Finals and faith

Students do funny things when finals week is here. Suddenly you will find people quizzing each other in bathrooms, the hallway, studios, and in the computer lab. Students will send you emails at three o'clock in the morning, leave endless messages with questions on your voicemail, ask about review sessions and old quizzes and tests, and spend every waking moment in our building. In all honesty, my students here are not that much different from my students back in Europe, or students in Texas or up in New England. Everyone is nervous, stressed out, tired, and wants to do well. And go home. With honor, preferably.

But there is one thing that is unbelievably, vastly, and above all, unexpectedly different from anywhere else I have taught or been a student: religion. Our students will not only spend hours in the hallway studying, the majority will also spend at least a few moments before every final in prayer. Yes, in prayer. Sometimes they will even pray out loud. Or sing a little. And no, we are not a baptist/mennonite/quaker/mormon college. We are a simple public school, which is thus not supposed to have any religious affilitation whatsoever. Supposed, yes. And I suppose if you don't consider all the times the president or provost opens an official meetig with a prayer, or those occasions when we are reminded that we should tell our students to take their concerns to God, or all the towel and basin displays we have in every building, then yes, our school has no religious affiliation at all.

And it's not just prayer. Today during one of my finals, one of my students called out; "Jesus!", to which I responded, "He's not here right now, but maybe I can help you."
All my students were in uproar. Jesus was there, in spirit, and I had better believe it, because they needed him. There was, and I quote, not going to be any devilworshipping while they were doing their final. No sir. And Amen to that. Alrighty then.
And when I walked into the second final of the day, the following message had been scrawled on the whiteboard:
"Thank you Jesus for His son. Jesus, have mercy on us! Philosophy and ethics, 2009"
I looked at the board, and said something noncommittal, to which my students responded that they were really serious, and I had better not jinx them. My finals are apparently so hard, only God can help them through.

Now let me just come out of the closet here and tell you all that I am a Christian too. A tree-hugging, liberal, hippie Christian, but a Christian nonetheless. I go to church every week, and even teach Awana. But even for me, this really raises my eyebrows. What are my students going to do if they ever have to work for an atheist/Muslim/Jewish/Mormon/Wiccan boss? One who doesn't appreciate such outbursts of faith? Tell him he is going to hell? That will go over really well, I'm sure.

Well, I guess I better grade my finals. See if God really shined down on my students today, or if they just didn't study enough.