Currents Magazine Winter 2019

Worship Winter 2019

Table of Contents 4

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Exploring the Meaning of Worship

Social Action for the Marginalized

Faith, Soul and All that Jazz

Christ in Adversity

Denominations in Christianity

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Rose Bush

A World of Prayer

“I’ve Seen God in the Ocean”

Worshipping False Idols

For the Love of God

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How to Worship: Church-of-Christ-Style

The Church of Sports

How an Atheist Worships

Shop till You Drop

Identity Inspires Worship

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Word Up Encourages All Types of Worship

Up

Staff and Contributors Other Contributers

Copy Editor, Makena Huey

Section Editor, Haidyn Harvey

Olivia Belda Madeleine Carr Araceli Crescencio Aliya Edwards Caroline Edwards Carolina French Nathan Heard Callie Mechelke Kaelin Mendez Hattie Pace Jacob Resendiz Nicole Spafford Maria Valente Bethany Wilson Kayiu Wong

Adviser Christina Littlefield, Journalism and Religion Professor Section Editor, Sofia Telch

Assistant Editor, Mary Cate Long

Lead Designer, Grace Kruse

Cover modeled by Cover photo by

Bella Alabi Milan Loiacono

Photo Editor, Milan Loiacono

Section Designer, Krystal Yu Zhang

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Letter from the Editor What is worship?

The definition of worship can be anything and everything and it is different for every single person. It’s hard to convey someone’s deep connection to worship or their struggle in worship with a word limit and a page count. But we are hoping to plant seeds, be the next dinner conversation starter and expand your view of worship with this issue of Currents.

When I look at my spiritual journey, worship is the first place I defined my relation-

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ship with God and His worth to me. I found myself returning to the piano bench daily, playing and singing for hours and wishing I never had to leave. The piano bench is where He revealed my calling, where He partnered in prayer with me and where I started to hear the songs He was singing over me. The piano bench is where I found the love that became the home I carried with me. The relationship I found there is the place I live from. This relationship taught me to find my identity by resting in God. I worship God by finding as many outlets as I can to express

for Him and in the process, I find the many ways He loves me.

When I look at traditions of faith, worship is something ingrained in the daily practices but not something that is clearly defined or taught. When I look at Pepperdine, worship brings people together across different spaces, denominations and even differing beliefs. We are surrounded by walking examples of different ways of worship. Isn’t that exciting?

As much as I have defined worship through my experiences with God, my definition only grows as I learn of the many ways my peers worship. We all come to worship in different ways and rather than dividing us as a people of faith or as humanity in general, worship brings us together and empowers us to love.

Worship expands beyond the confines of the Christian faith. We find the practice of other world religions on our campus. Worship goes beyond the confines of religion, it can be found in sports, body image and jazz. It takes stepping out of comfort zones and understanding someone else’s culture for us to grow in our own values. How people define worship reveals the values they carry, the morals behind their actions and the beliefs that shape the world they see.

In this issue, I hope to not only feature the many different ways of worship, but also to expand our definition of the word. Our definition can be shaped by the religions we practice and the religions we seek to understand.

Our definition comes from our values, culture, ethnicity and sexuality.

These definitions ultimately help us understand where we direct our worship. They point toward the time, adoration and attention

given to social media or maybe the internship we so desperately want. What we worship and how we worship is evident in the passions that fuel our dreams, the people we want to give a voice to and the places we see in need.

This magazine would not have been possible without the writers, photographers, designers, artists, editors and adviser, who made my vision come to life. Thank you all for being rockstars, inspiring me and keeping me grounded.

When reading this issue, I hope that you bring the desire to learn what worship means to someone else. Know that it could be different from what you are used to and maybe even contradict something you believe. Flip through with an open mind, knowing that your definition of worship might grow by the end.

Allison Lee Editor-in-Chief

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Exploring the Meaning of Worship Written by Madeleine Carr Photos by Milan Loiacono

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Modeled by Oore Okediji, Channa Steinmetz, Audrey Keim, Jasmine Croom, Tommy Koppang

L

eaping into the air with eyes closed, a woman dances alone in the dark.

In the chapel, a professor kneels at a pew, words whispered under her breath.

A student leans over a phone, scrolling through a beloved celebrity’s latest posts.

Inspired by injustice, an advocate sparks conversation with his peers about LGBTQ+ rights.

While these actions differ widely from one another, each could be categorized as worship – a term people use often without a clear definition.

However,inacommunitycomprisedofcountlessreligions and denominations, a “one size fits all” interpretation of worship is no easy task. A Currents poll of 141 students found that while 58 percent worship primarily through music, students also listed prayer, Scripture, community, nature, dancing, art and social justice.

Religion Professor David Lemley studies and teaches Christian worship. In his teaching, he defines worship as “participation in God’s self-communication,” an academic interpretation that is also meaningful to him in a personal way.

“It kind of recognizes that worship is something that is our response to God’s initiative and that worship is also something that is relational,” Lemley said. “God becomes available and present and invites people into relationship with Him and the response that people have to that is worship.”

Lemley said this definition is difficult to expand to encompass all faiths because in some religions, there is less of an emphasis on individual relationships with a deity.

Religion Professor Dyron Daughrity, who studies and teaches world religions, expanded his definition to apply to all faiths.

“Worship is an expression of awe or gratitude or commitment to the realm of the divine and it is inherently connected to sacrifice,” Daughrity said.

The ways humans worship are countless because human expression has manifold forms, Daughrity said.

He cited how Eastern Orthodox Christians worship through icons, Hindus typically worship through puja and Daoists burn incense.

Philosophy Professor Tomás Bogardus broadened the definition beyond religious worship.

“Worship is the intense devotion and admiration of someone or something manifested in some sort of sacrifice of time, talent or wealth in a way that the object of

your devotion would appreciate,” Bogardus said.

Adapting this definition to a Christian perspective, Bogardus said the target would be God. One could worship an individual, an object or even oneself, giving the amount of time and attention a Christian gives to God. This means worship can also be associated with the secular world.

Sophomore Cristina Kostin said she defines herself as spiritual but secular. She defines worship as putting aside time to communicate appreciation of something or someone. She sees everyone as part of God, each person made of the same stardust and connected to the universe.

Kostin worships through nature walks, meditation and yoga.Anotherpartofherworshipisseeingothers’happiness.

“I think what binds us is our humanity,” Kostin said.

“In this world, we’re so obsessed with perfection, but what we forget is that everyone struggles. Life isn’t wonderful all the time but if we learn to be grateful for what we do have, then what we don’t have doesn’t matter anymore.”

While Kostin isn’t Christian, she incorporates Christian aspects into her worship that’s directed toward the universe as a whole. She sometimes calls on angels or talks to Jesus, whom she views as a teacher.

“I believe God lives within us, not above us, that we are all part of God and God is love,” Kostin said. “I believe we are all one conscious universe, one system and life is one moment in time.”

For sophomore Christian Abad, a Roman Catholic, worship was a religious ritual that he was expected to take part in. As he grew older, it is now something he turns to for stress relief and support.

When we worship God, we become more human because we become more of who we were created to be.

Sara Barton

“As time progressed, I started to feel that worshipping was a way of life, a way for you to feel accountable, a way for you to feel relaxed, a way for you to just feel better about yourself and knowing that if there’s no one else that has your back, it’s God,” Abad said.

For University Chaplain Sara Barton, worship is participating in a greater celebration of God.

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“Worship means acknowledging worth or ascribing worth, giving worth to,” Barton said. “So in that way, I think it’s just simple – giving worth and glory to God. But for Christians in particular, I think that we, at least as you read in Scripture, we claim to join in with the worship of all creation, that all of creation is worshipping God.” Barton mentioned Christian theologian N. T. Wright, who discusses how one becomes what one worships. In worshipping God, Barton said she feels more human.

“If you worship money, then you become like a human bank,” Barton said. “If you worship power, then you wield power ruthlessly because you want it for yourself.

But when we worship God, we become more human because we become more of who we were created to be.”

Worship, an act of one or many From church services to private prayer, acts of worship can involve one person or thousands of people.

“I think that worship can be individual and even as an individual, I worship, at times, alone,” Barton said.

“I think it’s clear that Christianity is something that’s done in community, that in the ideal, one who is a Christian is doing something that people do together.

So our worship is personal. It’s also bigger than that.

It’s bigger than the individual and the person.”

This Christian focus on community dates back to the early Christians whose roots were in the familial Jewish faith, Lemley said. Before Christianity, the routine of rituals and prayers was ever-present in their lives. With the birth of Christianity, these early Christians integrated this emphasis on community into the burgeoning faith.

“Worship became centrally about believing that when they gathered as Christians around a table like Jesus and his disciples, that Jesus was present in that,” 6

Worship

Lemley said. “It became a place where they defined their central idea about community and their identities in the world were changed by that event.”

Daughrity emphasized the importance of true corporate worship in world religions, where group members know each other deeply through the community.

In a more authentic definition of corporate worship, Daughrity said members of a faith share goals, worldviews and even family connections.

Without this element of community, it is not truly group worship.

“It’s private worship; they just happen to be in a room full of people,” Daughrity said.

A balance between personal and community worship is important in one’s spiritual life, Philosophy Professor Garrett Pendergraft said. An overemphasis on either corporate or individual worship means one is missing out on the important parts of the other.

Alison Barragan, a senior and nondenominational Christian, said she feels most connected to God when she worships alone, although she does participate in corporate worship.

“Every time I’m in a place of worship, I’m reminded of the truth of who I am and who God is,” Barragan said.

“I think that centers everything for me. There’s no way to not receive the truth when you are in worship.”

Mediums of worship Whether one worships alone or with others, there are several ways one can express emotion. Judging from the variety of worship opportunities on campus, such as the sermon-based Wednesday Morning Chapel and Campus Recreation’s God in the Wilderness program, students have several outlets to choose from.

“I think the numbers of ways we can worship is up to our imagination,” Barton said. “I think we sometimes limit ourselves by thinking that worship is much smaller than the things we can [do]. I think that we’ve made it too small. I love it when – especially working with young people – when they come up with new things.”

Oftentimes, people use the word worship to describe Christian music, leading to a strong correlation between the two. While music is important, worship should include carrying the messages of these songs through daily life, Barton said. “[Worship] just can’t be strictly defined by – or it shouldn’t be strictly defined by – singing or making music,” Barton said. “There is so much more to worship than that. I think the one thing I remember is that if

worship is only singing, then that song has to go outside the walls of the church too.”

Barragan said she sees worship as a broader term that individuals narrow down for themselves. She enjoys worshipping through silent prayer in solitude.

“For me, [worship is] any way that people can feel a greater sense of adoration through whichever way that looks like,” Barragan said. “People find worship through nature and through silence, through reading the word.

There’s so many different ways people can worship, so I think it’s the most open-ended thing.”

Others, like Lemley, have a more fixed perspective.

“As a Christian theologian who teaches about worship, I’ve got to ground my definition in how God has been revealed, especially in Scripture and most especially in Jesus,” Lemley said. “I can’t just say because somebody said it was worship, it is. I’ve really got to measure it by what I consider so foundational, which is, ‘Is this bringing me into a deeper dialogue and relationship with God revealed in Christ?’”

Nonreligious worship While the term worship is typically associated with the religious sphere, the act of devotion is still a part of the nonreligious individual’s life, Bogardus said.

“In that more generic sense of worship where it’s just intense devotion and admiration of someone or something manifested through the sacrifice of time, talents or wealth in a way that the person or thing would appreciate – probably everybody does that, if only with themselves,” Bogardus said.

Sophomore Loreley Estrada identifies as a nondenominational Christian, defining worship as being thankful for God’s presence and demonstrating this gratitude. While she said she chooses to worship God through song, meditation and breath prayer, Estrada said others can worship in a nonreligious context.

“A lot of us, we worship success,” Estrada said. “We worship and admire political figures. We worship social media because it has such a high place in our life because we give it a lot of time.”

Lemley remarked on how the concept of worship plays an active part in an individual’s life, religious or nonreligious.

“You could use worship to describe any sort of, you know, act of sort of putting yourself in submission or surrender or bringing your full attention to anything that you love,” Lemley said. “What we worship is what we love and in relationship to that, what we love is what

we worship, and how we worship is what we become.”

Worship for college students The Currents poll found that students used worship to draw closer to God but also to find peace, joy, renewal, gratitude, purpose, fulfillment, stillness, clarity or a sense of belonging.

Barton said she noticed students explore more worship forms as they go through college.

“Students grow and mature and change and they seem to want to connect with God with even more ways than perhaps they knew about when they first came in,” Barton said.

Barragan mentioned her own exposure to different worship settings at Pepperdine.

“Coming into Pepperdine, experiencing that in a more corporate setting, was kind of more of an interesting transition for me because I was like, ‘Whoa, this is something so intimate for me and now I’m doing it with like a bunch of people,’” Barragan said.

The broadening of worship outlets in college brings difficulties, such as balancing co-curriculars and finding transportation to services, Pendergraft said.

“Worship looks the same because the fundamental, the essence of worship, is the same sort of activity directed toward God,” Pendergraft said. “But there are different obstacles to it for college students. Every stage of life involves a different experience of what it’s like to worship and so that changes how worship is experienced. Fundamentally, it’s the same activity, it’s just in a different context.”

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Social Action for the Marginalized Where faith and justice intersect Written by Kayiu Wong Art by Bethany Wilson

F

ou can’t be Christian and gay.”

This is a phrase sophomore Juan Carlos Hugues hears constantly from his family, from members in the Church of Christ congregation he grew up in and from fellow Christians he interacts with on campus.

“It makes me feel very sad because it’s like they’re separating me from the love of God,” Hugues said. “I’ve

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spent my whole life growing up learning how Christians should live a life of love and grace. There is no love in those words.”

Hugues, who is from Spartanburg, South Carolina, said facing hostility for being gay and coming from a Church of Christ background sparked his passion to improve relationshipsbetweenchurchcommunities and LGBTQ+ individuals.

For Hugues, fighting for LGBTQ+

rights is fully connected to living out his Christian faith.

“Who I am is Christian; who I am is a manifestation of God,” Hugues said.

“Just as I cannot deny being Christian, I cannot deny being gay. They’re inseparable for me. Accepting people who are both is just the right thing to do.”

Many people of faith feel called to social justice work because religions emphasize living righteously and caring for others.

“I don’t know of a religion that doesn’t prescribe to concepts of social justice,” said Jeff Banks, director of Pepperdine’s Social Action and Justice Colloquium. “The essence of religion is love and I think that’s the same essence of social justice.”

Banks said social justice is a concept that holds that all people should have equal access to economic and social opportunities and privileges.

“It means to do good for the most people in the best way possible,” Banks said.

The essence of religion is love and I think that’s the same essence of social justice.

