Posted: 4/27/07

Ministers rank high in job satisfaction

By Marcia Nelson

Religion News Service

CHICAGO (RNS)—If you want to be rich, get an MBA. If you want to be happy, go for an M.Div.

Members of the clergy rank highest in job satisfaction, according to a report released by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. More than 87 percent of clergy said they were satisfied with their jobs, followed by firefighters (80 percent) and physical therapists (78 percent).

Cynthia Lindner, director of ministry studies at the university’s divinity school, said the findings rang true to her. People come to the field with no expectation of getting rich and every expectation of being able to make some difference in the world, she said.

“People are not going into the profession out of some sense of ‘I want a lot of power and prestige,’” she said. “Most of all, my students would say, ‘We want to help heal the world.’”

Because work plays such an important role in people’s lives, workers who are more satisfied also tend to be happier. So, clergy also topped the list as happiest, with 67 percent of them describing themselves as generally happy.

Tom Smith, director of the General Social Survey at the university research center, said he was surprised clergy led the list.

Many “helping” occupations, such as doctors and nurses, also experience stress, which can affect their overall happiness, he said.

“Apparently the rewards of spiritual guidance and leadership outweigh the burdens of being a religious leader,” he said.

At the bottom of the job satisfaction scale were workers normally on top of things. Roofers were least satisfied with their jobs, followed by waiters. Roofers also were the second unhappiest occupation; garage and service station attendants ranked as unhappiest.

Researchers noted the jobs people were most satisfied by tend to involve helping others or expressing creativity. Education administrators and teachers, psychologists, authors, painters and sculptors all expressed high degrees of satisfaction.

The least satisfying jobs were low-skill or customer-service jobs. Waiters, cashiers, laborers, and clothing and furniture salespeople were among the least satisfied with their jobs.

The rankings are based on information collected in the research center’s General Social Survey over almost two decades from more than 27,000 people.

Posted: 4/27/07

On the Move

• Josh Adair has resigned as youth minister at First Church in Tom Bean.

• Larry Ashley has resigned as pastor of First Church in Centerville.

• Calvin Bell to Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church in Whitney as pastor.

• Paul Briggs to Axtell Church in Axtell as pastor.

• Gary Colburn to Bazette Church in Kerens as pastor.

• Shane Greer to Shady Shores Church in Shady Shores as youth minister worship evangelist.

• Charles Higgs will resign as pastor of Cowboy Church of Erath County, effective May 30, to become director of the western heritage ministry of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, a position he has held on a part-time basis since 2003.

• Matt Hollingsworth to First Church in Belton as youth minister.

• Simon Keizer to Fairview Church in Sherman as youth minister.

• Zach Kouns to Shady Shores Church in Shady Shores as youth minister intern.

• Ronnie Lambert to First Church in Paducah as pastor from First Church in Texline.

• Leslie Mills has resigned as pastor of North Church in Greenville.

• Jason Miller to First Church in Longview as minister to students from North West Church in Houston.

• David Nash to First Church in Westbrook as pastor.

• Charissa Reeves to First Church in Edna as children’s minister.

• Gene Rice has resigned as pastor of Baptist Temple in Victoria.

• David Ritsema to Woodlawn Church in Austin as pastor from Oak Knoll Church in Fort Worth.

• James Roberts to First Church in Temple as minister to students.

• Kelly Russell to First Church in Olney as pastor.

• Mike Tisdal to First Church in El Paso as family ministries pastor, where he was students and recreation minister.

• Michael Tollison has resigned as youth minister at North Park Church in Sherman.

• Matt Walton to Southland Church in San Angelo as minister to students from Baptist Temple in Houston.

• Steve Weeks to Fairview Church in Sherman as music minister.

• Tim White to First Church in Desdemona as pastor.

• Ricky Woodall to Navarro Mills Church in Purdon as pastor.

Posted: 4/27/07

Most physicians will agree:
Religion does a body good

By Melissa Stee

Religion News Service

CHICAGO (RNS)—Most physicians say religion and spirituality have a significant impact on health, according to a new study, while just 6 percent of doctors believe religion or spirituality changed “hard” medical outcomes.

The survey, part of a University of Chicago study published by the Archives of Internal Medicine, showed more than half (54 percent) of doctors said “God or another supernatural being” can intervene in a patient’s health.

