On Tuesday, Oct. 27, Stuart Religious Counselor Adam Kirtley presented a lecture entitled “Religious Diversity: Beyond Tolerance” in Prentiss Great Hall. His lecture was part of the Prentiss Hall Lecture Series.

The Prentiss Lecture Series was created by the spring 2007 Prentiss staff in the hope of providing an avenue for challenging Whitman students’ stereotypes regarding issues pertaining to themselves, other students on campus and the community outside of Whitman.

“We hope to challenge both conscious and unconscious stereotypes that exist on the Whitman campus,” Prentiss Resident Assistants Mariah Weston and Brianna Sullivan said in an e-mail.

The theme of this semester’s series is Expanding Horizons and is aimed at challenging students to investigate perspectives they previously haven’t considered.

Kirtley’s lecture focused on religious and spiritual life among college students and religious intolerance on college campuses.

“At Whitman just about 50 percent of students come in identifying with some specific faith background,” Kirtley said in the lecture.

Although this number is relatively low from a national perspective, it is not necessarily surprising for a college such as Whitman that is located in the Pacific Northwest, an area that is known for its lower numbers of religiously active people compared to other parts of the country.

Spirituality, however, far exceeds religiosity at Whitman, and many more students identify as spiritual than religious. According to Kirtley, 70 percent of Whitman students say that spirituality is important to them in some sense.

The high percentage of Whitman students showing a high degree of spiritual interest and involvement is on par with the national trend that is visible on college campuses across the country.

In the lecture, Kirtley offered explanation behind this trend. “Fundamental questions are being asked by college aged students: Who am I? Where am I going? What can I believe in? How can I be happy? And, will my life make a difference?

“I consider this mean-making to be a spiritual journey.”

Kirtley also highlighted the resources on campus for spirituality, which include the Spiritual Activities Room, the Spiritual Life Web site, interfaith services and the Spirituali-TEAs, discussions he hosted about spirituality.

Currently in discussion is the possibility of creating an interfaith residence section on campus.

Student feedback from the recent Spiritual Living Community survey has been both positive and negative, with some students welcoming and encouraging the idea whereas others are uncomfortable or weary of the idea.

What is especially telling is that although many students expressed their desire to live in such a community, they also noted that their fear of being negatively judged by the rest of the campus would prevent them from doing so.

“I feel like there is a stigma against religion on campus, even if it’s in jest, religion is not treated very well here,” was one student response to the survey, and many other responses made mention of Whitman students being intolerant of religion.

“I’m troubled by reports of religious intolerance happening at Whitman. I think some people deem this intolerance okay because religion is simply a choice. It is also, of course, deeply integrated into many people’s sense of themselves, their identity,” said Kirtley, who also discussed religious intolerance on college campuses nationwide.

“I thought [the lecture] would be more about the level of religious tolerance at Whitman, but I found it really interesting that there was quite a vibrant religious community here,” said first-year Nina Trotto, who attended the lecture. “Also, I found it very telling and kind of sad that Kirtley said that students were wary to pursue living in an interfaith section because they would be frightened.”

There are two more lectures in the Expanding Horizons series. On Nov. 6, Assistant Director of Residence Life Sean Gerhke will present “Talking About Your Generation.” Three weeks later on Nov. 27, Resident Director and Whitman Alumna Elana Stone will present “Gensex: Queer’s Not Just for Homo’s Anymore.”

Future lectures for next semester may focus on topics such as socioeconomic issues and political stereotypes.

“We encourage anyone to attend these lectures who wishes to ‘expand their horizons,'” Weston and Sullivan said in an e-mail. “Hopefully the Prentiss Lecture Series will encourage people to relate these issues to the world outside Whitman.”