by Mark R. Orten, Dean of Spiritual and Religious Life

Welcome to a new academic year at Middlebury! For some it is a first. For others, a blessed continuation. In any case it has been eventful already! And just when it feels that we might be finding a rhythm and settling into some predictable patterns we learn the very sad news of the death of a student, someone who was known to many within and beyond the college. Whether we knew Evelyn or not, we feel the loss. We sense the grief within an institution that is, beneath it all, made up of people. You and I are connected; and when one of us is impacted it impacts us all.

Religion comes from a word that means “connected.” At its best it can also become one of the ways in which we express and experience our connectedness. Mature religions are conduits of this interplay of our lives that emphasize and enhances healthy interdependencies. It gives shape to our “inter-being.” Many worldviews and philosophies that are not religious, per se, also give expression to core convictions and ultimate values that are lived out in human harmonies that can look like hearty religious community and spiritual practice without subscribing to their traditions.

All of this is supported by the Scott Center for Spiritual and Religious Life at Middlebury. Whether we’re sipping tea and watercoloring at the ‘anti-program’ known as The SlowDown, or saying Jumma prayers, or passing challah at Shabbat, or baking with the Quakers (can we call it ‘quaking’?), or singing with InterVarsity (Revival), or retreating with Newman (R. Catholics) — we’re celebrating our connectedness, among other things. We’re re-membering one another, including those we have lost recently like Evelyn, and we are making the sense we need for the time being of going on with our lives. Together.

May you find those connections this year, whatever they may be. May you belong. May you be embraced and be included even as you embrace and include—and celebrate—the lives of others, just as they are.