The questionnaire asked medical professionals to estimate how often their patients mention religion and spirituality issues, how much those factors influence health and how that influence is manifested.

“Consensus seems to begin and end with the idea that many, if not most, patients draw on prayer and other religious resources to navigate and overcome the spiritual challenges that arise in their experiences with illness,” Farr Curlin, John Lantos, Marshall Chin and Sarah Sellergren wrote in the Archives.

Compared to those with low religiosity, physicians with high religiosity are substantially more likely to report that patients often mention religion and spirituality issues, 36 percent to 11 percent, the study showed.

According to Curlin, that response shows that “with respect to what physicians bring to the data, that has as much influence on their interpretation as the data itself.”

Most respondents, however, interpreted those factors positively rather than negatively.

“Although the great majority, 85 percent, believe that the influence of religion and spirituality is generally positive, few, 6 percent, believe that religion and spirituality often changes hard medical outcomes,” Curlin and colleagues wrote in the Archives.

The results showed that three out of four physicians believe religion and spirituality help patients cope, and the same number credit those factors for giving patients a positive state of mind.

Of the 2,000 physicians who received the survey, 1,144 responded. The overall study has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Posted: 4/27/07

Dima	Kristina	Sergey

Families urgently needed
to adopt Russian orphans

By Analiz González

Buckner International

ALLAS—Buckner Adoption and Maternity Services urgently needs to find families for Russian orphans who soon will age out of orphanage care.

Once the children turn 16, they can’t be adopted internationally. In essence, that means they won’t get adopted at all, said Debbie Wynne, director of Buckner Adoption and Maternity Services.

Kostya and Ella

For more information on adopting children internationally through Buckner, contact Phil Brinkmeyer or Irina Shytova at (214) 381-1552 or call toll-free(866) 236-7823

“When the children turn 18, they’re forced out into the street,” she said. “Domestic adoptions in Russia are rare. And when they are adopted in Russia, they are younger children. So the only chance these children have of a forever family is to be adopted internationally.”

Statistics show 10 percent of the kids put out by the orphanages are victims of either homicide or suicide within three years. Thirty percent live lives of crime and 30 percent live on the street. That’s why Buckner is pushing for the adoption of several sibling groups who are approaching that age, Wynne said.

Some of the children already have been placed in orphanages for older children, which separated them from their younger siblings.

Kostya and his sister, Ella participated in the summer 2005 Buckner Angels from Abroad program and are desperately in need of a family together.

Kostya had to be separated from Ella in the fall of 2006 because he’s older than 12. His sister misses him and prays for them to be reunited in a family.

The Angels from Abroad host parents described Ella as “easy-going and loving.” She’s quick to hug people she knows and is very respectful of adults. And Kostya is “friendly and communicative and likes to play games.”

According to adoption staff, the siblings have been waiting for families for several years.

“Everyone that knows them feels they’d be great in an adoptive family,” Wynne said.

Another pair of siblings separated because of their ages is Dima and Kristina. Their 2005 Angels from Abroad host family described Kristina as a “very happy child, communicative, caring and loving.” Dima was called “quiet, patient and stable.”

Kristina suffers from a joint problem that affects one of her knees, but it doesn’t keep her from swimming and playing outdoors, her host family said. Doctors at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital said she will need some ongoing medical care and they’ll do a free, more thorough evaluation once she’s adopted.

And a donor has offered to pay for all the adoption fees for Kristina and her brother, Dima, Wynne added.

“There would still be some other costs, but it would be significantly less expensive than a typical international adoption,” she said.

Sergey, another child waiting to be adopted, participated in the summer 2006 Angels from Abroad program.

His host family described him as “intelligent, a problem-solver and an observer.” He’s also “self-sufficient, but also accepting of help from others.” They also said he’s inquisitive and delights in learning new things.

Posted: 4/27/07

Texas Baptists offer relief to
victims of widespread storms

By Barbara Bedrick

Texas Baptist Communications

From suburban Fort Worth to the Panhandle plains to the Rio Grande, Texas Baptists provided disaster relief after a series of violent storms swept through the state.

High winds, heavy rain and a tornado killed two people and damaged more than 150 homes in Tarrant County April 13, and another storm system followed a similar path 11 days later. Haltom City, just north of Fort Worth, experienced some of the worst damage from the first wave of storms.

