The King’s College Community through a non-Catholic’s Perspective
Sometimes I find myself reflecting on why I chose King’s College in the first place. Although I was raised Catholic, I did not pick King’s for its religious preference to Catholicism; in fact, I chose this school for other reasons. In 2012, I was a high school senior who had no idea where she wanted to go but knew she wished to further her education. My family was limited on paying tuition for school, and I had poor SAT scores. Because of these things, I decided to apply to my sister’s alma mater, King’s College. Within a few months of submitting my application, I received my acceptance letter in the mail. I thought little about the religious aspect of the school until the night before my first day. I was worried that I would not fit in because I am not a practicing Catholic.
After a while, I started to wonder if the concern I had about not fitting in was anything similar to what other non-Christian students might have felt. To put my curiosity to bed, I decided to interview non-Christian students and faculty members on campus.
However, there was something stopping me from getting the answer that I wanted: I am terrified of talking to strangers about religion. I’m afraid I’m like this because I don’t want to offend the person I’m talking to; because of my fear, I ignore the topic of religion at all social gatherings. Every time I think about how people talk about religion I picture my Western Civilizations classes, and how every time two social groups disagreed on religion, wars and bloodshed broke out. I understand that this is an irrational fear, but it’s my fear nonetheless.
With this fear in my head, I carefully crafted interview questions that I believe, or at least hoped, would not offend anyone when I interviewed them.
King’s College freshman Courtney Pisano was my first interviewee. We met in the Corgan Library on campus. I fumbled with my bags while I tried to find my interview questions that I had put so much effort into, and yet I couldn’t find them. I pulled out my iPhone to record our conversation, and I thought to myself, now I have to wing it, great. Courtney looked at me, and at the same moment we smiled at each other.
Courtney is a freshman here at King’s and is a Communications major. She is a commuter who lives with her parents, and just recently welcomed a new important person into her life; she’s a new mom. I started by asking her if her parents ever thrusted any particular religion on her upbringing.
“They never forced me to believe in anything,” Courtney says. “I went to Catechism like three times, and never went again, so uh. I guess you can say I never really fully experienced it.” “Having a religion to practice, I mean.”
Courtney shifted her left leg to cross her right.
“So would you classify yourself as an Atheist or Agnostic?” I asked.
Courtney’s lips form into a frown. Her electric blue eyes reflect off of the lighting in the library. “No, I wouldn’t say that. I believe in God, I just don’t have a particular way I show my worship.”
There was a silence between us when I tried to come up with more questions. To fill up the empty silence, I told Courtney some of my CCD class stories.
I eventually got Courtney to laugh and soon, I realize that talking about religion doesn’t have to be a scary. Hey! Look at me go! A few minutes into the interview and I hadn’t offended Courtney. I asked her if she feels comfortable here at King’s and what made her come to this school.
“I initially wanted to go away to school, but once I had my baby, I wanted to stay local. I was stuck between King’s and Misericordia. In the end, I chose King’s because I liked the small campus and everyone is sweet here.” she said. “I was worried that I wouldn’t fit in because I’m not Catholic, but once got here, I noticed that there are many other religions represented on campus.” she said.
“Have you ever participated in the campus religious activities here at King’s?” I asked.
“Actually yeah, I have. I want to get more involved in Catholicism because I want to get my son baptized, and I want him to have some kind of a religious background growing up,” she said.
Courtney looked nervous to me, and I wondered why until I remembered the conversation we had through email a few minutes before we met; she had work right after the interview. Our departure from each other is slightly awkward. In just a few minutes, I felt like I had a conversation with one of my very good friends. I was half tempted to hug her like she’s one of my best friends, but I didn’t want to intrude on her personal space. Instead, we smiled at each other and part ways.
I tossed and turned in my bed that night while I thought about Courtney and our conversation. I rolled over to my nightstand and picked up my iPhone. I logged into to Facebook and searched Courtney’s name into my Facebook search bar. Yes, I was Facebook stalking my interview. I found Courtney’s page, and on it, I saw countless photos of her with her son. I want my son to grow up with some kind of a religious background; her words echoed in my head while I drifted off to sleep.