Jeff Banks

Social justice at Pepperdine The SAAJ Colloquium is a four-semester program at Pepperdine that focuses on issues of social justice such as human rights, wealth and poverty, race relations, domestic violence and gender inequality.

Through guest speakers, field trips and community service, Banks said the colloquium exposes students to a wide array of social issues so they can consider how to alleviate different types of suffering in the world.

“It’s about how you can make a commitment in some way, in some part of your life, for some period in your life, to look out for the poor, for the hungry, for the disadvantaged, for the suffering,” Banks said.

Although the SAAJ classes are not taught from a religious lens, Banks believes that giving back to others ties faith and social justice together. “[SAAJ] students are required to do 20 hours of social justice and do it in any way they want,” Banks said. “They can work with disabled people; they can work with undocumented people. They can work with people who are ill; they can work with people who are hungry. There are a multitude of ways to help, and I think that’s what the basis of religion is - through divinity to help others. Social justice is to do the same thing.”

Jesus’ call to love

Junior Annika Lile, who is a SAAJ student and teaching assistant, said the colloquium has been her most eyeopening experience at Pepperdine.

“I’ve learned about so many injustices in our world that I had no idea existed,” Lile said. “The program is not just like, ‘Oh, let me just sit and listen to this awful story and then like leave.’ It pushes us to think, ‘How can this moment change us?’”

SAAJ has inspired Lile to pursue nonprofit work after college. Lile said she sees pursuing a life of social action as

Photo courtesy of Veronica Lempert

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the ultimate way of embodying her Christian faith.

“I find inspiration in Jesus going against the grain and serving as an activist for the marginalized and the overlooked,” Lile said. “I’ve just felt so called to embody that aspect of Jesus because social action, in my opinion, is a product of our faith. I think if you truly love the Lord and you want to walk in His footsteps, you’ll want to help other people, you’ll want to love other people.”

Jesus’ call for Christians to love thy neighbors as thyself pushes Lile’s passion to reverse the injustices seen in the foster care system and in private, for-profit prisons.

“I’m receiving this love from Jesus and I want to pour it out to other people too,” Lile said. “I think the more we focus on ourselves, the more we forget about how much loving others is so satisfying to your soul.”

Passion for Civil Rights Junior Payton Silket said his passion for social justice work inspired him to take a seven-day trip retracing the Civil Rights Movement in the South.

Silket, who was a junior in high school at the time, visited cities such as Little Rock, Arkansas; Memphis, Tennessee; and Montgomery, Alabama to see where the troubles and triumphs of desegregation occurred.

For Silket, meeting activists from the Civil Rights era and hearing firsthand accounts of their fight to break the country’s color barrier ignited his calling to improve race relations.

Silket said he felt most resolved after meeting Elizabeth Eckford, one of the members of the Little Rock Nine — a group of African American students in Arkansas who enrolled in an all-white high school to desegregate its schools following the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court ruling. “[Eckford] had a mob of about 300 white people spitting at her and yelling that she should be strung up,” Silket said. “Meeting her sparked my realization that there is work that still needs to be done because she fought for our generation to continue to move race relations forward. I looked her in the eye and told her I was not going to be part of the generation that became complacent, apathetic and let the ball drop.”

As Silket devotes himself to continuing the work of Civil Rights leaders, he cites his faith as a guiding light in times of darkness.

“I’m inspired by the Gospels of Jesus,” Silket said. “The veryfoundationsofJesus[are]workingtogetherandloving 10

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each other, and that is my way of worship and giving honor to God as I pursue my passions.”

Environmental protection For Religion Professor Chris Doran, Christian tenets of treating others fairly are inseparable from caring for the Earth.

“A Christian point of view to seek justice means living fairly,” Doran said. “It means living in a way so that you’re treating your neighbor justly and in a loving sort of way.

When we think about climate change disproportionately burdening the marginalized and the poor far more so than the wealthy, there is room for Christians to really help neighbors who are being harmed around our planet.”

Doran eats a plant-rich diet and uses an electric segway as acts of environmental sustainability. His book “Hope in the Age of Climate Change” highlights how some Christians in the United States are hesitant to change their behaviors to be more environmentally sustainable.

“Taking care of creation I think is something that Christians are commanded to do,” Doran said. “If we treat the Earth well, we tend to protect and treat the marginalized in our community well.”

Caring for the marginalized Adam Taylor, who teaches religion in politics at Pepperdine’s Washington D.C. program, said Jesus’ concern for the poor and marginalized in the Christian Gospels is a major point of inspiration for social justice work.

“There’s a lot of great examples of where Christians have used their faith in order to be real champions for social and political change: the abolition movement to end slavery in the British Empire, certainly Dr. Martin Luther King and other leaders of the black church during the civil rights struggle,” Taylor said. “More recently there are many Christians who are deeply engaged in efforts to try to reduce poverty in the United States and around the world.”

Taylor also serves as the executive director of Sojourners, an organization based in Washington D.C. that provides biblically-based social justice resources to inspire Christians to put their faith into action.

“We do that by sharing lots of content around the nexus between faith, social justice and politics through a magazine and our digital platform, but we also have a number of campaigns where we’re working directly with churches and with faith leaders in order to help them live out their faith more fully and engage in social justice work,” Taylor said.

Taylor said Sojourners runs campaigns to mobilize church leaders to protect the right to

vote in marginalized and underserved communities, to focus on immigration reform that protects undocumented immigrants and increases efforts to protect the environment and end climate change.

Taylor acknowledged that even within the Christian community, figuring out how to respond to social issues is contentious.

“Sometimes I feel Christians are putting their partisan identities and their ideology above and beyond their theological identity and their Christian identity,” Taylor said. “There’s a lot more common ground that [Christians] could find with one another if we start with core values that start with a real shared commitment in Christ.”

For Hugues, Christianity’s core value of loving others is what pushes him to combine his commitment to Christ with his commitment to advocating for LGBTQ+ rights.

“I want to fight for LGBTQ+ in all spheres of Christianity because it’s the right thing to do,” Hugues said. “It’s love. And it’s what Jesus would do.”

Hugues said he uses class presentations and projects as platforms to raise awareness about LGBTQ+ inequality.

“I just really take up those moments when professors give us free range to research and connect class with whatever topic we want,” Hugues said. “I think about how Jesus sparked conversationsaboutoverlookedgroupsandthat is exactly what I try to do in those situations.”

Raymond Carr speaks onThelonious Monk at Queen’s University in Belfast, Ireland

Faith, Soul and All that Jazz

R

Written by Haidyn Harvey Photo courtesy of Raymond Carr

eligion Professor Raymond Carr uses the music of Thelonious Monk to merge the ideas of Karl Barth, a European theologian, with James Cone, the “father of black theology.”

Monk’s jazz is crisp, soulful and sudden.

In many ways, he differs from the smooth, silky sound that most think of when they think of jazz. Monk’s music plays like a conversation; it’s filled with inflections, pauses and abrupt exclamations. The piano keys chatter, full of life, as if Monk were sitting in a chair across the room.

Carr believes that Monk’s music is the perfect medium for discussing theology. Carr is currently writing a book in which he will explore Monk’s jazz and how it unites the philosophies of his favorite religious thinkers.

Carr said faith should be less about religion and more about being “radically human.”

“We’ve made it more about religion than it is about faith in God,” Carr said. “A religious orientation has become so dominant that it almost smothers in mass what it means to be human. And so one of the things that I was attracted to about Thelonious Monk was that he was human.”

Carr was drawn to the passionate and unapologetic way Monk played piano, personifying Carr’s idea of being radically human.

“He played the piano like a drunk; he played flat-fingered,” Carr said. “Did you see him when he crossed his arms? There’s one time — did you see him use his elbow?”

Carr uses Monk’s spirited style to merge the ideas of Barth and Cone. Barth was a widely influential Swiss theologian who inspired Cone’s black theology. “[Cone is] saying that Christ speaks to black people’s needs, that God cares about black people,” Carr said.

“Theology never talked about that.”

Carr said he hopes he can use Monk to prove that white theology and black theology do not need to be separated.

“Here’s why Monk is important for these two guys ....

He played music between the cracks, meaning neither the white keys nor the black keys,” Carr said. “His music wasn’t reduced to that.”

Monk’s technique of “playing between the cracks” exemplifies the way Carr hopes to unite Barth and Cone’s work.

Carr said that if people stay loyal to just one theologian, they miss everything in between.

Carr furthered his point by discussing Barth and Cone’s musical tastes.

“Barth woke up every day to Mozart and the day he died ... his wife had gone into the room and turned on Mozart for him,” Carr said.

Cone wrote a book titled “The Spirituals and the Blues” in which he used that style of music to discuss his ideas.

“There’s something special and sacred about that language because it emerges out of the life of the people that made that music,” Carr said.

Carr saw Barth and Cone’s differing musical interests as a perfect opportunity to unite them.

“I bring Barth and Cone back together using the music of Thelonious Monk because jazz is America’s classical music and jazz follows the blues,” Carr said.

Carr argued that just as Monk played “between the cracks” of the white and black piano keys, theology should play between the cracks too.

“There’s this divine melody in our world that is multi-dialogical and it includes the life of black people, white people, red people, LGBTQ+ people,” Carr said. “They are all a part of God’s music and we live in a world that’s filled with difference … and so we needed a more kaleidoscopic view of a creation.”

Christ in Adversity How trauma draws some closer and pushes others away Written by Nicole Spafford

n the early hours of Nov. 7, freshman Ashley Mowreader and her suitemates were huddling in the lobby of their Debell F Suite next to a police scanner.

News of a shooting at the Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks broke around 11:30 p.m. Their friend and suitemate Alaina Housley was in attendance, and was missing.

Restless energy permeated through the room, with some girls scrolling frantically through the #Borderlineshooting on Twitter, and others keeping their eyes on broadcast news channels.

No one slept.

The following afternoon, Mowreader, who is now a section assistant for the Graphic, came face-to-face with an unfathomable reality. Housley, with whom she had spent countless hours bonding over musicals, was one of 12 victims killed in the shooting.

“For the next few hours we just held each other and cried until we physically couldn’t anymore,” Mowreader said. “We were exhausted, broken and grieving – but we were together.”

The following day the situation grew even more chaotic as the Woolsey Fire began to ransack Malibu, burning down the structures and homes of many Pepperdine students and faculty.

While some students were sheltering-in-place on Pepperdine’s campus, others such as senior Amelia Hemsley were fleeing with nothing but the clothes on their backs.

Forty-eight hours after the Borderline shooting, Hemsley awoke to a call from her housemate, inform-

Photo by Milan Loiacono

ing her the home they were renting had burned to the ground.

“My reaction was shock and disbelief,” Hemsley said.

“I just never thought something like that could happen to me, and it’s still kind of hard to believe.”

Now living in a new apartment, Hemsley said she is still struggling with the loss of her most precious belongings, including items she acquired during various trips abroad.

Faith in trauma Several weeks after the tragic events, the canyon roads are open, classes are in session and students are back in their regular routines. Yet, the impact of the trauma lingers.

“It seems like there’s just a wide range of emotions,” Connie Horton, vice president for Student Affairs, said. “Of course there are some who lost their very close friend, there are others who were in a very violent situation, and there’s every variation in between, as well as people who lost their homes.”

And with different emotions come different coping mechanisms. Some are focusing on academics, while others are choosing to spend quality time with friends.

Mowreader said she is relying on her faith during this time.

“I have felt the most at peace in church or in worship as I try to figure out what this means for my life now,” Mowreader said. “There’s of course the questions of ‘why?’ or ‘How could a good God let this happen?’ but

I’ve found the most comfort in knowing there’s an eternal God with a perfect plan and that I am a part of it all.”

Although Hemsley said she is still struggling, she echoed that sentiment.

“Even in the saddest and darkest moments of this whole ordeal, I never lost faith that it was supposed to happen,” Hemsley said. “In a few months or a few years or whatever, I’m going to look back and realize that this all happened for a reason.”

However, some students have trouble relying on God when facing adversity. Senior Morgan Proffitt said she has doubted God in times of strife.

“In the face of hardship, I’ve questioned God,” Proffitt said. “I feel ashamed for that anger. Yet I wonder, why didn’t He protect me? Why didn’t He lead me down a different path?”

Reasons for the discrepancy University Chaplain Sara Barton said differing experiences students have with faith may contribute to why trauma draws some people to worship and pushes others away.

“Some people are experiencing God close and personal, like never before,” Barton said. “There are others who perhaps are not feeling inclined toward worship right now, who just need a little bit of space and time.”

Horton said these different experiences may shape one’s primary views of God, which then determines whether one relies on Him during times of crisis.

“If you view God as with you, for you, beside you – that kind of idea – then when you’re in trouble, you’re going to cling for dear life, more dependent than ever on this God that you say you believe in,” Horton said.

But doubt in the aftermath of adversity does not minimize faith. In fact, it may even strengthen it, Horton said.

“If you feel like you have to have it all wrapped up in a neat bow, and you feel like you’re not supposed to

Even in the saddest and darkest moments of this whole ordeal, I never lost faith that it was supposed to happen, and in a few months or a few years or whatever, I’m going to look back and realize that this all happened for a reason.

Amelia Hemsley

question, like there are supposed to be easy answers, that would be another way that I would think your faith almost doesn’t have complexities in it,” Horton said.

And while it is normal to question God, Horton said it is not ideal for darkness to overshadow faith for too long.

“The Psalms are full of lamentations, where people are saying, ‘God, where are you?’ And I think if you have that steady sense of God with you, then you’re free to both have those cries within or even verbalize and still be feeling connected to God,” Horton said. “To me there’s some wisdom and some richness and some spiritual truth and growth in that.”

Barton said growth is apparent in the Psalms.

“Psalms end with those people saying, ‘Yet, I will keep trying to trust you God,’ and so I think I hear those kinds of messages with people,” Barton said. “‘I don’t know where God is, and I don’t know how to make sense of it, but all I know to do is keep trying or keep praying.’”

Horton said that while the University heavily emphasizes faith, doing so does not supersede the gravity of the November tragedies – rather, it supplements it.

“I would say from a post-traumatic stress point of view, we do better if we talk, if we process as a person of faith,” Horton said.

Photo courtesy Ron Hall

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Worship

“We’re doing that in a way that feels genuine to students and for those who are not people of faith, that feels attractive at best or at least not fake.”

Administration provides support Barton said administration is holding a number of faith-based and secular events in the aftermath of this past semester’s tragedies.

Barton said the Chaplain’s Office held a worship night and a memorial service for Housley and has since made itself increasingly accessible for students, with its doors always open.

“Really, we are just willing to be with people. It’s not that we have black and white answers to give,” Barton said. “It is that we have listening ears, and we believe that God shows up in community when we’re with one another.”