The April 13 storm left two churches in shambles, tore roofs off homes and heavily damaged a grocery store. Ruth Gunson and her family, who live near the supermarket, tried to pick up the pieces after a tornado uprooted trees and sent limbs more than five-feet in circumference into her house, leaving two gaping holes in its roof. 

A team of Texas Baptist Men volunteers spent hours strategically working to remove the huge tree limbs from the rooftop of the Gunson’s home and cover the holes. Victim Relief Ministry chaplains assisted with clean-up efforts and provided counseling and pizza for the displaced family. They also counseled other storm victims, including the family who lost a son in the tornado.

Volunteers from Lake Pointe Church in Rockwall led by Joel Bachman worked atop damaged roofs removing huge tree limbs that dangled precariously. With climbing gear and special protective clothing, Bachman and teammate Ken Hull carefully maneuvered the trees down to the ground safely before sawing the wood into smaller pieces other workers could remove.

In the days that followed, other Texas Baptist Men volunteers from Collin, Dallas and Tarrant Baptist associations arrived to offer relief and recovery.

One week after the Haltom City tornado, more than 450 families in Tulia and Cactus turned to Texas Baptists for help after tornadoes ripped through their communities. TBM volunteers and area Baptist churches provided aid to many who lost their homes, sustained severe property damage or lacked utilities.

For tornado victims in Cactus, a town of about 3,000 people 60 miles north of Amarillo, the struggle was particularly difficult as they tried to cope with the storm’s aftermath. The tornado wiped out the Cactus water tower, destroyed about one-third of the city and knocked out electricity to more than 14,000 in the area, according to disaster relief coordinators.

“We activated the feeding unit at the Top o’ Texas Baptist Association in the Panhandle and the chainsaw team from Paramount Baptist Church in Amarillo to work with victims in Tulia and Cactus,” Smith said. Four TBM volunteers from O’Donnell provided a shower unit, and TBM set up a childcare unit in Cactus.

Nearly 30 TBM chainsaw team volunteers helped dig out residents in Tulia, a town of about 5,000 people, south of Amarillo. In the first two days following the tornado, Jeff Roper, TBM incident director, said the chainsaw teams completed 10 jobs including removing dangerous tree limbs and debris from homes and streets.

Since Cactus lost electricity, storm victims traveled about 10 miles away to Dumas where the TBM feeding unit set up adjacent to the Moore County Community Center and served more than 1,500 meals a day. About 300 families stayed at a Red Cross shelter in Dumas, and according to relief coordinators, they could remain there for two to three weeks.

James Hassell, pastor of First Baptist Church in Tulia, was at a Methodist minister’s home next door to his house when the tornado hit. Before huddling in his neighbor’s basement, Hassell witnessed a funnel cloud moving towards his home.

“I saw it spewing debris everywhere, and I got kind of scared,” Hassell recalled. “It looked like it was in the vicinity of our church but … it missed the building by a few blocks.”

Baptist General Convention of Texas Congregational Strategist Charles Davenport visited with Hassell soon after the disaster, and BGCT Disaster Response provided $7,000 to assist at least four church families who either lost their homes or received severe damage from the weekend tornado. All of them were in need of immediate care, Hassell said.

Hassell noted that some victims had home insurance, but all their possessions are gone. Clothes and food were in question for many families.

Haltom City storm victim Ruth Gunson sheds tears as she's comforted by a Victim Relief Ministries chaplain. TMB volunteers helped remove debris at her damaged home.

TBM volunteers worked alongside church members in the kitchen at First Baptist Church in Tulia, cooking and serving meals. As many as 800 people were being served meals every day, Hassell noted.

Disaster relief volunteers also delivered meals to the worst-hit zone in Tulia twice a day for relief workers, law enforcement officers, volunteers and others.

“We’ve been in the damage zone since Saturday night after the tornado rolled through. There is a lot of physical labor and meals to provide,” Hassell explained.

The church also opened up its doors to a group of inmates from nearby prisons. After the inmates worked all day in the clean-up effort, they ate dinner served at the church every night by TBM and church volunteers.

Because the tornadoes were so devastating to the city, First Baptist Church of Tulia was host site for a community forum and support meeting where church members, residents and storm victims could ask questions and share their concerns.

A team of trained counselors equipped to handle crisis intervention serve on the BGCT crisis intervention team and were available to respond to questions and needs. The group of counselors in West Texas, part of Victim Relief Ministries, also held small group counseling sessions.