The next day I woke up to the sensation of my iPhone buzzing from a new email. It read “RE: Interview Help: Please help.” Yes! Someone finally responded to my email! For the past two weeks, I had been trying to find students and faculty members to interview. With a bunch of no replies in my pocket, I was worried that I would never get answers to my questions. The only reason why I landed Courtney’s interview the day before was because I emailed Kelly Lettieri , the head of Career planning, and desperately asked her to connect me with some students to talk to.
I replied to the email Dr. Fevzi Akinci sent me and I hit send. Dr. Akinci is the Associate Dean of the William McGowan School of Business at King’s, and his title makes heart palpitate too quickly. Doctoral level professors intimidate me.
Although talking to Courtney was a breeze for me, I felt like my conversation with Dr. Akinci was going to be a new ball game. Courtney was easier to talk to because her religious faith is much like mine; she questions everything and doesn’t particularly identify with a specific religion.
Dr. Akinici, on the other hand, to my knowledge, which is very little, is probably heavily cemented in his faith. Because he is more cemented in his belief, I probably run more risk of offending him due to my lack of knowledge about of other religions.
With this in my mind, I hesitantly walked up to Dr. Akinci’s office Monday morning and knocked on the door. His office door was see-through, and so I could see him at his desk, typing away at some document. He rose from his chair and opened the door for me.
He flashed a smile, and I relaxed a bit and placed my backpack near a chair. Dr. Akinci is a short man, reaching almost the same height as me at five-feet tall, but aside from his size, he is a lot more professional in the way he walks and stands in posture than me.
I took a seat across from him and slouch in my chair. Once again, I had issues finding my interview questions in my backpack, but this time, I found them and I took out my iPhone.
I asked Dr. Akinici if I can record our conversation and he says yes. While I press the start button, he hands me one of his business cards. He’s so professional and proper. Here he was wearing nice dress pants and an extravagant sweater with a white button down underneath; and yet, here I was, wearing the stereotypical college student attire; sweatpants and sweatshirt and all.
Dr. Akinci said that he was born and raised in Turkey. He was raised Muslim and continues to practice the Muslim faith to this day.
I looked around his office. It’s tidy and well kept, and I noticed there was a few trinkets of his that have Turkish words written on them.
Dr. Akinci has been working here at King’s for three and a half years. Before he was a teacher, he was a junior faculty member from 1998 to 2004. His job here at King’s was his very first place of employment. He talked about his interview process with me.
“Throughout the whole interview process, I was more concerned about making sure the college valued my credentials.” Dr. Akinci said.
” Religion never became an issue, but I was aware that the school was Catholic, but even with that said, a lot of the values my religion believes in are very similar to what the Catholic religion and the King’s College mission upholds to.”
I said something strange like, ” I’m glad, that’s great.” I’m not exactly sure why I said this; I think it’s just so I can hear my own voice. I’ve been quiet throughout the whole interview because Dr. Akinici had been doing most of the talking. And quite frankly, I’m perfectly okay with this because he kept answering all of my questions, and I don’t have to stop to ask them. I’m transfixed into his story. And our conversation feels like a typical student-teacher meeting to discuss grades. It’s very formal, and I felt like he was sharing small grains of wisdom with me. Then our conversation became more reflective for Dr. Akinici.
“I was reflecting on this the other day because you contacted me,” he says. “When 9/11 happened, I was a junior faculty member here, and Muslims were having a difficult time in America. But while I was here at King’s, my colleagues reached out to me and asked me if I was okay” he says. “I can honestly say that King’s College is a home for me.”
His words were so fresh that I forgot that I have a class starting soon. I wish I could sit there all day and listen to his stories about his country and his religion but I cannot, and I’m sure he had assignments to get to. I turned the recorder off on my iPhone and placed it in my bag. I thanked him for helping me with my project. Like the natural gentleman that he is, Dr. Akinci escorted me out of his office.
The next day Dr. Akinici emailed me and sent me another student’s email that I could interview. This student’s name is Amer Albishi. He does his work study in the International Student Recruitment Office on campus and helps the international students transition into the King’s College community.
I reached out to Amer through email and we agreed to meet at the student center on campus. Two days later, I walked into the campus student center sit on a chair and place my bags on the floor. I cross my legs and pick up a campus flyer. For a few minutes, I smile at every guy that comes into the campus center. Each and every one of them looks at me quizzingly and passes me by. I don’t know what Amer looks like.