Horton said Pepperdine administration has added more counselors so that students who want individual counseling will not be put on a waiting list.

The Student Care Team is also allocating money from the Pepperdine Strong Fund to students affected by the fire, Horton said.

“We also follow up to see what else students need emotionally, physically,” Horton said. “Getting gas gift cards, giving linens, giving toiletries, giving, you know, physical things as well as trying to make sure how people are. What do they need, do they need counseling,

Photo courtesy of Luis Quiroz

do they need some help getting connected?”

Moving forward Barton said she is in awe at students’ resilience after Borderline and the fires.

“I see people, I would say maturing in their faith, going deeper, even if it means that it’s not an easy journey,” Barton said. “I see depth, I see maturity, I see growth on a journey. None of us would ever have chosen some of this, but I don’t see people folding. I see a lot of strength.”

Proffitt said the reasons she previously questioned God are the same reasons her faith is now strong.

“I believe I have found a lesson from God to be learned in every hardship,” Proffitt said. “The death of a friend has reminded me to be more intentional with my time and shown me the love and support those around me, and most importantly God, have to offer. Family illnesses have proved that in the face of adversity my family is steadfast in love.”

Mowreader said that while she does not have all the answers during this time of loss, she would not be able to get through it if it were not for her faith in God. “Being able to ask my friends and family for prayer, turning on my worship music and spending quiet time with God are all things that have kept me going and grounded me this past month,” Mowreader said. “I don’t know why it all happened, I don’t think I ever will, but I know it’s not for nothing, and there’s hope in that.”

Photo by Milan Loiacono

Winter 2019

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Seeking God through Different Denominations Written by Allison Lee

44,000.

That’s how many denominations exist within the Christian faith, Religion Professor Dyron Daughrity said. Each of these denominations have found their own variation of expressing awe and gratitude to God, adding to the plethora of definitions of worship.

Pepperdine hosts a community of students from a variety of denominations within the Christian faith, creating opportunities to learn from people who may carry out different practices around the same beliefs.

Daughrity explained the differences as he traced the main branches within the faith. Worship in Christian churches was cohesive for the first few centuries before the split during the Medieval Era, when Latin influences formed the Roman Catholic faith and Greek influences led to the beginning of the Eastern Orthodox Church, Daughrity said.

The Protestant Reformation led to the third branch of Protestantism.

Catholicism Worship in Catholicism centers around Communion. Junior Chase Manson said the importance of the Holy Eucharist and the Holy Sacrament is something distinctly Catholic, encapsulating everything that Jesus taught.

Before taking Communion, participants engage in a call and response prayer with the priest. Man16

Worship

Photo courtesy of Julia Stratton

son said his favorite part of Mass is when he recites, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”

“When we come to worship, we are not worthy of the gifts that God has given us,” Manson said. “But we are called by God and He has given us everything, and we are still worthy of communion with Him.” Manson attends Mass at Our Lady of Malibu weekly.

“Mass is prayer, one large prayer where we celebrate the mysteries,” Manson said. “There are a lot of mysteries in Catholicism, which is part of the beauty of it.”

Manson converted to Catholicism during his first year at Pepperdine, though he had been introduced to Catholic theology at his Jesuit Catholic high school. He calls Catholicism “logical” and “easy to follow.”

Catholicism teaches its congregation why it worships in Catechism, which is a written version of the Catholic beliefs, Daughrity said. The church sets up private and corporate worship. Private worship can be done through the shrine, an altar dedicated to different figures such as Mary and Jesus. Manson’s experience in Mass is an example of corporate worship in the Catholic faith.

Manson sees private worship as a special and holy time. He found God in his individual meditation

with the rosary - a string of knots or beads used when reciting prayers.

The Ignatian Prayer, which focuses on an intimate relationship with God, has led him to reflect on himself and how he sees God in his everyday life.

“I really love the ability of Catholicism for me to spend intentional time and reverence for God, His word, the Gospel, and how it has impacted our lives,” Manson said.

His faith has helped him find more ways to see God. His connection to Catholicism is strengthened in its ties to social justice and he believes that God is present in the poor and vulnerable. Catholicism has opened another outlet of worship for Manson through social justice.

“We should uplift [the poor and vulnerable] because they are children of God,” Manson said. “I am a politically aware person and how I see God is in helping those that need help.”

“If I were to smell incense, it can take you to that sacred moment back at church,” Stratigos said. “It’s hard to sit in church and listen to everything they’re saying. But sometimes you can zone out and reflect on iconography and the sounds.”

Stratigos’ faith was challenged when she came to Pepperdine, only knowing the songs in Greek and finding few students who shared the same Orthodox roots and beliefs.

“It was hard for me to transition how I connect with God,” Stratigos said. “If I were to compare the church style to what we have at Pepperdine, it’s an older branch of the religion with a lot more tradition involved.”

Stratigos found the environmental setting of Celebration Chapel to be helpful for her to connect in worship and she continues to try different styles at Pepperdine.

Greek Orthodox

Daughrity listed three forms of Protestantism: Historic Protestantism, Evangelicalism and Pentecostalism. Historic Protestantism, also known as Mainline Protestantism, includes denominations such as Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran and Anglican. These can be traced back to the early Protestant Reformation.

Sophomore Benjamin Hancock affirmed the emphasis on theological and scriptural study as a valued form of worship in his Presbyterian denomination. He was raised in a traditional Presbyterian Church that incorporated organs, hymnals and choirs into their worship.

“The idea that you are worshipping in the same way that so many Christians before you gives an un-

Senior Eleni Stratigos grew up in a Greek Orthodox Church, learning the Greek language by attending services as well as the Greek dances.

“What I do like about my church is the service we have every Sunday is the same exact one they were having thousands of years ago,” Stratigos said.

She said her service has some similarities to a Catholic Mass. She uses the word “ritualistic” as they would sing the same songs, take Communion and use candles and incense.

Stratigos said sensory details such as iconography, stained-glass windows, scents and Byzantine music at every service allowed her to connect to worship in a holistic way.

Mainline Protestantism

deniable feeling of reverence,” Hancock said. “It is also a communal feeling to be joined not just with Christians past but to all raise one voice together in song.”

Hancock said his denomination’s way of worship allows him to connect with the traditional theologians of the Protestant Reformation.

“They too valued not only the musical worship style but rigorous study and discussion,” Hancock said. “Their dedication to God and to seeking Him inspires me to do the same, and the traditional worship only increases that.”

Hancock currently attends Malibu Presbyterian Church, which he describes as both traditional and communal. Though he hasn’t found any churches that worship in the traditional style he is used to, he considers the contemporary worship gatherings as a different, yet valuable experience.

“Worship to me is any action seeking God,” Hancock said. “This could be anything from working out, to discussing Scripture, to singing songs. All of these things, when done in pursuit of God, are worship.”

Evangelicalism Moving away from Historic Protestantism’s emphasis on traditions, Evangelicalism downplays liturgies and welcomes outsiders unacquainted with traditional styles of worship.

Evangelicalism is a more recent phenomenon with a freer, less formal and more spontaneous approach.

“The primary concern comes from the word itself,” Daughrity said. “It’s about bringing outsiders to Christ and spreading the good news.”

For junior Esther Chung, biblical teachings have been the core of Winter 2019

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her Southern Baptist faith. Her denomination has taught her what to look for in sound biblical worship.

She believes worship is receiving the Gospel and understanding Jesus’ sacrifice.

“It’s like, ‘Wow, we are serving a God so wonderful who loved someone who didn’t deserve to be loved,’” Chung said. “How can we not worship a God who loves the people who don’t deserve to be loved?”

Chung said the combination of her Korean culture and Southern Baptist faith further enhances her beliefs. Her culture has taught her the importance of family and blood, which has helped her understand the significance of Jesus’ blood.

“It’s easier for me to understand the Gospel as a Korean American,” Chung said.

Raised in a traditional church, Chung is still hesitant to try different things. She said her church believes that worship should comprise of praying, singing and listening to sermons.

“I would feel really weird not doing those three things,” Chung said.

“The more I learn, I realize that worship isn’t just going to church and being there for an hour to two hours but worship should be something that happens daily.”

Chung said Southern Baptists adhere to a strict interpretation of the Bible. Now that she has been exposed to other denominations, she said it doesn’t matter which denomination one belongs to as long as one stays true to the Bible.

“When I specifically think about Christianity, how can you worship someone you don’t know?” Chung said. “The best ways to learn about God is going to church and some18

Worship

one teaching you about Christ and being with different believers to get to know God better.”

Pentecostalism Pentecostalism began with the 1906 Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles. Daughrity said this form of Protestantism emphasizes the gifts of the Holy Spirit as described in the book of Acts in the New Testament.

“These include healing, speaking in tongues, prophecy, confrontation of demons, ecstatic utterances and far more heightened energy during worship services,” Daughrity said.

Junior Ikechukwu Egwuonwu considers himself nondenominational but if he had to identify with one branch, it would be Pentecostal.

When Egwuonwu was 4 months old, he stopped breathing. He was rushed to the hospital but the doctors didn’t know what to do. Pastors, including his own father, encircled the room and prayed for hours.

“My life in itself is a testimony of God’s power,” Egwuonwu said.

“From the things I’ve seen in my life, spiritual gifts of God are not a thing of the past. The Holy Spirit within us healing and casting out demons is not just something reserved for Jesus or pastors – it’s reserved for all Christians.”

Egwuonwu said the key aspect of Pentecostal worship is freedom. Being a part of the worship team at his home church, he learned to always leave room for God. “Essentially, it’s just no limitations,” Egwuonwu said. “There is an agenda to get through, but if God moves, we are totally down to throw the schedule away.”

Egwuonwu said he was exposed to the Church of Christ acapella

style worship when he came to Pepperdine. This opened his eyes to another way of worship and made him more open-minded. Egwuonwu also looks for opportunities to worship with people who are not comfortable with the Pentecostal style he is used to.

“When I’m in those spaces, I have to hold back because I know some people may be uncomfortable with it,” Egwuonwu said. “It made me question these different backgrounds.”

Worship at Pepperdine Junior Julia Stratton leads worship at The Well and Celebration Chapel on campus, developing the awareness that people come from different backgrounds in worship.

“We started doing Communion,” Stratton said. “For a lot of people, that aspect of Communion or the table is the central aspect of their service. They might worship best through Communion.”

Stratton and her team have worked to create a space where everyone feels welcome to participate in the way they are used to worshipping.

In addition to adding Communion, they have also included small groups to create conversations and quiet time to write down their prayers.

“I’ve realized that growing up in one tradition for so long, I never really had exposure to other traditions and that made me ignorant in terms of a worship leader because I assumed this is how everyone worships,” Stratton said. “It’s so important for everyone to learn about other people’s background. It’s learning about your family and how your family operates and providing them with a space where they feel at home.”

Nondenominational Stratton was raised in a nondenominational church, which she describes as having no restrictions as they are encouraged to worship how they best connect with God. Her connection came from the freedom in proclaiming His goodness through music.

“I am one of those people who will hardcore dance,” Stratton said.

“Being joyful before the Lord is the coolest thing because that’s what He wants for us, to have that joy. I love God and He gave me this joy so I’m just going to be crazy.”

She recently started seeing worship as more than a hobby, deciding that she would pursue musical worship as a career.

“My eyes had just been opened of God being like, ‘I’ve been telling you this for two years, you’re supposed to be doing worship,’” Strat-

ton said. “He used a popular music song to speak to me and validate the thoughts I was having. I’ve just always seen God in music.”

Stratton has also been learning how to worship in silence. Attending Mass, she found herself actually being able to focus on God in the silence.

“This is a really good time of reflection where I am sitting with my thoughts and absolutely no distractions,” Stratton said. “I had never done that before. This small little thing is so groundbreaking and I think it’s really important to experience their traditions.”

Daughrity also speaks to the difficulties of serving the vast mix of preferred approaches to worship on Pepperdine’s campus. He said a liturgical approach would cause many people to be confused while extreme Pentecostal methods could deter people away.

“You have to go with the lowest common denominator,” Daughrity said. “So you emphasize the love relationship with God.” Differences between denominations have caused a divide between people who carry out different ways of worship with the same underlying beliefs.

“If they have faith in Jesus Christ and they have the same belief, who are we to judge how they view Him as Lord?” Daughrity said. “We don’t have the right to condemn how they worship Christ.”

Being joyful before the Lord is the coolest thing because that’s what He wants for us, to have that joy.

Julia Stratton

Winter 2019 Photo by Kaelin Mendez

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Rose Bush Written by Art by

Nathan Heard Aliya Edwards

A rose bush requires intentional care.

It’s a piece of work to keep it healthy, but a piece of work that is rewarding.

Roses smell sweet, a scent unparalleled, a paragon of the process of perfection, but the process takes effort.

Because every rose has thorns, and if left unattended it becomes easy for the thorns to outpace the petals, and then you have not a rose bush, but a thorn bush, a scarred, scornful mockery of what the plant’s adorned form used to be.

Pruning out the unwanted stems can be a painful process, and a long one, but in the long run, dedication is what makes the flower bloom.

The fruits of your efforts take slow, sweet time to show but your efforts do cause the roses to grow and do not go unnoticed.

The soft, full petals of these precious flowers grow from intentionality.

Dedication begets beauty.

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Worship

A World of Prayer Worship across the globe

O

Written by Araceli Crescencio Photos courtesy of Swati Reddy and Jodi Vongvanij

ne world, many religions.

And worship looks different for each one of them Religions are complex.

They have traditions, symbols, narratives and sacred histories that give them meaning. They shape ethics, values and lifestyles. They divide and unite us.

“All the major traditions have resources that call us to treat other people as we want to be treated, to love and look out for the well-being of people that are in communities that are different than ours,” said John Barton, religion professor and director for the Center for Faith and Learning.

For Pepperdine students of various faiths, this is what worship looks like.

“Being nice to people, always treating others with respect and always trying to build people up, that all kind of comes together full circle with me getting my teacher credential and going into teaching,” Reddy said. “The whole idea of helping others, especially in Indian culture, is so important, so I really wanted to incorporate that into my career.”

Bahá’í

Hinduism Raised in an Indian household, culture and religion were tightly bound for senior Swati Reddy.

“For me growing up, we did certain things in our culture because of our religion, so the two always came together,” Reddy said.

Hindus believe in infinite manifestations of God and their worship is less formal than in other religions, Reddy said.

“Praying usually is not really that intense,” Reddy said. “You pray whenever, wherever you are. Usually at home, we have pictures or idols. But even here at Pepperdine, I just pray in my bed.

Obviously in the temple it’s different.

There’s actually a priest there and they do rituals and stuff.”

Hinduism also includes many different annual celebrations. Reddy’s favorite holiday is Diwali, the festival of lights, because it coincides with her favorite childhood story.