One Tulia family plans to rebuild after the tornado ripped off their roof.

Texas Baptist Men activated several disaster relief teams April 25 to serve in the wake of a tornado that struck around Eagle Pass and across the Rio Grande in Piedras Negras, Mexico. A tornado along the Texas-Mexico border killed at least 10 people, injured more than 70 and destroyed 20 homes.

The Permian Basin emergency food service team and a survey team from the San Antonio area served in the area, and TBM disaster relief organizers also put together clean-out teams from LaGrange, Kerrville and Pearsall. A chainsaw crew and a shower unit also were dispatched to Piedras Negras.

BGCT staff traveled to the region to provide assistance to Baptist churches and member families. Trained counselors from Buckner International and Four Baptist University of the Americas students worked alongside others to comfort grieving families.

In Piedras Negras, Baptists indicated there is an 8-block wide area that is devastated and some people were trapped under rubble.

A family from Iglesia Bautista Peniel in Eagle Pass—a husband, his pregnant wife and their 1-year-old son—said the roof of their mobile home was “ripped off like the top of a sardine can.”

BGCT Church Starter Robert Cepeda surveyed the devastation, concluding, “It looked like a bomb exploded.”

Posted: 4/27/07

Texas Tidbits

Scholarships endowed at Wayland. Three families recently endowed scholarships at Wayland Baptist University. The McDougal Scholarship honors Delbert and Carolyn McDougal of Lubbock. He served more than 10 years on the Wayland board of trustees, including service as chairman and vice chairman of the board and chairman of the property management committee. The Norman and Louise Wright Scholarship, established by their children, honors longtime members of First Baptist Church in Plainview. He served on Wayland’s board of trustees. The Bill and Nell Hardage Scholarship was begun with gifts provided by the Hardages and completed with memorial gifts made at the time of his death one year ago. He was associated with Wayland more than 40 years—first as a student and member of the track and field team, and then later as a coach and administrator. He served, at various times, as director of special services, academic vice president, advancement vice president and executive vice president.

Foundation grants scholarship to Wayland San Antonio. Baptist Health Foundation of San Antonio made a $60,000 scholarship gift for the 2007-2008 academic year to the San Antonio campus of Wayland Baptist University. The funds will be available for local students in the undergraduate nursing program, and in the master’s- level Christian ministry and counseling degree programs. The gift is a $10,000 increase over last year.

Estate gift benefits Howard Payne. Howard Payne University’s Douglas MacArthur Academy of Freedom will receive about $1.7 million for scholarships from the estate of Terry and Ouida Dunsworth of Bedford. With the addition of this gift, the academy’s total endowment is valued at $7 million, said Howard Payne President Lanny Hall.

Baptist communicators honored. Public relations representatives from several Texas-based Baptist agencies and institutions were honored in the Wilmer C. Fields Awards competition, sponsored by the Baptist Communicators Association. The marketing and public relations office at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor received the exceptional achievement award in interactive communications and first place in the website division. Miranda Bradley of Children at Heart Ministries won first place for a single feature article and second place for a series in the newspaper or newsletter division. Erin Tooley with Woman’s Missionary Union of Texas won first place in the poster or flyer division and first place for a direct mail kit or campaign. Dallas-based Guidestone Financial Resources’ communications department won first place in the special events category, and Guidestone’s Lisa Hennington won first place in the single direct mail category.

New director for Laity Lodge named. The H. E. Butt Foundation has named Steven Purcell director of the Laity Lodge Christian retreat center. Purcell, a native Texan, is a former managing director of Schloss Mittersill, a Christian retreat and conference center in Austria with ties to Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia. Owned and operated by the H.E. Butt Foundation, Laity Lodge has been presenting adult retreats since 1961 at its 1,900-acre facility in the Texas Hill Country. 
 

Posted: 4/27/07

TOGETHER:
Simple ideas put emphasis on missions

A group of Texas and world Baptist leaders put missions at the top of their agendas last week when they met for a Missions Exchange in Waco. The discussion generated many great ideas—some big and strategic, others small and practical. Here’s a sampling:

• Encourage pastors to place a world map on their desks to remind them the whole world should be on the heart and mind of the church.

Executive Director BGCT Executive Board

• Have a missions website with a global map that helps people connect with efforts being done by churches and institutions and with ways for people to discover where they could get involved.