A few more minutes pass, and I get spooked by a young fellow that runs up to me from behind. It’s Amer and he looks tired and he’s panting as if he just ran a 5K.
“Hi, I’m sorry I’m late,” he said.
“It’s okay, I’m just jumpy, ” I replied.
We walked back to the International Student Recruitment Office together and Amer started to talk about the students he’s helping.
“We have 17 international students this semester,” he says. “And they all have a broad range of religious backgrounds.”
He opens the door to the center for me, and we walk upstairs to his office.
Amer is a sophomore student here, and he is currently majoring in Chemistry. His wife also attends King’s and she is in the graduate school for the Health Care program.
“So why did you choose King’s?” I asked.
“When we arrived here in America, my wife attended Marywood University to study English as a second language. But the both of us wanted to attend a better school, and so we discovered that King’s was a better choice for us through research. My wife applied for the Health Care graduate school program at King’s, and I applied for the Chemistry program. The Chemistry program was a perfect fit for me because I’m already interested in it, and I have 7 years of experience in biochemistry.”
Amer described the hard adjustment he went through.
“The first three months were hard for us to transition, ” Amer says. “We don’t have any family here in America so we were feeling very homesick.”
My thoughts raced through my head when Amer said this. I can’t imagine leaving my home, going to another country to live without my family, and only having my significant other to talk to. I would imagine that might have taken a test to Amer and his wife’s relationship. And to think I wanted to go away to college. There is no way I would have lasted longer than Amer and his wife.
I asked Amer if he was worried about fitting in at King’s.
“I was more concerned about fitting in, in America because I am Muslim, and there is some Islamophobia happening in the US.”
And he has every right to feel afraid. For the past couple of months, the media in America has been publicizing the violent terrorist attacks of ISIS, a new terrorist group that proclaims that they are practicing the right form of Islam. Due to all of this publicizing from the media, and the harsh remarks of removing Muslims from the country by the Republican frontrunner, Donald Trump, Islamophobia has become a prevalent issue in the United States.
Amer described to me how sometimes he doesn’t feel safe in certain areas of the city.
“After the first three to six months, I think the community is somewhat accepting of us, but sometimes we do feel like we have to pretend that we are not Muslim. We only do this if we feel like we are in an environment where there is Islamic hostility.”
I felt my heart sink into my body. I don’t think I’d be able to cope with living in an area that isn’t accepting of my culture.
Amer talks about how it took a while to settle in on the campus.
“The first three months I did get people who stared at me,” Amer says. “Sometimes they look at me as if I’m a stranger.”
I can’t say that I identify with Amer completely with this feeling. The closest thing I have to Amer’s experience was when I would get my ashes on Ash Wednesday for Lent. I would have my ashes on my head, and my mother would drag me across town shopping while every person who passed me by stared at my forehead. For a couple of years, whenever Ash Wednesday came around, I would rub off my ashes as soon as the church service was done. My mother caught on after a while, and so she started to yell at me for doing it.
“Don’t be ashamed of your faith Emily Ann!” my mother would say.
Her words echoed in my mind while I talked to Amer. If I shouldn’t be ashamed of my religion, or my lack of faith, then why should Amer and his family be?
I turn the voice recorder off on my iPhone. Amer offers me a cup of coffee. We chat a bit but before we know it, he has to leave for a meeting. We say our goodbyes and I walk out towards Franklin Street.
Now that it’s been a week since I’ve done these interviews, I can finally reflect on what I’ve learned from them. From all of my interviews, I discovered that the students and faculty members at King’s had similar answers to mine about why they chose King’s College.
They were also somewhat worried about fitting in like I was when I first stepped onto the campus. The only exception to this is probably Dr. Akinci. He seemed like he was completely comfortable with the transition.
And it seems like none of the people I interviewed had any issue fitting in at the school like I had no problem. The only exception is probably Amer’s experience, but I think his experience refers to when he is outside of the school campus. But there isn’t much we can do about the people outside of the campus. But we can mold our students here on campus to become good people who tolerate all walks of life, race, color, religion, or creed. And we can send our students off into the world and make the people who give faces to people Amer in public and change their minds about their intolerance.
And if we have more good people in the world, then we all can talk about religion the way I did with Courtney, Dr. Akinci, and Amer. We can all sit down and have a chat like we do with our friends. No wars have to erupt. We can just sit and talk, and share our stories.
Journalistic Writing