“Diwali comes from the story of Lord Rama and it’s the day he saved the goddess from the evil demon,” Reddy said. “It’s a really elaborate story and you’re always learning it when you’re a kid.”

The morals Reddy acquired through Hinduism shaped her career aspirations.

“People generally think the Bahá’í faith is a cult,” senior Mateen Taghizadeh said. “You have to make it real clear to people it’s not. Or that there are only a little of us, but no, there are nearly 9 million of us and we’re growing constantly.”

The Bahá’í faith is the second most geographically widespread religion on Earth, second only to Christianity.

For Taghizadeh, worship translates to having a direct relationship with God. The Bahá’í faith has thousands of written prayers that the founder Bahá’u’lláh wrote, he said.

“They span a wide range of categories like healing the departed or providing assistance or just being closer to God or forgiveness,” Taghizadeh said.

“So we pray in that sense and usually pray in our own private space settings and not really in a big setting.”

One of his favorite values from the Bahá’í faith is the emphasis on the equality of men and women.

“Bahai’s all over the world believe in that, almost every prayer includes Winter 2019

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equality in some sort of way,” Taghizadeh said. “I always think about the expression of the bird. If the bird only has one wing, then how can it fly?”

Islam For sophomore Abdullah Alshalash, worship is far more than how much time someone spends with God. “How you act in society, the way you present yourself to people – that is worship,” Alshalash said. “Being a good person of good deeds is one of the most important things you can do as a Muslim.”

Alshalash is a strong believer that religion can bring communities together.

“Islam really preaches peace and living in harmony together, and I don’t think most people understand that,” he said.

Ramadan is Alshalash’s favorite religious holiday, precisely because it is very communal. Alshalash said Muslims celebrate Ramadan in different ways but its primary purpose is to honor the first revelation of the Quran to Mu22

Worship

hammad the prophet.

“It’s a time for family,” Alshalash said. “You gather together for a whole month to pray and honor God.” Ramadan lasts for 29 to 30 days, and celebrating the holiday includes fasting from dawn until sunset.

“People in neighborhoods gather together to pray in mosques as late as 3 a.m. and everyone is still awake,” Alshalash said. “Waking up in the morning and still feeling like I’m worshipping God, I think that’s very special and indescribable. You wake up in the morning and feel like you are restraining yourself, yet in the night you celebrate your worship with your friends and family.”

Alshalash said whenever he is in a city with a strong religious community, regardless of what faith it is, he feels more at peace.

“I feel like there’s somehow a connection between everyone in the community, even if it doesn’t seem that way for many people, for some reason it seems like that to me,” Alshalash said.

It is for this reason that the rise in religious intolerance really disturbs him.

“It pains me and saddens me to see people destroying places of worship due to hate crimes,” Alshalash said. “It perplexes me and I don’t understand why they do it. But I think it’s important that people know about the thing they are destroying. I think people need to read a lot about religion and I think it’s important to teach kids early on about different world religions.”

Buddhism As a Buddhist, senior Jodi Vongvanij worships through meditation, prayer and sermons on her phone.

She looks forward to reaching the ultimate spiritual goal of Buddhism – nirvana. The literal translation of nirvana is extinguishing, liberation, blowing out. In Buddhism, reaching nirvana represents the release of the cycle of rebirth.

Vongvanij said seeking the state of nirvana helps her stay grounded and follow the five main Buddhist commandments: don’t lie, steal, drink alcohol with bad intentions, have an affair or harm living things.

“Knowing about God and different practices too, is something Buddhists are open to,” Vongvanij said. “Sometimes I go to church and listen to a sermon and think it was really good. It makes sense, you don’t have to be a Christian to relate to it.”

When she is back home in Thailand, Vongvanij said

she enjoys going to give merits to the monks. Giving merits is similar to an offering of money or food.

They are commonly given during religious services or when someone dies.

Judaism “Being loving and peaceful” is how senior Logan Hall described being Jewish.

Hall views Judaism as a religion that teaches people to be loving and accepting of different kinds of people trying to live a better life.

Being part of the Jewish community was an important part of Hall’s upbringing, especially observing Shabbat (the Jewish Sabbath), a time to contemplate spiritual aspects of his life.

Growing up attending synagogue on Friday nights, Hall remembers learning about the Holocaust and anti-Semitism. Back then, Hall said thatmentalityseemedsodistantandhe never thought he would experience it, let alone at Pepperdine.

But a couple of months ago, Hall heard a student praise Hitler as they were learning about World War II in their humanities class, calling him a genius and deeming his actions legendary.

“We need to learn more about how hateful and how hurtful a lot of these actions are,” Hall said. “That’s really the only way that we will be able to come together.”

Hall thinks education can help people understand not only the differences in religious worldviews but also the similarities.

“Learning about these faiths, you understand they are very peace-

ful,” Hall said. “Education is great because it teaches people that fear mongering isn’t real and to be more loving.”

Last year, Pepperdine hired Ari Schwarzberg as a part-time rabbi in residence. His duties include meeting with Jewish students one-on-one, hosting a club convo and occasionally working with the Chaplain’s Office to plan events.

Schwarzberg said that because he works with an interfaith group, it is important for him to show the similarities and differences between Judaism and Christianity. In his club convo, he asks his students to take the ideas that Judaism is expressing in the text they are studying and process them through a Christian lens.

“Oftentimes it comes up that our religious traditions unsurprisingly have a lot of similarities and a lot of very similar goals that we accomplish through different means and emphases,” Schwarzberg said.

Embracing difference Scholars said that today more than ever, it is important that people respect and understand the various ways people worship.

“We’re certainly in a time right now in our country and globally where not just religious differences, but differences of all kinds are being exasperated, are being leveraged in a lot of different ways,” Barton said.

Social media amplifies minority voices, enabling them to radicalize others to dangerous ideologies.

“The fear of the other, fear of difference, is really at the core of this,” said Roslyn Satchel, communication professor and itinerant elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. “The idea that if people are not like me, then they are inferior, violent, dangerous, somehow or another worthy of being killed in cold blood.”

Viewing diversity as a strength can help individuals appreciate different cultures, traditions and faiths, she said.

“The more that we can see that, the benefits and the beauties of those diversities – the better off we’ll all be,” Barton said. “But we can’t have those benefits – unless we invite those differences into our midst, even with their tensions, and learn how to navigate them with more clarity and integrity.”

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“I’ve Seen God in the Ocean” Nontraditional ways of worship Written by Haidyn Harvey

W

orship and tradition are tightly bound by the passing of time.

Generations have recited the same prayers, sang from the same hymnals and celebrated the same holidays. Tradition, in many ways, is a sacred part of faith and community.

But when people spill out of their churches, synagogues and mosques, how can they continue to worship in their day-to-day lives? People across Pepperdine’s campus have found ways to connect to their spiritual side through their passions, their geography and simply their way of being.

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Worship

Winter 2019

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Surfing

Sierra Perry

Sandy feet, saltwater hair and sleepy sunrises are part of senior Sierra Perry’s daily life and faith. Perry, manager of the Pepperdine Surf Team, said her passion for surfing intersects with her faith.

“It’s truly an experience,” Perry said.

“It’s like walking on water, which I think is something that God wants us to be able to experience here on Earth. Maybe that’s why he brought surfing to us because it’s the closest we can get to that story.”

Perry’s face is painted with freckles, souvenirs from her time spent under the sun – and she spends a lot of her time under the sun. For Perry, surfing isn’t just a sport. It’s a way of worship.

“I think worship is just kind of a sense of surrendering everything and all of who you are in that moment to who God is,” Perry said.

Perry, who began surfing at the age of 3, said the ocean is where she can surrender.

“The water is essentially one of the most forgiving elements because you can just fall completely into it, which is kind of how I started to really stress

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Worship

Photos courtesy of Sierra Perry

myself into falling in love with faith too,” Perry said. “When I’m out in the water, that’s the place where I can just be with God and it’s a place where I’m not allowed to think about anything else.”

Born and raised in Rancho Cucamonga, California, Perry said her family would travel to San Diego on the weekends to surf.

“My dad took me out on the nose of his board when I was 3 years old and I was wearing a life vest,” Perry said.

“He just kind of tugged the strap and said, ‘Stand up.’ That was kind of it.

You just get the bug.”

Once she was old enough, Perry graduated to her own board. “[I] kind of fell in love with it in a different way because when my dad wasn’t right behind me and pulling my life vest strap up, it was very much like, ‘OK, this is me and he’s not going to be there to catch me when I fall this time,’” Perry said.

Surfing became spiritual for Perry after she struggled with anxiety following Bethany Hamilton’s infamous 2003 shark attack. Perry said the event led her to fear the dangers that come with surfing.

“I was like, ‘OK, God, is this something that you want me to struggle with?’ And I was like, ‘No, probably not. You just want me to believe that

It’s truly an experience. It’s like walking on water ...

Sierra Perry

you’re going to keep me safe and it’s going to be OK,’” Perry said.

Since then, Perry’s time with God is time spent in the water.

“Some people may just call it surfing,” Perry said. “But for me it’s that moment like, OK, I’m getting up in the morning at 6:00 a.m. to go be with God to take that time. And sometimes it’s going to be cold.”

Sometimes the water is rough and the waves are uncertain but Perry said this is when she feels most reminded of God’s strength.

“It’s on those days when you kind of have to go like, ‘Wow, Scripture literally tells us God’s love for us is mightier than the waves of the sea.

But what does that feel like?’” Perry said. “When you feel a wave that heavy, you know.”

The early hours and cold mornings can be grueling but Perry said it’s worth it.

“You just get this moment where you’re on top of – you’re floating on – creation,” Perry said. “It’s just like you’re walking on water.”

Nature

Annabelle Childers and Jake Nichols

Photos by Milan Loiacono

Freshmen Annabelle Childers and Jake Nichols both feel God’s presence when in nature.

The two friends met this year at Basecamp, an annual Pepperdine getaway designed to help freshmen settle in, unplug and meet their peers.

“It’s basically a time to decide the trajectory of your four years and create community with Campus Ministry and University Church,” Childers said.

Basecamp consists of all the normal camping things: sleeping bags, campfires and mosquitoes. Camping isn’t for everyone but it’s perfect for both Nichols and Childers.

“There have been several times [when] we’ve been out at the beach and able to see the sunset,” Childers said.

“I’ve had moments where it’s like, ‘Wow, this is pretty crazy,’ and I’ve seen God in the ocean and the sunset.”

Nichols, who recently left Stillwater, Oklahoma to begin his time at Pepperdine, recalled feeling close to God through the scenery of his hometown.

“I can remember driving down just next to one of those grass pastures and the sun coming down,” Nichols said. “The sunset in that moment was probably one of the more incredible sunsets I’ve ever seen. It was actually kind of during a rougher time in my life and that was one of the more focusing moments, I guess. It brought me back down to reality.”

Childers, originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, recalled a moment of private worship during a back-

packing trip in Colorado.

“There was a time where we all just separated and went on our ways,” Childers said. “Just sitting down and being completely unplugged and being able to look at everything was really, really cool because there was nothing to distract. It was just like creation was embellishing my view of God.” Childers and Nichols both said they’ve had multiple experiences in nature that felt like worship. Nichols said he believes to worship is to admire.

“When I think of the word worship, I guess I think of the word glorify,” Nichols said. “So it’s a time when I’m lifting up or glorifying God through whatever action it is.”

For Childers, worship is attention.

“It’s a time where I’m completely focused on God,” Childers said. “So I guess, in terms of nature, when I’m hiking and get to the top, just sitting in silence and focusing on ... God’s creation.”

Nichols said that since college started, his relationship with God has transformed.

“I would say it’s changing, definitely. Especially since I came here because I thought it was pretty set in stone in high school,” Nichols said. “What I thought I knew about the Bible or about my faith, I now have questions about but that’s only a good thing, I would say.”

Nichols said he feels centered in his faith when he is surrounded by nature.

“That moment, every morning, I walk out and just see the ocean and it may only be five seconds but that’d be worship for me,” Nichols said.

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Dance

Jasmine Croom and Bella Alabi

Arms stretching wide, legs extending into the air, fingers reaching toward the sky. For juniors Jasmine Croom and Bella Alabi, dance isn’t just beats and rhythm. It’s time with God. Both Croom and Alabi are members of Dance In Flight and both said movement allows them to connect with themselves and with God in a way that words can't.

“I can use my body and my movements to mimic my emotions and so I use it as an outlet to express how I’m feeling or what I want to say,” Alabi said.

Croom often starts her sentences and then stops, unable to settle on the right words. When she pauses, she smiles.

Her vibrant purple curls bounce with her laughter.

“I just use [dance] – to express anything that I can’t express through words because my words fail me a lot,” Croom said. “I have a lot of things going on in my head and nothing comes out in sentences that ever make sense, and so the only way for me to feel settled is to move my body.”

Alabi started dancing when she was 4 years old. She hasn’t stopped since. Croom started a little later – the summer before sixth grade. Describing herself as an “extremely shy child,” Croom surprised her mom when she asked to attend a summer dance camp.

“I honestly think it was God pulling me, just telling me, ‘Hey, this is what you should do,’” Croom said.

Alabi said for her, dance is a way of worship. She describes worship as a way of expressing gratitude.

“To me, worship is being able to express praise and thanks to God,” Alabi said. “For me, dance has been a really powerful outlet.”

Alabi previously worked with The Well by performing with a group during service, showing how dance can be spiritual.

“When I was dancing, I really just let the music run through my body and let the words carry me and let my expressions reflect how I was feeling and how the words of the song, because it was a worship song, made me feel,” Alabi said.

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Croom said it wasn’t until she arrived at Pepperdine and joined DIF and the Step Team that she began to recognize the spiritual side of dance.

“I think it provides me a way to get in a space where I feel like I can worship and feel comfortable enough to worship,” Croom said.

Croom recalled a recent moment between DIF rehearsals where she was alone in the studio, working on her choreography. In this moment, she felt something more.

“I just never felt that free and that connected,” Croom said. “It was really interesting.”

Alabi said when she goes home to Seattle, she likes to dance in her local studio with all the lights off.

“I don’t want it to be about me or what I look like or how my technique is, because it’s so easy to get caught up on that as a dancer, especially when you’re in a studio with mirrors,” Alabi said. “So when I dance for worship, I don’t want it to be about me at all and I’m just using my body for God.” These moments are powerful for Alabi.

“It was just so cool to feel like I could do whatever and move however I felt I needed to move and feel safe and feel OK in all of that,” Alabi said. “I felt an overwhelming sense of God’s presence there in that with me, in the similar way I think when people sing or lift their hands in worship and you feel that God’s presence is there.”

Photos by Milan Loiacono

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Trail Blazer

Economics Professor Ron Batchelder

For Economics Professor Ron Batchelder, maintaining Pepperdine’s trail to the cross started as something he did for his dog, Freddy.