• Understand missions must be done from the inside out, with people first gaining an internal passion for missions before it is expressed in an outward fashion. Help churches discover their “Mission DNA” and call members to a missions lifestyle.

• Recognize the biblical truth that those who are blessed, as Texas Baptists are, must become a blessing to others here and around the world.

• Encourage greater collaboration among all our Texas Baptist entities.

• Check the label in your shirt every morning and pray a moment for the people where the shirt was made.

• Include mission illustrations in sermons.

• Share mission stories through BaptistWay Press.

• Provide a small book to help returning mission volunteers integrate into their daily lives a continuing mission passion.

• Get involved with Texas Baptist institutions as they serve people in Texas and around the world in Christ’s name.

• Expand the scope of the Mary Hill Davis Offering for Texas Missions and the Texas Baptist Offering for World Hunger.

• Work on making missions and discipleship go together, just like missions and evangelism.

• Call out the called by inviting people to do what God is nudging them to do.

• Measure mission development by mission deployment.

This is only a beginning. The future of missions is before us. We are in a time where information technology can be a great tool for mission advance, and we must take advantage of what is now possible. Pray for our missionaries. Pray for the people of every nation, tribe and people for God to guide and bless us as we respond to the great needs all around us with the heart of Christ and the skills he has put in our hands.

One of our greatest needs is collaboration. Baptists need to learn anew how to work together in our common missions tasks.

I spoke the other day to some people who work with teams of horses. One person said: “It takes much training to get two horses to pull together, and it is even more difficult to get more than two horses to pull together. It can be done, but it is not easy.”

The task of missions collaboration will not be easy, but it can be done. Let’s pray and work toward that end.

We are loved … all around the world.

Posted: 4/27/07

Six Baptist-affiliated students
among 32 dead at Virginia Tech

RICHMOND, Va. (ABP)—At least six of the 32 dead in the April 16 massacre at Virginia Tech had ties to Baptist churches in Virginia, Baptist leaders in the state said.

Here is what is known about the six with Baptist ties, based in part on reporting by MSNBC:

• Brian Bluhm, 25, was active in the Baptist collegiate ministries at Virginia Tech and attended Blacksburg Baptist Church, adjacent to the campus. Bluhm, who received a degree in civil engineering, was preparing to defend his graduate thesis about water resources. Born in Iowa and raised in Detroit, he already had accepted a job in Baltimore. Bluhm’s parents moved to Winchester, Va., while he was in school, so Blacksburg became his real home, said Bluhm’s close friend Michael Marshall of Richmond, Va.

Bluhm was an ardent fan of the Detroit Tigers baseball team, which announced his death before last Tuesday’s game against Kansas City. “He went to a game last weekend and saw them win, and I’m glad he did,” Marshall said. Bluhm also loved Virginia Tech’s Hokies football team and often traveled to away games with a close group of friends.

But Marshall said it was Bluhm’s faith and work with the Baptist college ministry that his friend loved most. “Brian was a Christian, and first and foremost, that’s what he would want to be remembered as,” he said.

• Austin Cloyd, 18, was a freshman majoring in international studies and French. Cloyd, who attended Blacksburg Baptist Church, moved with her family from Champaign, Ill., to Blacksburg in 2005 when her father took a job in the accounting department at Virginia Tech.

Before moving, the Cloyds were active in First United Methodist Church in Champaign, Pastor Terry Harter said. Cloyd was so inspired by an Appalachian service project to help rehabilitate homes that she and her mother started a similar program in their native Illinois town, her former pastor said.

The Methodist pastor, whose Illinois church held a prayer service for the family, described Cloyd as a “very delightful, intelligent, warm young lady” and an athlete who played basketball and volleyball in high school. But it was the mission trips to Appalachia that showed just how caring and faithful she was, he said.

“It made an important impact on her life. That’s the kind of person she was,” he said.

• Caitlin Hammaren, 19, also attended Blacksburg Baptist Church. She was a sophomore majoring in international studies and French, according to officials at her former school district in Westtown, N.Y.

“She was just one of the most outstanding young individuals that I’ve had the privilege of working with in my 31 years as an educator,” said John Latini, principal of Minisink Valley High School, where she graduated in 2005. “Caitlin was a leader among our students.”

• Rachael Hill, 18, of Richmond, Va., was a freshman studying biology. She graduated from Grove Avenue Christian School, which is affiliated with Grove Avenue Baptist Church in Richmond. Hill, an only child, was popular, had a penchant for shoes and was competitive on the volleyball court.

