.
“I don’t think plain-out spirituality without
religion is worth anything. Spirituality without religion is like a
search in the dark,” said Ryan Bradel, a fourth-year
political science student and member of Alpha Gamma Omega,
UCLA’s Christ-based fraternity.
Fourth-year philosophy student Wolfgang Behm said whether a
distinction exists depends on how one defines religion and
spirituality.
“Should things such as love and philanthropy count as
spiritual?” Behm said. “What reason do we have that
there is a distinction between religion and
spirituality?”
The Graduate School of Education and Information Studies invited
Chapman Walsh to speak partly because of her work in organizing a
symposium at Wellesley called “The Education as
Transformation Project.”
The symposium aimed to educate members of 13 religions on campus
about religious pluralism and spirituality in higher education.
Citing the willingness of people to address spirituality on
campus as the reason for its popularity, Chapman Walsh said the
connotation of spirituality ““ which she jokingly referred to
as the “S-word” ““ has kept people from staging
similar events.
Bradel likened the connotation of spirituality to a “to
each his own” attitude. To him, religion implies truth.
Despite this connotation, core values must be integrated into
classroom instruction, said Chapman Walsh.
“Today’s college students need spiritual
qualities,” she continued. “We fail them if we send
them off with diplomas but with no means to create a culture of
moral companionship.”
Quoting Mahatma Ghandi, Chapman Walsh said to the audience to
“be the change you want to see.”
Uma Jayakamar, a first-year graduate student in higher
education, said that she had thought about the connection between
education and spirituality before and that she enjoyed hearing
Chapman Walsh articulate it.
First-year graduate student in higher education, Ellen
Stolzenberg said many students focus solely on academics but they
should strive for personal growth as well.
“There’s no reason you can’t develop your
inner self too,” she said.