“My initial motivation was not to help other people,” Batchelder said.

“It was to walk my dog.”

Photos of Freddy are pinned to the walls of Batchelder’s office and fill the frames on his desk. The beloved rat terrier – who tried to chase every airplane that flew by – survived a rattlesnake bite, a coyote attack and a mountain lion encounter. He was Batchelder’s friend and companion for 15 years. Batchelder described him as a “feisty character.”

“Freddy was kind of a rebel,” Batchelder said. “The dog was an incredibly sweet dog but he was a hunter, so we used to go up there and he was always very active, and if I had him off the leash, then he would often run away from me.”

Soon, Batchelder began cleaning up the trail for Freddy.

“I’ve maintained that trail in the sense that every time it gets overgrown, I’m up there cleaning it up, fixing it,” Batchelder said. “I’ve worked recently on bypassing difficult places where people could get hurt.”

Maintaining the trail to the cross started as a safety precaution but Batchelder said it soon became a spiritual experience.

“Let’s put it this way. I wasn’t initially working on the trail because I was pursuing some spiritual end,” Batchelder said. “I did it because I got a certain amount of satisfaction and accomplishment out of working on the trail and making it better because I could look back at it and feel good about it. But in the process of pur30

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Photo by Olivia Belda

suing that, I think I did get this sort of spiritual uplift from the solitude, beauty and accomplishment.”

Batchelder wouldn’t describe himself as particularly religious. He said he doesn’t belong to a congregation and he doesn’t sit down to pray intentionally.

“I think my view of Christianity is less about whether you believe in your God or not, per se, but how do you treat other people, animals and the environment?” Batchelder said.

“To me that is critical and I think that’s what the teachings of Jesus were about.”

Batchelder and his three brothers didn’t grow up going to church. His parents had Christian backgrounds but decided to let their children choose for themselves if and when they would approach religion.

“I guess if you go back to the 12 apostles, I’m kind of a doubting Thomas,” Batchelder said. “I’m not somebody who just accepts what people say. I want it to make sense. I want to see the evidence.”

Batchelder describes worship as moments of unconscious reflection.

“I can’t say I consciously go through this act,” Batchelder said. “There are times I guess I would call it reflection.

I think to some degree it’s probably the same kind of thing [as worship] but it’s not a formal process I engage in.”

Maintaining the trail to the cross offers him moments of spiritual reflection.

“I think there is something about the process of physical labor and the beauty of the campus and the different views you get from sunrises to sunsets,” Batchelder said.

Batchelder now has a new dog, Elle.

He fears, at 14 years old, she is too old to walk the trail regularly. But Batchelder continues to maintain it. He said he keeps going back because it’s a great way to take a break from the office, think about his work and reflect.

“I was driven by other factors. The fact that I realized what a beautiful place this was and how it could disappear into this world and you could focus on something at the same time,” Batchelder said. “... It was just a nice release for me to leave my office so I spend most of my time here.”

Art

Bethany Wilson

Oil, watercolor or acrylic; art is just a way of being for junior Bethany Wilson.

“I’ve been doing art since as long as I can remember,” Wilson said.

“Some of my first memories are doing art. I don’t want to say I haven’t felt passionately about it but it’s not like something I would have considered myself very dedicated to.

It’s just something that I did all the time, sort of like writing or breathing.”

Wilson, an art and psychology major, carries a couple of sketch books at all times. She paints, draws and sculpts. Wilson said she also enjoys performing arts like dance.

“It is essential to me to communicate through art as a form of expression,” Wilson said.

Wilson considers art to be her primary form of worship.

“When I do paint or draw, I feel very at ease and peaceful and more connected to God, I guess,” Wilson said. “And it puts me in a certain state of mind that I don’t think anything else really puts me in.”

It wasn’t until recently that Wilson started recognizing art as a way of worship. Looking back, however, Wilson said it has always helped her feel connected to God. “When I was in middle school, during worship I would ... sit in a corner and draw and sing at the same time,” Wilson said. “It just puts me in a certain state of mind that I feel, for me, connects me to God a little bit more.”

Wilson describes worship, whether it’s Christian or nonreligious, as a display of adoration.

“Worship doesn’t even have to be

related to God necessarily,” Wilson said. “It is just whatever you’re adoring but feeling connected to it in whatever way. For me, it’s feeling like I’m understanding whatever it is a little bit more or feeling its presence very strongly.”

Wilson, who once worked 13 consecutive hours on a painting, said it is art that gives her the space and the time to connect with and adore God. “If I’m painting or drawing and thinking in general, I feel God’s presence a little bit more and I feel like I’m kind of getting to know Him and spending time with Him,” Wilson said.

Worship looks different for everyone. For Wilson, it’s more of an inward experience.

“I don’t really get worked up about most things,” Wilson said. “And so I think that worship and feeling connected as it relates to art, for me, is more of a meditative experience.”

In general, she likes to paint or draw abstractions of people and places. The medium depends on the day. Wilson said she gets the same meditative experience from all art forms but turns to different skill sets depending on her mood.

“They have a similar effect. It brings me back to the same place, but depending on where I am in the moment, I need different outlets for things,” Wilson said. “So if I am feeling very focused and more steady, then I’ll want to do something detailed and then I’ll draw.

But if I’m ... feeling something more fluid or messy, then I like to paint.”

Wilson said she wants to pursue a career in social work but she also sees art in her future.

“I’ve just always done it naturally and never stopped and thought about what it would be like to not do it,” Wilson said.

Photo by Milan Loiacono

Winter 2019

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Worshipping False Idols Written by Mary Cate Long Photos by Milan Loiacono

T

he term false idol has a distinctly religious and antiquated connotation. A picture of a pagan dance circle surrounding a golden statue or some other generally heathen mental image fill the mind.

However, Erich Fromm, German-American psychoanalyst and philosopher, argued that idolatry is alive and well in today’s society, albeit in increasingly inconspicuous forms.

“The idols against which the Old Testament prophets fought were idols in stone or wood, or trees or hills,” Fromm wrote in his book, “The Revolution of Hope.” “The idols of our day are leaders, institutions, especially the State, the nation, production, law and order, and every man-made thing.”

The definition of an idol is “an object of extreme devotion” or “a representation or symbol of an object of worship,” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary.

Pepperdine Religion Professor Raymond Carr builds off of Fromm’s book and offers an intriguing definition that demythologizes the concept of idolatry.

“Fromm is saying idolatry is alienation,” Carr said. “So what are you alienating yourself from? Now the believer would say, ‘From God.’ That’s true but it’s not just alienation from God – it’s alienation from yourself because you end up worshipping a thing and by worshipping a thing, you become a thing.”

The concept of idolatry is universally relatable to mankind. Whether religious, nonreligious and anything in between, people put their time and attention toward things that alienate them from their true purposes.

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Social Media

Written by Makena Huey

Idolizing other people and their content. Obsessing over the perfect photos. Drawing self-worth from followers. Prioritizing apps over everything else.

These are only some examples of what it looks like to worship social media.

Social media has the power to become a false idol because it is everywhere and allows for instant gratification, said Klive Oh, a public relations professor who specializes in social media and digital culture.

“People long for some kind of merit that comes out of social media ... It is a social need to be recognized and acknowledged,” Oh said.

A Currents poll of 141 students found that over 20 percent feel they worship social media as a false idol.

Senior Courtney Jobe said because Pepperdine is a small campus where everyone knows each other, students feel pressure to always be perfect and are often afraid of appearing vulnerable.

“Social media is the perfect place to promote perfection,” Jobe said.

Although social media can be a helpful tool for staying up-to-date with current events and remaining connected with others, several members of the Pepperdine community said idolizing it has consequences on the way one views oneself and others.

Oh said on an intrapersonal level, prioritizing social media can cause individuals to be less productive, waste time, be misinformed, expose themselves to criticism and lead an imbalanced life.

Students agreed that because social media is only a highlight reel with people portraying the best versions of themselves, it can lead to comparison and low self-esteem.

Instagram profiles rarely reflect authenticity or vulnerability, Jobe said.

“In this age of social media being instant gratification, it’s hard for some people to believe in or understand a relationship with God, which is sometimes not instant gratification,” junior Emma Craven said.

Craven said many Pepperdine students post Bible verses or share how strong their faith is, which can make others feel guilty.

At an interpersonal level, idolizing social media can lead individuals to judge others before knowing them and to not be fully present in their relationships with friends and family, Oh said. A reliance on platforms 34

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Modeled by Natalie Rulon

such as Instagram and Twitter can cause one’s sense of community to become distorted.

“When you prioritize social media, it leads to a tendency to prioritize the image over the individual,” Jobe said.

Students are aware of the addictive nature of social media but still choose to use it, Oh said. He encouraged everyone to find balance and use social media to help achieve – rather than contradict – their goals. “[Social media] is food for the mind and therefore you want to think about balancing all of that and treating social media from afar sometimes,” Oh said.

When you prioritize social media, it leads to a tendency to prioritize the image over the individual.

Courtney Jobe

Body Image

Written by Makena Huey

Body image – the way an individual thinks and feels about his or her body – becomes a false idol when it consumes one’s time, effort and money. Several Pepperdine students and faculty members agreed this could range from an obsession with working out and counting calories to taking hundreds of selfies only to delete them all.

A Currents poll of 141 students found that over 30 percent idolize body image.

“We live in a society that conveys the message that the way somebody looks is more important than anything else and I think a lot of people buy into that,” said Jennifer Harriger, a psychology professor and coordinator of Pepperdine’s Body Project – an organization designed to promote positive body image among female students. “They think, ‘If I just look a certain way or weigh this amount or do this plastic surgery, then I am going to be happy and beautiful and accepted,’ and in that way many people prioritize the way they look.”

Because Pepperdine is in Malibu, students and faculty agreed that the community faces more pressure to achieve what is known as the thin ideal.

Malibu prioritizes a healthy lifestyle due to its higher socioeconomic status and fails to represent the average U.S. city, said Jordan Diab, a senior and Body Project leader. The consistently warm weather allows for more revealing clothing and a pressure to look ‘beach-ready’ year-round.

Sophomore Alexa Rydell believes students are constantly talking about how they need to be on a diet and work out but they do it because they have to rather than because they want to. The line between wanting to be healthy and wanting to have a certain body type is blurred but the motivation behind an individual’s behavior is what differentiates the two, Harriger said.

“Because the United States’ ideal body image is so unrealistic and not achievable for the majority of women, it allows us to fall into the trap of thinking that we aren’t good enough … which is exactly the opposite of how God wants us to view ourselves,” sophomore Annie Vander Mey said.

Diab, Rydell and Vander Mey said idolizing body image is harmful because even if an individual achieves his or her physical goal, the ideal is constantly changing.

“It keeps us from being able to engage in meaningful, authentic relationships if we are only looking at superficial things like outward appearance,” Harriger said. “We can’t connect with others if we’re only focused on what they look like.”

Students echo Harriger, agreeing that body image idols alter the nature of relationships.

“If you are so focused on what you are putting into your body and what you are doing, it is going to take time away from God and school and friends,” Rydell said.

Diab said negative body image can lead to objectifying not only oneself, but also others, making it easier to compare oneself to them and treat them unkindly.

“If I am holding how I look above all other aspects of who I am, I am saying that my body as a physical instrument is the most important part of me, which reduces all of the other parts,” Diab said.

Students and faculty agreed that because it is such a prevalent societal issue, most students are not aware of how damaging idolizing body image can be.

“I want people to know that it is so normal to struggle with [body image],” Diab said. “I encourage people that are struggling with this ... to reach out to someone. Reach out to a friend.

Don’t be afraid to get help.”

Modeled by Natalie Behnen

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Celebrities

Written by Mary Cate Long

The Oscars, the NBA Finals, the Country Music Awards and the Super Bowl have one thing in common: celebrities.

Just these few events represent staggering numbers of cash spent on advertising, outfitting, programming and merchandise. Whether it’s film, sports or music, society gives its dollars and attention to celebrities. The nation’s relationship with the famous is difficult to define.

Fascination, definitely.

Adoration, probably.

Worship?

“I think I’ve had a lot of experience with friends worshipping celebrities,” senior Sterling Gualtieri said. “A lot of it is subconsciously. I don’t think they mean to worship these people or look at them as an idol but I think that once you begin obsessing with a celebrity and look at them daily, it’s basically worship.”

While students indicated a strong belief that their peers have problems with celebrity worship, few self-identified with this issue.

In a poll of 141 Pepperdine students, less than 8 percent felt they worship celebrities to a dangerous degree in their own lives.

Several students cited social media as a major player in bringing celebrities to the forefront of their everyday lives.

“They are always on the face of things, in the news and all over your phone,” junior Sydney Scherler said. “It’s easy to say, ‘Oh, I want to be just like them and do what they do.’”

Film Studies Professor Stephen Parmelee said the celebrity fascination can be traced back to the early 1900s, with the rise of movie stars. In the very beginning of film history, there was hardly even an effort to mention the actors’ names during the film. However, movie producers began to catch on to the money-making power of certain actors. Parmelee said this is when the idea of a movie star was born.

“By the ‘20s and ‘30s, movie stars began to basically be seen as minor gods and goddesses,” Parmelee said.

Situated near Los Angeles, Pepperdine shares the same locale of many celebrities’ homes and workplaces. Gualtieri attends and serves at a Christian church called Churchome, well known as the religious community of several celebrities, such as Justin Bieber, Kourtney Kardashian and Patrick Schwarzenegger.

After several incidents of fans coming to the church and taking photos of celebrities worshipping, Gualtieri said Pas36

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tor Judah Smith gave a sermon on a passage in the Bible about “the least of these.” The Matthew 25:31-46 passage traditionally teaches Christians to care for the poor and needy; however, the pastor took a new look at the meaning of the passage. “‘The least of these’ are defined as people that are written off as inhuman and not equal to everyone else,” Gualtieri said. “He said the celebrities in our community are not looked at the same as everyone else and are written off as inhuman. They want community as much as you do.”

Although Gualtieri touched on how celebrity worship may harm famous individuals themselves, other students focused on the negative effect for the worshipper. Several students equated idolizing celebrities with envying them.

“When I think of idolizing celebrities, I think of some of my friends that literally emulate how they dress and want to be exactly like them,” junior Roman Morales said. “I even have a friend that tries to walk just like her favorite celebrities.”

Junior Kammi Calhoun said she thinks some people try “to shape their actual lives based on what they see celebrities do” and “thinks it would be their ultimate happiness to be just like them.”

Modern celebrities sport different skill sets – from musical to athletic inclinations – that could be objects of the commoner’s envy. Nevertheless, it is the celebrities’ fame, rather than skill, that often commands people’s respect, Parmelee said.