“Rachael was a very bright, articulate, intelligent, beautiful, confident, poised young woman. She had a tremendous future in front of her,” said Clay Fogler, administrator for the Grove Avenue school. “Obviously, the Lord had other plans for her.”

• Jarrett Lane, 22, from Narrows, Va., was a senior majoring in civil engineering who was valedictorian of his high school class. A member of First Baptist Church in Narrows, Va., Lane’s high school put up a memorial to him that included pictures, musical instruments and his athletic jerseys. Lane played the trombone, ran track and played football and basketball at Narrows High School.

“We’re just kind of binding together as a family,” Principal Robert Stump said.

Lane’s brother-in-law Daniel Farrell called Lane “full of spirit” and fun-loving.

“He had a caring heart and was a friend to everyone he met,” Farrell said. “We are leaning on God’s grace in these trying hours.”

• Nicole White, 20, of Carrollton, Va., was a junior majoring in international studies and German. White, a member of Nansemond River Baptist Church in Suffolk, Va., graduated from Smithfield High School in 2004, according to the Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk. White worked at a YMCA as a lifeguard and was an honor student in high school, the newspaper reported.

Posted: 4/27/07

Tech students gather at Baptist campus center

By Jim White

Virginia Religious Herald

BLACKSBURG, Va. (ABP)—As the sun began to set and the wind continued to howl over a wounded campus and city, Virginia Tech students gathered for prayer, comfort and counseling at the school’s Baptist student center.

Blacksburg, the small city that houses the university’s 26,000-plus students, was even quieter than usual the night after a massacre unprecedented in American history. The gunman, who shot 32 students and professors and then took his own life, also had silenced the usually bustling activity on the commercial strips around the sprawling campus’s edges.

One of the few signs of life at Virginia Tech was an evening gathering at the school’s Baptist Collegiate Ministry Center, a ministry of the Baptist General Association of Virginia.

Although barraged with requests from national and foreign news outlets, Darrell Cook, the lead Virginia Baptist campus minister, focused his attention on the needs of students. By mid-afternoon the day of the shootings, he had invited two of the school’s other major Christian campus groups—Intervarsity and Campus Crusade for Christ—to join in prayer for the surviving victims and loved ones of those who died.

Before the gathering, Cook and ministry associate Mark Appleton counseled with the students who dropped by the Baptist center in search of solace or simply for a safe-feeling place to hang out.

Members of area churches began stopping by with pizza for the students. Some reported that the owner of the pizzeria didn’t want to accept payment for the pizzas. They insisted on paying.

Area pastors were on the scene, too, bringing a sense of calm to a chaotic time. Tommy McDearis, pastor of Blacksburg Baptist Church, who also is chaplain of the local police force, spent much of the day at the hospital. The church is located directly across the street from the Tech campus, and it has served as the church home for generations of Hokie students, faculty members and administrators.

When it was time for the prayer service to begin, students began to drift in, slowly at first in groups of twos and threes, and then in a virtual torrent of troubled young men and women. They grouped themselves naturally into fives and sixes throughout the center. The first question on nearly everyone’s lips was: “Is anybody missing?”

Most of the students had spent a large part of the day tracking down friends and acquaintances making sure they were all right. When their own groups proved intact, they then began to expand their circle of concern to include classmates. As the evening progressed, names of people not accounted for began to surface—referred to simply as “the missing.”

As the groups of students at the ministry center dissolved and re-formed, sharing information and concern, some students openly wept. Many prayed. All hugged. They needed, it seemed, not just to be “in touch” with friends but actually, physically to hold on to each other.

The most common reason students gave for wanting to attend the gather-ing was: “I just wanted to be with people I care about.” Other students spoke of their need to support other students and be supported by them.

One student remarked that he had come just to be quiet. He had spent the day furiously tracking down his friends and answering his cell phone assuring family members, friends from home, and campus acquaintances that he was safe. Now, at the end of the day, he needed to sit on the floor with two of his friends and be quiet.

Greg Alexander, a collegiate ministry strategist, and Darrell Fletcher, a Virginia Baptist field strategist, circulated among students along with Cook and Appleton. Two crisis-ministry volunteers were there to provide comfort.

