Campus minister strives to build collegians' fatih

Sister Maureen O'Leary, FSP, is hard at work when she goes for a walk.

One of two Catholic chaplains at The University at Albany, the Franciscan Sister of Peace takes time every day to stroll SUNY's massive uptown campus, talking with students along the way.

Her subtle approach obviously works well: Sister Maureen was recently honored with SUNY's Justice Award for promoting diversity in the college community.

Called to college

The chaplain joked that working with college students was "not on my list of ministries" a couple of decades ago, when she was an educator, administrator, retreat team leader and drug-program coordinator in the Archdiocese of New York. She decided to try campus ministry only when she heard the SUNY chaplaincy position was open.

Fourteen years ago, Sister Maureen came to SUNY -- and fell in love with the "mystery" of serving students at such a challenging period in their lives. She's also director of campus ministry for the entire Albany Diocese.

"It's not pizza and hanging out," she said of college ministry. "It's really trying to engage the students."

School year

Sister Maureen's year starts in late summer, when she meets new students and parents arriving for orientation. SUNY has estimated in the past that about a third of its 12,000 students are Christians.

Catholic parents of freshmen, Sister Maureen said, often ask worriedly, "Will my child continue to go to church?" She tells them: "I don't know, but you know where I am."

She gives out information on Chapel House, SUNY's interfaith center, reassuring parents that the seeds of faith are planted at home and that even students who take a "sabbatical" from Mass for a while will hang onto their relationship with God.

At orientation, she also has students fill out a "religious option card" and sifts out the Catholic newcomers, adding their names to an email list for news about campus ministry events and Mass. (SUNY also has chaplains and services for other faiths.)

Catholics on campus

Mass is offered every Sunday night at Chapel House, where Jewish and Christian chapels sit side-by-side, each with a back wall that can be moved to accommodate a larger congregation.

Sister Maureen said that she and fellow chaplain Rev. Robert Longobucco try to make Chapel House like a parish for students, with sacraments, church committees, a Newman Association and even a Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA) program for new Catholics.

About 100 students attend Mass on campus; others go to churches in the neighborhoods around SUNY. Some don't go to church at all, but that doesn't offend the chaplains.

"This is a time in their lives when they have to take everything they've learned and personalize it and own it," Sister Maureen explained, joking: "I feel like the midwife!"

In touch

That sentiment springs from talking with a host of students who email, call or visit to talk about issues that are bothering them. Women often question the Church's position on abortion; surprisingly, Sister Maureen said that many male college students want to talk to her about feeling pressured to make relationships more serious.

"I'm the listener," she stated. "They almost talk themselves through it."

Active listening is one of the most crucial parts of Sister Maureen's job. All day, she said, students "get somebody talking at them in a classroom. I'm not sure they get the opportunity to talk that often."

Big issues

Students have a lot on their minds, she said, from divorce to family illnesses to the war in Iraq.

"Since 9/11, they're living in a different world," the chaplain said. She recalled that on Sept. 11, 2001, she happened to have a television on in a religion class she was teaching when planes hit the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Soon, she was comforting frantic students who couldn't reach their families on cell phones. Wearing a name tag, she walked the campus all day, talking with students and letting them literally cry on her shoulder.

"The war in Iraq resurrected some of that," she told The Evangelist. "It's in their lifetime, and it's close to home."

Meaning

Students are always searching for meaning in their lives, Sister Maureen added, but that was intensified by the war.

"I say, `Do you know God loves you?' They say, `I haven't thought about it.'"

Faith can sustain the young adults, but Sister Maureen has to work to get them reconnected with God.

"It's a job where you really can't sit down with a plan book," she remarked.

Success stories

When successes come her way, the chaplain is delighted. She talked happily about a group of students who told her casually, "You're not going to believe this -- a few of us met last night, and we prayed together."

"What time was it?" the chaplain happened to ask. "Midnight," the students said.

"I'm glad you didn't ask me!" Sister Maureen told them, chuckling.

A graduating student recently asked the chaplain to be her godmother as she journeyed toward becoming Catholic. Sister Maureen called that the "zenith" of her ministry.

Honored

The Justice Award was yet another honor. As a Franciscan, Sister Maureen said that promoting diversity is part of her own spirituality. In her work, she tries to be available to whoever needs her, regardless of race, ethnicity or religious background: "I don't see the diversity; I see them as young adults, struggling."

Now that the awards ceremony and graduation are over at SUNY, Sister Maureen's life has temporarily quieted. In her role as diocesan campus ministry director, she's turned her attention toward a summer barbecue for campus ministers from all over the Diocese.

Whether her charges are older adults or students, she noted, events are always better with snacks: "Everything where there's food, we're fine."

(Chaplains of different faith traditions meet about once a week at SUNY to discuss how they can best minister to students. Times of tragedy and an annual "festival of lights" (held during Advent) bring chaplains and students of all denominations together, as do other events. "We just had a karaoke barbecue -- all kosher," Sister Maureen remarked. In the fall, she hopes to help Muslim students who have been affected by the war in Iraq.)

(6/12/03) [[In-content Ad]]