“Their opinions are sought after,” Parmelee said. “I’m not sure why we believe just because they are popular that it gives them extra expertise in various issues.”

The film professor was referring to how celebrities often speak in court, on social media or even to national leaders about subjects which no one would typically value their opinion on, if it were not for their stardom.

“There’s no question that our global society ascribes a lot of our lives to celebrities,” Parmelee said.

Success

Written by Mary Cate Long

Figures in a bank account. Numbers that follow GPA on a resume. Followers on Instagram. These are just some numerical examples of ways that people envision success.

The unembellished Merriam-Webster dictionary definition of success is "a favorable or desired outcome."

This leaves the door open for endless personal and societal interpretation. According to this definition, the idea of true success can vary drastically from society to society, person to person and even day to day.

No matter how one defines success, it seems to be a substantial preoccupation for many Pepperdine students.

A Currents poll of 141 students found that roughly 44 percent worship success to a dangerous degree in their lives and 18 percent consider success as the most important thing in their lives.

However, the main problem many students find with idolization of success was not the desire or pursuit of success itself but the misperception of what true success is.

Religion Professor Raymond Carr spoke about this misperception of success in American society.

“The first problem with the idea of success as an idol is our notion of success is this: it’s incremental. It means things are always getting better,” Carr said. “Something is out there that is determining success by prosperity.”

Although the idea of American success may conjure up thoughts of Wall Street, several individuals talked about what idolizing success looks like in college.

Junior Emily Tran said when she was a freshman, she often found herself becoming over-involved with extracurriculars because she liked the “successful” feeling that it gave her.

“I found myself doing things just to put them on my résumé,” Tran said. “Now, I’ve organized my priorities and dropped some things that I was just doing for the name of it.”

Junior Tinashe Nyamupingidza said she values academic success above all other areas in her life. She said she does not consider this unhealthy, unless it begins to eclipse other areas of her life completely.

“I want to spend as much time as I can studying,” Nyamupingidza said. “Sometimes I sacrifice sleep and time with friends to make sure I can maintain my GPA.” Resident Director Andrew Wang said he believes comparison is a significant aspect in unhealthy relationships with success.

Photographed by Kaelin Mendez, Modeled by Juan Carlos Hugues

“We’ve come to think of success as very individualistic and we see it in a comparative way,” Wang said.

Several students said the balance between healthy success and success idolatry is difficult to define. As junior Beatrice Horas pointed out, if someone is attending Pepperdine University, they must be striving for success in some way through their studies. For Horas, healthy success means eliminating greed.

For junior Veronica Lempert, healthy success involves passion and choosing one’s own path.

“I would consider true success viewing money as something that comes along with passion in a healthy balance,” Lempert said. “You need to define that for yourself personally and not as a third-party expectation.”

Carr summed up America's skewed sense of success in a few words.

“Why does success have to be tied to being great? Why does success have to be tied to the idea of achievement?”

Carr asked. "Our modern notions of achievement, our modern notions of progress: why is that success?"

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For the Love of God Written by Allison Lee Photos courtesy of Sharita Wilson

P

ublic Speaking Professor Sharita Wilson and Associate Chaplain Eric Wilson realized they had feelings for each other during happy hour.

After a protest victory.

Since then, they have been shining the light of Christ by serving their surrounding communities together, standing with each other through hardship and standing up for justice where they can. They said their marriage speaks to the love they have for God and the Pepperdine students they serve.

“The way we love each other is an act of worship to God,” Sharita Wilson said.

Wilson met her husband during her undergraduate years at the University of Missouri. Spending time with the same people at the Black Culture Center, Missouri’s version of a black student union, they found themselves promoting opposing political viewpoints. Though they recognized their chemistry, Wilson said it was not until a year later, after the protest, that they had an epiphany.

Fraternity members hurt a young African American man at a party in Missouri’s Greek town. The Black Culture Center heard that the fraternity involved would only get a “slap on the wrist” at their hearing, Wilson said. The students at the Black Culture Center decided to attend the hearing to stand up for the man who was hurt.

“I think when you stand up for something that’s right, particularly as it relates to humanity, that can be an act of worship too,” Wilson said. “That energy is what ultimately led us to realizing how we felt about each other and how we see each other.”

The court suspended the trial until they collected more information. Feeling victorious, the students went to happy hour. As it was her last day of college, Sharita Wilson became emotional and Eric Wilson took her to get some air.

“We have this moment where we realize we were attracted to each other but also not sure how to talk to each other and figure things out,” Wilson said. “He said, ‘I’m 38

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going to give you a year and if I haven’t heard from you in a year, I’m going to come find you,’ and that was the beginning of our relationship.”

They began dating seriously a few months later.

Within six months, Wilson said they knew they were meant to be together. Wilson calls her and her husband servants of God, giving to others out of sheer gratitude for the abundance of blessings God has given them in their marriage.

“Servanthood is another reason our relationship

becomes an act of worship,” Wilson said. “No matter where we lived or worked, we have been fully engaged in serving others.”

Their relationship was strengthened through servanthood and hardship. Throughout their marriage, they have faced a recession, a move across states and a miscarriage.

“At that point, that was the most painful thing either of us had experienced individually and as a couple,” Wilson said. “But God’s faithfulness was loud.”

Wilson said God surrounded them with an extended family who lavished them with love when they cried and celebrated with them when they witnessed the births of their two sons. This support constantly reminded them that they were not alone and God would provide everything, even when they didn’t know what was needed.

For years, Wilson understood worship as music on Sunday mornings. However, as they journeyed through marriage, she began to see her entire life as an act of worship.

The community they found in their work, church and immediate family presented opportunities for them to minister and serve others. Their individual spiritual journeys evolved as they partnered in faith.

“When we first started growing individually in our faith walk, it transformed our relationship as well,” Wilson said. “When you’re interacting with all these different opportunities, it’s your opportunity to let them see the Jesus in you.

Whether they recognize that as the light of Jesus or not, you just got to try to shine for Him.” Her husband wasn’t interested in preaching until he felt a tug from the Lord five or six years after they married. Eric Wilson got a job as a chaplain at Pepperdine and Sharita Wilson came to teach public speaking. When Sharita Wilson became a full-time professor, she also became more engaged with spiritual mentoring.

“He and I found ourselves doing many of the same things,” Wilson said. “He’s the chaplain and I’m a professor, but we both see our roles here with students and serving students in the same way. Sharing about our day, we see so many similarities with how we connect with others, how we spend our time and even the words we use.”

They both feel divinely placed in their jobs at Pepperdine, carrying out their desire for students to know they are loved.

“Ministry is servanthood and

we understand each other well enough that as we are doing that service, we need to take care of ourselves and tend to our marriage too,” Wilson said. “It is helping us to see the way we love each other.

The way we take care of each other and tend to each other is an act of worship to God.”

When we first started growing individually in our faith walk, it transformed our relationship as well.

Sharita Wilson

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How to Worship: Church-of-Christ-Style Written by Mary Cate Long Photos by Callie Mechelke and Milan Loiacono

T

he first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of the Church of Christ may be the melodic harmonizing of voices and echoing absence of strings or percussion. But what about the cerebral turning of a biblical page? The shine of the chalice during the weekly celebration of Holy Communion? Acapella, or non-instrumental music, often takes the spotlight when it comes to Churches of Christ. However, there are many more elements to explore in order to truly understand this faith’s worship tradition.

The Church of Christ is a subdivision of Protestant Christianity that began with a spiritual reformation in the 1800s called the Restoration or Stone-Campbell Movement after founders Barton Stone and Alexander Campbell. From a scholarly focus on the Bible to an emphasis on Communion, the Church of Christ has a rich history of developing and shifting conventions that define worship.

The Church of Christ traditionally engages in acapella-style worship. Acapella is a term describing the absence of instruments and the use of only human voice to create melody. This tradition initially began because of financial realities, said David Baird, historian and dean emeritus of Seaver College.

“In post-Civil War times, some Northern groups of 40

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churches began incorporating mechanical or instrumental music into their services,” Baird said. “After the war, many Southern churches didn’t have the resources to do this and became critical of churches that spent money on instruments such as organs.”

University Chaplain Sara Barton said lack of funds was just one historical motivation for the acapella tradition. Early Church of Christ members also had enthusiasm for simplicity and a desire to include the entire congregation, she said.

“Part of the concern was that, if there was a choir or musicians, some people wouldn’t be able to participate,” Barton said.

Joi Carr, a singer, actress and professor of English and film studies at Pepperdine, said she grew up in the Church of Christ tradition using her talent for singing.

For her, acapella worship enables a connection to God in a way instruments cannot.

“I’m a lyrical person,” Carr said. “Words are of primary importance to me, so I feel that acapella worship facilitates that connection more for me.”

Carr said she has experienced differences in Church of Christ acapella worship throughout different regions of the United States. She said that while the South has a lot of “lush harmony,” California churches have an em-

phasis on “melody-driven” songs with components such as rounds and repetition.

Baird said he can remember a time several decades ago when acapella worship was “absolutely necessary” to be in accordance with proper Church of Christ practice.

Nowadays, although acapella music continues to be a notable tradition in Churches of Christ as a whole, it is mostly a matter of preference rather than moral or theological importance, Barton said.

“Some people are legalistic about [acapella music] and feel that acapella worship is the only right way to worship,” Barton said. “However, I myself actually don’t know that many people that feel very strongly about instrumental worship being inherently wrong anymore.”

As chaplain, Barton said she emphasizes the importance of “blended” worship, or the combination of acapella and instrumental music. Many worship opportunities at Pepperdine, including the Faculty and Staff Advent Service, Wednesday Morning Chapel and the Good Friday Service, display this style of worship.

Although the University Church of Christ (UCC) hosts strictly acapella Sunday morning services, Baird said the on-campus church recently decided to host smaller and less formal services on Sunday afternoons that include instrumental worship.

“There is a sense here on campus that if the church has an instrumental service, it will be filled by more stu-

Won by One

dents,” Baird said. “The greatest influence to include instruments is an assumption that it will be more relevant to the times, more current and contemporary, and as a consequence, that more students will join us.”

Sophomore Mary Elizabeth Salley noticed a difference between acapella conservatism at Pepperdine and her childhood church in Charleston, South Carolina.

She described her home church’s approach to acapella as more “strict and conservative” compared to practices at Pepperdine.

“I wasn’t exposed to instruments in worship growing up,” Salley said. “My family was super open to it but it was a big deal in church that you didn’t use instruments.”

Although Salley grew up in the Church of Christ tradition and continues to attend the UCC every Sunday, she said her preference for acapella music slightly diminished when she came to college.

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“For me, acapella music feels more like ‘church.’ I still really like acapella worship … I love hearing the harmonies and I like how everyone in the church has a part to play,” Salley said. “But for my own spiritual growth, I enjoy instrumental music and how it allows me to put my hands out and focus inwardly.”

Although the acapella worship tradition is highly discussed, Barton said other more deeply rooted customs are more definitional when it comes to worship for the Church of Christ faith.

“I have been to Churches of Christ that have instruments,” Barton said. “But I’ve never been to a Church of Christ that didn’t have Communion in the service.”

Salley and Baird also emphasized the importance of Communion. They affirmed that a service is never held without it and that this tradition stems from a Church of Christ tendency to interpret the Bible literally.

In fact, most of the Church of Christ worship rituals are quite

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Scripture-focused. Think biblical research and intellectual sermons.

Barton emphasized that every member is highly encouraged to study the Bible individually. An example of the importance of the word of God can be seen in Pepperdine’s Stauffer Chapel. A depiction of the Bible takes the center of the decorative, stained-glass windows.

Baird said there is no central creed or hierarchy that unites the Churches of Christ. Rather, practitioners derive their doctrine solely from individual analysis and detailed attention to the Bible. He described it as “speaking where the Bible speaks and remaining silent where it does not speak.”

For example, in the past, there was dissension over whether it was acceptable for multiple cups to be used during Communion. Baird ex-

plained that some Church of Christ goers resisted this idea and favored a single chalice. If the Bible only mentioned one cup in the passage, they would only use one cup too. Baird said this particular tradition has noticeably loosened over time due to fear of communicable diseases.

Opposition in certain congregations against children’s “Sunday School” is another demonstration of Church of Christ resistance to structures not specifically laid out in Scripture, Baird said.

Because Church of Christ members focus on scriptural study, Barton said it would be accurate to describe them as an “intellectual” and “rational” bunch – definitely not the group to emphasize spiritual emotion or mysticism.

“That’s probably why we have so many schools and universities,” Barton said. “Study is important to us.

We seek to encounter God through the Bible.”

Church of Christ worship entails a history of tension between strict reliance on Scripture versus movement to adapt with the Modern era.

Whether that looks like dropping single chalice guidelines or experimenting with instrumental music, Churches of Christ everywhere are seeking to strike this balance.

The Church of Sports Written by Jacob Resendiz Photos by Milan Loiacono

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utstretched arms. Cheering adoration.Everyonedressed in their Sunday best.

What worshippers do during Sunday morning services looks surprisingly similar to what sports fans do during Sunday afternoon football games.

Both sports and religion build community and shared identity, and both require dedication and sacrifice, said Craig Forney, religion professor at Palomar University and the author of “The Holy Trinity of American Sports: Civil Religion in Football, Baseball, and Basketball.” Sports and religion attract many passionate followers who dedicate their time and their money.

“Sports fans express faith but it is not as clearly defined as organized religion,” Forney said.

However, Pepperdine students said there is a distinct difference in how people value the two. Both athletes and sports fans said they hold God highest, even if some students said they might skip church for a game.

“I can’t take worship out of any context other than worshipping Jesus,” senior volleyball player Heidi Dyer said. “I believe there’s either worshipping Jesus and then there’s worshipping anything else [and] for me, one of my biggest goals in life is to keep it that way and to not worship volleyball like I want to worship Jesus.”

Sports as religion Love of sports is part of the civil religion that unites a city or country throughsharedbeliefsandpractices, Forney said.

Think of how the entire city of Philadelphia celebrated together after the Eagles’ 2017 Super Bowl victory over the New England Patriots.

Although 71 percent of Americans identify as Christian, only about one-third of adult Americans attend religious services each week, according to Pew Research Center’s 2014 Religious Landscape Study. That means as many as 90 million go to church each week.

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icans, however, watch football regularly, according to a 2011 Tvbythenumbers article. Just shy of 100 million watched the Eagles’ win, whereas on average 19 million typically watch the World Series and 16 million watch the NBA Finals.

A Currents poll of 74 students found 73 percent consider themselves sports fans­— slightly less than the 80 percent who consider themselves religious.

The amount of time spent on something determines its value. Roughly 85 percent of Pepperdine students commit at least one hour per week to religion, while 70 percent allot time to sports. About 40 percent of students surveyed spend five or more hours per week watching sports games.