Members of Northstar Church, a Baptist congregation in Blacksburg , also were there, helping as they could. Jennifer Kincaid, director of the church’s women’s ministries, coordinated the food. Matt Morris, who earned his doctorate from Virginia Tech and works as a family therapist, counseled informally. Others were simply available to listen to students when they felt like talking.

Some students spoke of how difficult it will be to return to class and how their sense of serenity and security has been destroyed. Not surprisingly on a campus renowned for its engineering program, some shared a perspective expressed by senior Kevin Prussia. He referred to the statistical unlikelihood of such an unspeakable tragedy every taking place on the Tech campus again.

As the service began in the center’s chapel, student who could get in sat on the floor while others stood in the back, filling the aisle and doorways. Many others, unable to get close enough to hear or see, continued their conversations in other parts of the center.

Even after the worship time ended, students continued to talk well into the night. Many stayed at the center while others returned, usually in groups, to dorm rooms, apartments or area restaurants.

Over sandwiches and ice cream, the president-elect of Tech’s Baptist Campus Student Ministries strategized with two friends about how to answer questions students will inevitably ask. Chad Wallace, a junior and member of First Baptist Church of Newport News, Va., and his friends also wondered how to best share their faith in the aftermath of the campus tragedy.

“I’ve seen Christians take advantage of people’s grief, and I don’t want to do that,” Wallace said. “I want to respect them and what they are going through, but I also want to point them to Christ.”

— Robert Marus of ABP contributed to this story.

Posted: 4/27/07

Texas students pray, remember
peers at Virginia Tech

By Barbara Bedrick

Texas Baptist Communications

USTIN—A week after the deadly shooting rampage at Virginia Tech, Texas Baptist college students continued to gather in chapels, sing tributes and pray for the families of the victims, students, faculty and staff.

In a special tribute to the victims and their families, the Dallas Baptist University Chorale—already scheduled to perform at Washington National Cathedral’s “Texas Day” celebration April 22—was asked to provide prelude music for a procession that included Virginia Tech officials and alumni. They placed 33 candles at the foot of the altar—one for each victim and one for the man who killed them, Seung-Hui Cho.

The day after the tragedy, more than 150 DBU students, staff and faculty gathered for two prayer vigils. Sharing Scripture and signatures of support, many DBU students also signed a card of condolences and mailed it to Virginia Tech.

Like campuses nationwide, DBU administrators also e-mailed students to make sure they were aware counseling services were available to anyone struggling or needing to talk.

Echoing the same sentiments across the Baylor University campus, chapel bells rang out two days after the tragedy 32 times, one stroke for each student and professor who died at Virginia Tech.

Two hymns followed the tolling of the bells. Joining other colleges across the state and nation, Baylor also observed a moment of silence.

Expressing sympathy for the victims, Baylor University President John Lilley said, “Our hearts go out to the families and friends of everyone who was harmed by this unimaginable tragedy, and our deepest prayers are with them at this very moment.”

Stephen Holcomb directs the Dallas Baptist University Chorale as they provide the choral prelude for an evening prayer service at the Washington National Cathedral, held in honor of those affected by the Virginia Tech tragedy. (DBU/Kristen Counts)

At the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, Chaplain George Loutherback described an e-mail from Darrell Cook, Baptist Student Ministry director at Virginia Tech, saying he was “overwhelmed by the support and prayers of our campus ministry family around the nation.”

Loutherback said Virginia Tech’s Baptist campus ministry prayer request was for “students sitting next to empty chairs in classrooms and professors who are no longer there,” and for “staff to meet the needs of remaining students and to help answer any questions they have.”

“I told him (Cook) we’re here to pray as a family to go through this … and pray for each other, and to encourage them when this is over … and to pray for the student body and the administration,” Loutherback said.

Two Virginia Tech alumni who live in Belton joined the community, UMHB students, faculty and staff in a special prayer at the university’s chapel two days after the tragedy.

Baylor University students signed green and gold banners in the Bill Daniel Student Center and at the university’s Diadeloso “Day of the Bear” event. The banners, bearing hundreds of student signatures and condolences, will be sent to Virginia Tech.

In the service, UMHB Baptist Student Ministry co-presidents Emily Burkhead and Dawson Barksdale led a responsive reading from Lamentations, followed by a prayer for Virginia Tech’s administration led by UMHB President Jerry Bawcom.