Americans spend around seven hours per week consuming sports, 44

Worship

according to a May 2014 Statista survey.

While sports are not the same as faith, they can have a religious element.

Juniors Brock Petty and Jeff Taylor share a passionate love for sports.

Both said they grew up playing sports and fell in love with the fierce competition and unpredictability of games.

“There’s some thrill of seeing your team succeed that’s like an adrenaline rush,” Taylor said. “I’m a junkie for it.”

Taylor is one of many Americans who count sports as part of their daily lives.

The passion associated with sports fandom is so intense that for people like Petty sports is a defining characteristic.

“Without sports I would not be the same person I am,” Petty said.

Balancing the two “Without the fulfillment of playing sports or watching sports, I wouldn’t have that piece of my identity.”

Prioritizing between sports and religion is a common issue for many Pepperdine students; 90 percent of students surveyed said the two conflict at least once a week.

Yetmanystriveforabalancebetween the two in their own lives.

“Going to a sports game over church doesn’t mean I prioritize sports over a relationship with God,” Petty said.

Although Petty coaches a Little League baseball team on Sunday mornings and cannot attend a church service then, he said his relationship with God does not suffer.

“Coaching these kids is such a good way to be a role model so I think that in itself can be taken in a religious sense,” Petty said.

The difference Most religions are clearly defined and focus on a higher power or deity, which differentiate them from sports, Forney said.

However, it is easy for sports fans to idolize, imitate or even worship athletes, Sports Administration Professor Alicia Jessop said.

Lorenzo Romar, Pepperdine’s men’s basketball head coach, said he grew up idolizing Elgin Baylor, Milwaukee Bucks legend and Hall of Fame basketball player.

“When I was younger, this guy named Elgin Baylor was a superstar,” Romar said. “He was wearing a knee brace and I got me a knee brace. There was nothing wrong with my knee — I­­ just wanted to be like Elgin Baylor.”

Jessop and Watson said that even with the most fanatical of sports fans, there should be a limit to how far their praise extends.

“I think it’s OK to admire people who are successful but I would not worship them,” Sports Administration Professor John Watson said.

There is a difference between admiring and imitating a human and worshipping a God or higher power, Watson said.

Worship within a religious context has a sense of reverence or submission to something or someone who is far greater than an individual, Watson said.

“Religion is the deepest driving force of us; it is all-encompassing,” Forney said.

God in sports While balancing sports and religion can be challenging for some, others combine the two to strengthen their faith.

Dyer believes her God-given ability to play volleyball reinforces

her faith. Dyer said she struggled early on in her athletic career with balancing sports and faith before realizing that she could honor her faith through her volleyball achievements.

“The way I play can be a form of worship,” Dyer said. “Instead of me worshipping the sport, I can, through the sport, worship God. Volleyball is my ministry and it’s a chance to represent Christ and love on people.”

Similarly, Romar struggled early on in his professional basketball career to maintain a healthy relationship with God while competing at the highest level.

Romar said he eventually figured out that if he plays for the glory of God, he can use the time he spends competing as a time of worship as well.

“I have learned as a Christian, if I do all for the glory of God, then those highs last a lot longer than just competing for myself,” Romar said.

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How an Atheist Worships Written by Allison Lee Infograph by Krystal Zhang

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hat if worship didn’t need a god?

Worship often comes with a religious connotation. Merriam-Webster defines worship as “to honor a divine being or supernatural power” or “to regard with great or extravagant respect, honor, or devotion.”

The synonyms listed under worship include honor and adore, actions subconsciously practiced in our everyday lives. Professors, pastors, coaches and friends are a few of the many role models we look up to and maybe even worship. For those who believe in a higher power, that adoration is often directed toward a god. Those who do not believe in a higher power find others to direct that honor toward.

Growing up going to church, senior Wesley Cha thought of worship as preparation for the service. It wasn’t until he got older that he came to understand worship to be an emotional connection. Cha said he lacks the belief in God that allows Christians to connect with Him. “I myself have always been a very tactile person who finds reassurance in things that I understand and see,” Cha said. “Because of that, it has made it very hard to experience Christianity myself. That’s why I say I’m an atheist.”

At home, his parents shared different views of the faith they were both raised with. His mother’s Christian beliefs grew stronger with time whereas his father no longer considers himself a Christian.

Coming to Pepperdine, Cha shifted from agnosticism to atheism. Cha said he is yet to experience the presence of God and understand the Bible. Cha believes that religion exists for the same reason science does: to understand humankind’s existence.

“I would rather not know why something happened

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than subscribe to an explanation that does not make sense to me,” Cha said.

For Cha, worship involves those around him.

“Find people that you really admire and respect,” Cha said. “I think worshipping people is another way of saying you’re learning from people who have knowledge that you don’t.”

Cha defines worship as “giving your attention to something or someone in a way that humbles yourself.”

Through this definition, Cha worships those who have skills or qualities that he is attracted to. Whether that be ping pong or generosity, Cha surrounds himself with people he wants to learn from.

“That way, whenever you worship, you’re always going to be humbled because you’re in the presence of someone who is wiser,” Cha said. “If I see people that exhibit a virtue, that makes me want to worship them in a way.”

Cha said his worship requires building relationships with the individuals he admires. Whereas worship in a church setting allows the worshipper to connect immediately, worshipping people occurs over time.

“The more intimate the relationship, the more I worship them,” Cha said. “The more you know someone, the easier it is to see the good in them.”

Cha’s understanding of Christianity involves a defined sense of authority: God. Rather than relying on a God-like figure, Cha said he relies on his parents and other role models.

“To be honest, in everyone’s life, I don’t think there are that many people who have that level of authority,” Cha said.

I think worshipping people is another way of saying you’re learning from people who have knowledge that you don’t that they can give to you.

Wesley Cha

Cha believes those who practice a faith can worship the same way he does. He said learning from others is applicable to everyone.

“If you’re a person who wants to become better, you can worship the way I worship,” Cha said. “We have the desire to get better and worship is a way to do that.”

Cha said he sees spirituality as a lifelong journey in which anything can change. He believes there are lessons to be learned through Christianity and the Bible as they explain to him how to live life and even help him define worship.

Cha said he continues to see worship in a secular sense because people are in need of each other.

“We have to reach out to people,” Cha said. “Those are the people who know things that you don’t and can enlighten you. That’s why you should worship other people.

If I were to meet someone who would say that they don’t need that, I would think that they’re very prideful.”

PewReligious Religious Landscape Study on Millennials Pew Landscape Study on Millennials

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Shop till You Drop Church shopping is a necessary evil Written by Maria Valente Art by Aliya Edwards

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efore she found a home at Agoura Bible Fellowship, freshman Rachel Stull visited about seven churches but none of them were a perfect fit.

“Honestly, the bottom line has been just finding something that feels normal,” Stull said. “There’s been a lot of my suitemates and I just visiting churches and coming away from a service and being like, ‘Wow, that was really weird,’ or like ‘This is not normal.’”

Stull’s case is not unique. Around half of the American population church shops at some point, according to Pew data collected in 2016.

Church shopping refers to the idea of going to different churches and religious communities until one finds the perfect fit. “[People are] going through a process of visiting different worshipping communities in order to get a sense of what they want to be part of,” Religion Professor David Lemley said. “It’s about looking for an experience in worship that they want to have over and over again.”

People worship shop for a variety of reasons, whether their focus is on worship style and quality of preaching or theology and geography.

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Church shopping is often unavoidable when searching for a religious community in new surroundings. Some faculty and staff cited several reasons church shopping can affect the growth of one’s faith in the long term.

Pros “It is a time of exploration, which is a very exciting thing,” University Chaplain Sara Barton said. “I think five weeks in if [someone] got up and went to church every Sunday … great job. I would affirm students for being adventurous and trying new things.”

Hopping from church to church allows one to experience various worship styles. Sometimes there are very specific characteristics that people search for, including quality of sermons, specific worship style, ambience of the building and the people who frequent it.

People are looking to maximize their worship experience and grow in their faith, and sometimes this means stepping away from what they know as worship.

Sophomore Hadley Biggs grew up in the Church of Christ, and ended up switching churches when

she was around 12 or 13 years old.

“My family and I switched to nondenominational,” said Biggs, an abroad correspondent to the Graphic. “There wasn’t a good community at my Church of Christ church. The youth groups weren’t very developed, and I’m someone who really likes to be around people when I grow my faith.”

Biggs is currently studying abroad in Florence and took it upon herself to head the villa’s house church. In a house of 55 students, around 30 to 40 students make their way to worship every Monday night, along with the faculty family in residence and the program director.

Creating one’s own worship community could be a more effective method to finding a suitable home church than church shopping.

David Humphrey, associate dean of Student Affairs for Diversity and Inclusion, cited this as one of the most positive aspects of Pepperdine.

“I think that there is a space for students to imagine what that space could look like and work with us to create such an opportunity to be authentic and to relate with others who share that,” Humphrey said.

“No one worships the same way.

Everyone I know accesses God differently, and it’s important to us to create spaces that are authentic to them.”

Finding a community is a crucial aspect for a worship shopper. The people within a worship setting can make or break one’s church experience.

“When I think about church, to me, I don’t think about a building that I go to,” said Dusty Breeding, campus and youth minister of the University Church of Christ. “I think about a group of people I belong to.”

Breeding described this as ecclesia, which is the Greek word for church. In this context, however, church is referring to the people one worships with, which is sometimes more important than the style of worship. “[People] are kind of using worship as a measure of whether they feel they fit into [a] community,” Lemley said. “They might stay and be a part of the life of that church more than just the worship itself.”

For people who might disagree or dislike some aspects of their heritage church, or the church of their family, church shopping gives them an opportunity to experience styles of

worship they weren’t exposed to while growing up.

Millennials in particular are known for leaving their heritage faith. Sociology Professor Robin Perrin said this generation is more open to trying new things regarding worship than previous generations.

“Most of the mainline denominations are declining,” Perrin said. “I think young people certainly are more interested in creative ways of doing things.”

Senior Jessie Mandel, a service team leader for Campus Ministry, grew up in the Churches of Christ and never experienced anything other than an acapella style of worship.

“I’m a very big fan of instrumental worship and Church of Christ usually doesn’t allow it or doesn’t believe in it,” Mandel said.

This doesn’t stop Mandel from exploring other churches, however.

“I still attend Church of Christ a lot of the time but I also attend megachurches; sometimes I don’t know what their denomination is,” Mandel said. “I go to Calvary sometimes and Hillsong and Mosaic.”

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While regularly experiencing different churches might seem noncommittal, Barton thinks that it is actually a sign of a seasoned worshipper.

“We mature as we would in our faith and in our worship experiences,” Barton said. “I think a mark of maturity in worship is being able to worship with people who do not worship in your favorite way.”

Cons “I have a negative connotation to the phrase worship shopping or church shopping because I often think it is shallow,” Breeding said. “It doesn’t have depth.”

Although Barton praises students for opening themselves up to new worship experiences, she recognizes that worship shopping can also be isolating.

“Because we’re maybe shopping or looking around or not picking one place, we start to feel lonely and there’s a lack of belonging to something,” Barton said.

Constant church shopping, like the kind Stull participated in, results in feelings of uprootedness, and a lack of community to share one’s life or worship with, Breeding said.

Some argue that spending an extended period of time shopping shifts one’s point of view on church itself.

Ronald Cox, a religion professor and associate dean of International Programs, compared worship shopping to a trip to Ralphs.

“There’s a whole aisle of cereal … there’s so much choice,” Cox said. “If I’m moving from church to church, looking for one that suits me, I’m reducing church down to a commodity. The problem with doing that is I then am looking at not just the worship but the people that I’m there with as commodities that can be dispensed with if they aren’t, quote unquote, meeting my needs.”

Like shopping, church hopping can be addictive. As one hops from experience to experience, one might crave more and more intense practices of worship to be satisfied. Some will try alternative methods to have an out-ofbody worship experience, including speaking in tongues or being slain by the Holy Spirit, said Daniel Rodriguez, divisional dean of the Religion and Philosophy Division.

This may have to do with society’s desensitized nature as a result of technology usage.

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“We live in a society where we spend the whole day on a computer screen,” Rodriguez said. “We become disconnected to ourselves, and worship [practices] like these [speaking in tongues, being slain by the Holy Spirit, etc.] help people to kind of feel it but also feel themselves.”

Focusing on these experiences can force theology to take a back seat when someone is making selections in churches.

“The music, the style, the lighting, the coffee – all of those things are about making people who would not normally go to church, because of the pews and the sort of rigid structure, feel more [comfortable],” Cox said.

“I don’t know how much people put theology and their beliefs really at the forefront anymore in terms of when they’re selecting churches. I just don’t know that people are as theologically or biblically literate. I don’t know that they ever have been.”

For Stull, it seems like her church shopping days are over. After mulling over all of the aspects of her ideal church – worship style, quality of preaching, the community – the Agoura Bible Fellowship is her home for now.

“I sort of see myself continuing to just kind of be there unless I find something else that’s [more] amazing,” Stull said. “But it’s the closest thing I’ve found to home.”

If I’m moving from church to church, looking for one that suits me, I’m reducing church down to a commodity.

Ronald Cox

Identity Inspires Worship Written by Sofia Telch Photos by Callie Mechelke

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reshman Natalia Escobedo prefers to worship in Spanish.

Junior Ikechukwu Egwuonwu likes Nigerian Gospel music.

Senior Anna Renfro enjoys traditional Christian hymns.

Everyone worships differently.

Worship isn’t just white, isn’t just Western, as scholars said some presume. Worship is colorful, global and shaped by all identities.

“We need to realize that not everyone worships or accesses God in the same way,” said David Humphrey, associate dean of Student Affairs for Diversity and Inclusion.

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Defining identity Ethnicity, culture, national origin, gender and sexuality are some of the markers that shape not only how one sees God, but also how one prefers to approach worship.

“All [cultures] have their own styles of worship but if we take them into the bigger picture, they’re all parts of the body of Christ,” sophomore David Kim said. “Let’s just say the Korean culture was the left arm and the Latino culture was the right arm – but when they come together they’re just arms on the same body. They’re just one.”

However, white Christians are often not aware that their culture influences how they practice their faith, said Religion Professor Raymond Carr, who teaches a class on exploring theologies born of struggle, including Native American, black, feminist, womanist and LGBTQ+ theology.

“Christian faith can be very different depending on what kind of cultural matrix you come out of,” Carr said.

“These are real differences that we sometimes really don’t acknowledge for people and so we end up undermining their faith or undermining their culture for our brand of faith.”

Different cultures have shaped and adapted Christian worship throughout the years, Carr said. So Christian belief shouldn’t be thought of as Western belief, as Christianity can be shaped, practiced and celebrated by every culture.

“Culture Christianity is when you confuse Christianity or Christian belief with the ideas of Western society,” Carr said. “The problem is that when you use Christianity to defend [your] culture it doesn’t render you open to 52

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Modeled by Ikechukwu Egwuonwu

other cultures. And then you use God to justify your particular culture.”

To accept different types of worship, it is vital to adhere to a model of Christianity shaped more by the Gospel of Christ than by American ideals, Carr said.

“Part of the problem is that only certain narratives are being used and only certain narratives are being heard,” he said. “And so it makes us one-sided when we got all of this beauty, all of this polyphony. We got this kaleidoscope of different sounds but we’re reducing them to one sound.”

Language

Music Music oftentimes shapes people’s experience in worship and music is shaped by culture. Most students said some type of music – contemporary Gospel, classical, instrumental, choir – helps them feel the Holy Spirit more than another.

Egwuonwu, who grew up with a strong Nigerian background and was raised around African American communities, said his preferred way of worship is through Nigerian and Gospel music.

“I feel like there’s a certain emotional pour out from music because it comes from what you’re feeling,” he said.

He said when he came to Pepperdine, it was hard for him to connect with instrumental worship like Celebration Chapel because he was used to worshipping in different styles.

Egwuonwu is the vice president of worship Word Up, a platform that students created to have the freedom to explore contemporary worship styles.

The gathering is typically held once a month and plays contemporary Gospel music.

Junior Peace Ikediuba, a singer in Word Up who also grew up in a Nigerian Christian home, said musical worship is her favorite way of approaching God. “In the morning when I’m showering getting ready for the day – I turn on my speakers to a playlist called Soul Cleanse,” Ikediuba said.

“I’ll just play that for the whole time I’m getting ready and just let the words get ingrained in my head so that whatever happens throughout the day, I’m remembering those words and what they mean to me.”

Religion Professor Dan Rodriguez said Gospel music came about as a result of a sense of agency within African American churches. “[During segregated America] people of color couldn’t control what happened in many places, but they [could] control what happened in the church,” Rodriguez said.

“And in one way they expressed that freedom was through their worship style.”

David Kim and sophomore Justin Chai, who are both Korean American, said music plays a big role in the way they worship. Kim said his parents encouraged him to learn how to play classical instruments from an early age and inspired him to acquire a love for music, which led him to eventually become a guitar worship leader at his church.

“Music is my most comfortable form of worship because it’s what I’ve grown up with my entire life,” David Kim said. “I play guitar, piano, cello, saxophone and violin too.”

Sociology Professor Rebecca Kim said the Korean Evangelical worship style typically involves instrumental praise. She said for older generations this means singing in Korean, while younger generations usually prefer to worship in English.

“And so the big tension is that [younger generations] don’t want to worship in the Korean language,” Rebecca Kim said. “Even within a Korean immigrant church, there’s always the Korean-speaking group (KM) and an English-speaking group (EM). So the worship is obviously going to be different in the language that they choose.”

Speech, text, signs – they all shape the way one perceives and approaches worship.

Escobedo was born in San Diego but her family is from Guadalajara, Mexico. She said her Mexican grandmother, who is very devout in her Roman Catholic faith, mostly shaped her own religious life.

“My grandmother loves her saints. She loves the Virgin Mary; La Virgen de Guadalupe,” Escobedo said. “We would always go to church on Sundays and I was put in Catholic school from kindergarten to eighth grade because of that.”

Now that she’s in college, Escobedo said she prays mostly by herself.

“I don’t go to church as much as I used to when I was younger,” she said. “Since I used to go to Catholic school, I would go to church

I feel that Spanish words have more weight to them. In English we always say ‘I love you’ a lot even though we don’t mean it as much. But in Spanish when someone says the word ‘amar,’ it’s much more powerful.

Natalia Escobedo

at least twice a week and then I went to public high school and I didn’t go to church as often. But my family and I still always prayed [together]. It’s something we’ve always done.”

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and her family cross the border to Tijuana during big holidays like Easter and Christmas to hear the services in Spanish as she connects most with her faith in that language.

“I feel that Spanish words have more weight to them,” she said. “In English we always say ‘I love you’ a lot even though we don’t mean it as much. But in Spanish when someone says the word ‘amar,’ it’s much more powerful.”

Junior Fernanda Alvarez, a Roman Catholic from Mexico City, said group worship is a big part of Latino culture.

“I pray in a group with my family every night,” Alvarez said.

Rodriguez said worshipping in Spanish is a way for some Latinos to feel closer to God. However, he explained that second- and third-generation Latinos often prefer to worship in English as it is the language they use most often with their friends.

“Most people, when it comes to worship, they prefer to do it in their native language,” he said. “They feel that they’re in the presence of God, ‘que tengan un sentir del sagrado’ – that they can feel the sacred.”

Gender Some identities like music and language are culturally shaped, while others like gender and sexual orientation are biologically determined.

Although biological identities are inherent, they can still rub against some church teachings. For women in many churches, their gender identity shapes how they should behave and sometimes impacts how they are able to worship.

In some Christian denominations, women are not allowed to lead worship.

The Bible says in 1 Timothy 12, “I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent.”

Renfro, a member of the Church 54

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Modeled by Loreley Estrada

of Christ who grew up in a nondenominational Christian home, said she sometimes struggles with the idea that some churches don’t allow women to lead worship.

“To not see someone who is more like you and representative of that feminine approach to faith [leading worship] does say something,” Renfro said. “It’s almost like I can’t really be represented and therefore it’s harder for me to connect.”

Senior Erika Bartlett, a nondenominational Christian, said she also felt like there was a lack of representation in both of the churches she attended growing up. She said the lack of female leadership made her realize how much it was needed, not just at church but in all areas of the world.

“I think there’s a lot that could be done,” Bartlett said. “Even if you don’t think women should be preachers – which some denominations don’t – they

still have valuable insight.”

She attended Bible studies at her church on “how to be a good Christian woman” that taught women “modest is hottest,” and urged her to dress modestly, remain sexually pure until marriage and always be kind.

“Thinking back on it, I don’t necessarily agree,” she said. “A woman can be whoever she wants. If you want to be a feminine woman, if you want to be strong, these qualities don’t need to be associated with gender.”

Bartlett thinks the first step to creating a more feminine approach to worship is to begin to understand the historical and social context of the specific passages that people reference [about women in worship] and understand how they can apply for our time today.

“I don’t think [they] necessarily [have] to mean the same thing,” Bartlett said. “For example, one of the passages is ‘women should not teach’ but if you actually read about it, it was because women [weren’t educated]. If you continue to read, it’ll say ‘instead let women learn,’ which was revolutionary at the time – to let women learn and become educated.”

She said it is this groundbreaking thinking that churches should focus on.

“I think people forget a lot that the things Jesus did were actually revolutionary,” Bartlett said. “Like just simply talking to women was revolutionary in the time period. So I think people should apply that same revolutionary thinking to today.”

History Professor Tanya Hart, who studies women’s history, agreed, arguing that there are many New Testament examples of women leading in the church.

“But over time it’s been the larger secular society saying that wom-

en can’t do this or you know, people who are black people, who are brown, people who are yellow can’t do this,” she said. “Christians have let those ideas come in and shape the church instead of letting Scripture and Jesus shape the church.”

said. “It just shows how people are willing to attack others who they don’t agree with and not really show the true concept of love that was commanded.”

Coming to Pepperdine was a relief for Jones in the sense that he found a worship space that was willing to Sexuality hear him out. He thinks churches Many LGBTQ+ students strug- should accept LGBTQ+ members gle with how to have their faith and because the Gospel commands us to love one another. sexuality coexist.

“Love is a funFeeling like one’s damental conidentity conflicts with

Love is a fundamental cept that God one’s faith isn’t easy to come to terms with, concept that God has com- has commandsenior Joshua Jones manded to us. Being gay, you ed to us,” Jones said. Jones struggled just want to show love to peo- said. “Being gay, with being part of the ple [but] oftentimes you [don’t you just want to LGBTQ+ commu- receive] love – which is against show love to peonity and attending God’s greatest commandment ple [but] oftentimes you [don’t a Christian church – to love our neighbors as we receive] love, growing up. which is against “I myself identify love ourselves.

Joshua Jones God’s greatest as gay,” Jones said. commandment “Growing up, I just wanted to be amongst people that I – to love our neighbors as we love ourfelt could understand me. Because selves.”

Sophomore Grace Ramsey, presioftentimes when you’re a minority, dent of Pepperdine’s LGBTQ+ stuyou feel very misunderstood.”

Jones attended church every Sun- dent club Crossroads, said she too day right around the corner from struggled with feeling accepted.

“I am a panromantic asexual,” his house. Oftentimes, the pastor would talk about how homosexuali- Ramsey said. “Asexuality is not having sexual attraction to anyone of any ty grows out of sin.

“I was heavily involved, [which] gender and panromanticism basically just made me feel like if I ever came means that I still want romantic relaout I would be rejected as a member tionships but I’m open to having them with anyone of any gender.” of that community,” Jones said.

Ramsey said her sexual identity Jones said homosexuality was never framed or mentioned in other contexts, definitely makes her more reserved which made him feel his church wasn’t than she would want to be in terms of speaking her truth and giving tespreaching true Christian principles.

“I’d say one of the fundamental timony.

“But here at Pepperdine it’s realthings about Christianity is it often gets lost in controversy about ly nice because I feel like everyone gender and sexual identity,” Jones at least is willing to hear you out,” Winter 2019

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Ramsey said. “And a lot of people here that are very religious are very accepting of Crossroads’ members.”

In 2016, Pepperdine created Crossroads as Seaver’s first LGBTQ+ friendly club. Since then, students of all orientations have joined the club but there is still some work to be done, Ramsey said. She said the University should make sure LGBTQ+ students feel comfortable in worship.

“Pepperdine constantly talks about diversity and says that everybody is welcome, but when it comes to the faith there is, I’d say, almost no other group that’s been quite as excluded as members from our community,” Ramsey said. “So it kind of takes an extra little bit of reassurance to get people to trust.”

Diversifying worship Humphrey said Student Affairs wants to help students connect with others who worship like them and create spaces of singing and praise.

“It’s important to find ways for students who feel like [Pepperdine] wasn’t made with them in mind to find a sense of belonging and to wrestle with difficult dialogue and difficult conversations,” he said. “It’s just about finding out where these students are and creating opportunities and spaces where [they] can come together and pray.”

The University Church of Christ recently created an instrumental Church of Christ worship service on Sunday nights, which senior Joshua Altrock leads.

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“Naturally, one of the goals is that more students can participate in the church community,” Altrock said.

“We have a lot of students whose background is in instrumental music and [since] the Sunday Church of Christ morning service is only acapella ... not as many students were attending.”

Rodriguez said during his time at Pepperdine, he’s seen student participation in worship events increase.

“I think we’re seeing the highest participation of students in corporate worship than we’ve ever seen in the history of the school since it’s moved to Malibu,” he said.

Carr said it would be nice to “switch things up” when it comes to Pepperdine worship events to show more of a breadth of culture. For example, bringing the Word Up contemporary Gospel style to Wednesday convo or Celebration Chapel.

“I think it’s nice to – maybe once a month or once every other month – shift the focus a little bit and maybe do a different emphasis,” Carr said.

“It’s always good to be a little bit predictably unpredictable in terms of worship and how we respond to God – because God is predictably unpredictable.”

Rebecca Kim also stressed that she thinks students of different cultures should hold leadership positions in traditional worship services and not just be the token “diverse” member, pushed to worship on the side. “[There isn’t] one standard way of doing worship,” Rebecca Kim said.

“Please do not tokenize minority students and be like, oh, worship in your way – show us, be onstage.

No, let the mainstream incorporate the different songs and you know, give the minorities power to shape the way the worship is done instead of saying: ‘Oh, now we’ll have the minority night.’ You know?”

Hart said it is Pepperdine’s duty to love and accept women, LGBTQ+ and all minorities, and encourage them to lead in worship.

“We need to get real about Jesus,” Hart said. “He died to save everyone, not just a particular group.

We’re here to love them and to accept them and embrace them and that’s what we need to do.”

Culture Christianity is when you confuse Christianity or Christian belief with the ideas of Western society. The problem is that when you use Christianity to defend [your] culture it doesn’t render you open to other cultures. And then you use God to justify your particular culture.

Ray Carr

Word Up Encourages All Types of Worship Written by Caroline Edwards

S

enior Valentine Douglas found his space to worship within the Pepperdine community as president of Word Up, an on-campus worship night featuring contemporary Gospel music that occurs at the end of every month.

“I think worship is a thing that we do to exalt God, acknowledge God in a way that’s genuine and connect with God,” Douglas said.

Word Up is currently in its fourth year and offers fellowship-type worship for students. Douglas joined it his freshman year. He said the style is similar to the worship and music at contemporary Gospel churches and black churches. Douglas said the night opens with worship to God followed by community time that includes games or fellowship and ends with “the word” for a discussion of the Bible.

“Word Up is fostering a space for people to be able to connect with each other and really be in the space with one another before we dive into the word together, which I think is really critical,” Douglas said.

Douglas said Word Up is an open space for different types of worship that “revolves around the ideas of community and diversity.” He emphasized that there is no right way to worship and that’s what makes Word Up so beautiful and diverse.

“We understand that not everybody worships the same,” Douglas said. “We want to make sure everybody can worship together.”

Douglas said people can be uncomfortable with worship styles different than their own and some people attach stigma to styles that seem strange to them.

However, Douglas said people should do what they’re comfortable with when it comes to worship.

“If everybody around me was jumping up and down and dancing and hands are in the air and that’s not what I do, then now I’m somehow worshipping less or if nobody’s doing that and I feel [the] need to do that, I felt like I can’t do that because now I’m somehow trying to get attention,” Douglas said.

Douglas said Word Up is one of his favorite ways to worship because it has made him and others more comfortable with their worship styles.

“One thing God has made clear to me is that when you will open up your space to worship God, then it can create space for other people to do it,” Douglas said. “I think it’s allowed me to not feel concerned about that, about standing out in worship, but to embrace it.”

Winter 2019

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Up Written by

Hattie Pace

I look up, and my eyes have to blink.

The white stucco is brighter in the warm air of Sunday morning.

I walk in, and my heart warms up; my eyes now aglow under the twinkle lights above.

And then the drums hit the beat, and the piano chords pound; voices rise in harmony, each soul rings a sound.

My eyes blink back tears when we sing to the sky; my whole heart screams “yes,” yes, You are the way, truth, and life.

The way to breathe, the truth in praise, the life given when You call my name.

I look up, and there aren’t words left.

So I bloom into a smile, pure awe in my chest.

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Now it’s your turn.

HOW DO YOU DEFINE WORSHIP?