UMHB Student Body President Chris Burkley read the names of all the students who lost their lives as he prayed for the Virginia Tech student body, and UMHB Vice President Steve Theodore prayed for the victims’ families.

Students at Wayland Baptist University mourning the tragic shootings offered support to the Virginia Tech campus community in a “Wayland Remembers Virginia Tech” event April 22.

Students, faculty and staff also signed a banner they mailed to a Wayland graduate who currently teaches at Virginia Tech. Similar cards will be delivered to the Baptist Student Ministry at Virginia Tech. 

Wayland BSM Director Donnie Brown led chapel services for the victims and their friends, families and colleagues.

Sharing the same sentiments, students at East Texas Baptist University in Marshall attended a memorial service to pay tribute to the victims.

As they listened to the university’s symphonic band, some sat silently, some prayed and others just stared straight ahead.

Following a moment of silence, students signed special messages to their peers who are about a thousand miles away.

One ETBU student signed, “God bless you guys and the Lord is with you, and we’re all praying for you.”

Posted: 4/27/07

NO EASY ANSWERS:
Campus ministers struggle
to explain the inexplicable

By Kevin Eckstrom

Religion News Service

Sometimes, answers to the tough questions just don’t come, campus ministers at Virginia Tech insist. When they do, they don’t come easily. And they often come up short.

As ministers and counsel-ors descended on Virginia Tech to offer comfort and consolation in the tragedy’s immediate aftermath, they said it was still too early to try to make sense of it all. There will be time enough for that.

Until then, they—like the Old Testament Prophet Elijah—were listening for the still small voice of God.

Virginia Tech students weep and comfort one another as they walk across the university’s campus in Blacksburg, Va. (REUTERS/Chris Keane)

“There is an incredible temptation to explain, to domesticate, to tie up all the loose ends of something so horrible,” said William King, the Lutheran campus minister at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va., since 1984. “Sometimes, one just has to be quiet.”

And so it went across the Virginia Tech campus, where 23-year-old Cho Seung-Hui fatally shot 32 people and wounded at least 15 others before turning the gun on himself.

“We haven’t gotten much beyond ‘We’re here with you,’” said Teresa Volante, the school’s Catholic campus minister. “The difficult questions haven’t yet come.”

For the short term, counselors said students were dealing with the “what if” questions: What if it had been my dorm where the shooting first broke out? What if I had been in an engineering class in Norris Hall where most of the victims died? What if I weren’t one of the lucky ones?

Mark Appleton, associate director of Virginia Tech’s Baptist Collegiate Ministries, heard those questions. He didn’t have easy answers, either.

“We’ve got everything from people who were supposed to be in that room and for some freak reason they weren’t by some providence of God. And there’s a lot of joy in that, but there’s also guilt,” Appleton said.

“We had a couple of students that were in the Norris building that could have easily been in there and … didn’t end up going to class or weren’t in the building, and so they were spared.”

The “what if” questions lead to the “why” and “how” questions that accompany any type of disaster, natural or manmade: Why would God allow this to occur? How could there be a God in the face of such unspeakable horror? Why did I get out alive?

Members of Virginia Tech’s Corp of Cadets pray in the War Memorial Chapel hours after a gunman shot dozens in a shooting spree at the university in Blacksburg, Va. (REUTERS/Brendan Bush)

“We don’t want to give pat religious answers that feel hollow to kids. It’s time to sit with them and their questions,” said Ginger Taylor Evans, director of Christian education at Blacksburg Presbyterian Church, where her husband, Alexander Evans, is the pastor.

“As Christians, we have to be comfortable living with the questions and not pretending to have all the answers.”

Perhaps the hardest struggle is confronting the age-old question of evil, campus ministers agreed. America wrestled with that demon in Oklahoma City, at Columbine High School, at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

The evil that lingered in Blacksburg was “way bigger and more absurd than we’ve got language for,” King said.

Appleton called it a “hideous” evil.

With limited language even to describe it, the answers become harder still.

In the days immediately following the shooting, the campus waited in somber stillness. The answers, campus ministers said, may come in time.

“So far, people have been pretty hunkered down in silent, small little groups. It’s been tough to have face-to-face contact with a lot of people,” King said. “We sense that we’re in the middle of the eye of a storm. Right now, it’s almost deathly quiet.”

Reporting by Amy Green, Marcia Nelson, Rachel Pomer-ance and Andrea Useem.

Posted: 4/27/07