• About
  • Advertising
  • History
  • Staff
  • Contact

The Andersonian

The Anderson University Student Newspaper

Anderson University’s Student Newspaper

  • Campus News
  • Audio
  • Features
  • Arts & Culture
  • Opinion
  • Sports
  • Video
  • COVID-19
You are here: Home / Opinion / Chapel speakers deserve more

Chapel speakers deserve more

February 7, 2018 by Andersonian Staff

It’s 11 a.m. You, like most AU students, have probably endured a whirlwind of a morning that began with a thrice-snoozed alarm, lectures, possibly a presentation or two and have ended here—in the audience of Reardon Auditorium.

Of course, your first impulse after sinking into your cushy seat is to check your phone. Who knows what you could have missed on Twitter this morning while you were confined to the classroom?

It’s only natural to scroll through social media, reply to a text or two—and perhaps click open your email while you’re at it.

Before you know it, it’s 11:30, and you realize that you haven’t heard much of what that day’s speaker has said. By then, it’s too late to catch on anyway, so you dip your head and return to your phone, or distract yourself with a conversation or a brief nap.

This experience may not be familiar to everyone on our campus, but it can safely be determined a common (and unfortunately expected) scene at chapel each week.

As college students, we are quick to place the blame for our inattentiveness on our disinterest in a certain chapel presentation or the million other things buzzing in our mind, begging for attention (like homework, emotional stresses or lunch).

Of course, being a college student is tough. But it isn’t tough enough that we can’t tune in to what’s happening before us in the present moment for just 50 minutes—or, at the very least, put our phones away.

We can’t earn a grade for chapel. We aren’t being compensated in any way for our time, so perhaps that is why we are less inclined to listen.

However, consider this: maybe paying attention to what’s unfolding onstage is less about us and more about the person who is standing up in front of hundreds of students, sharing with a crowd of strangers his or her perspective on God and the human experience.

Also, consider how much purposeful effort is poured into preparing a half-hour speech and, for some, traveling many miles away from work, family and friends just to relay that story to us.

Respect for these incredible presenters is due, regardless of whether we agree with the fundamentals of what they are saying—and regardless of whether we got three or eight hours of sleep that night.

Perhaps if we give chapel a chance before slipping into a daydream or unlocking our phones, we will do more than just offer the presenter the respect he or she deserves.

Maybe we will take something away from the experience, and maybe it will be something valuable or even life-changing. Maybe chapel will become more to us than something to dread or sleep through: something to enjoy.

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: Opinion

Watch

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Gillian Lintz interviews Dr. Sarah Neal about the current status of COVID-19 on campus and discusses the Boze Lyric Theatre’s upcoming play, “The Drowning Girls.” Mason Fridley provides updates on men’s baseball and men’s tennis standings.

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

More Video

Listen

Sky Cramer

In this audio story, Zac Tallent speaks with junior cinema and media arts major Sky Cramer about his passion for film and photography and making the most of his time at AU.

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

“Anything Goes” Encore this Saturday, April 23

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Fall Into Dance

Claire Mountcastle speaks with dancers Hannah Frick and Leah Pitman about the upcoming student-choreographed performance, Fall Into Dance.

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

The Conspiracy

Claire Mountcastle speaks with senior Melanie Marchena and director of orientation and first-year experience Nii Abrahams about The Conspiracy, a newly-formed community of students created to support AU athletics.

Share this:

  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

More Audio

Follow

andersonian Andersonian @andersonian ·
5 Apr

Check out the latest episode:
https://andersonian.com/2022/04/05/andersonian-2022-04-04/

Reply on Twitter 1511404967436988434 Retweet on Twitter 1511404967436988434 1 Like on Twitter 1511404967436988434 1 Twitter 1511404967436988434
andersonian Andersonian @andersonian ·
27 Mar

Student-created Instagram accounts cause controversy on campus.

Read more:

https://andersonian.com/2022/03/27/instagram-accounts-polarize-students%EF%BF%BC/

Reply on Twitter 1508168748573806602 Retweet on Twitter 1508168748573806602 Like on Twitter 1508168748573806602 1 Twitter 1508168748573806602
andersonian Andersonian @andersonian ·
23 Mar

Check out the latest episode!

https://andersonian.com/2022/03/23/andersonian-2022-03-21/

Reply on Twitter 1506671676725022726 Retweet on Twitter 1506671676725022726 1 Like on Twitter 1506671676725022726 1 Twitter 1506671676725022726
Load More

The Andersonian, the student newspaper of Anderson University, Anderson, Ind., publishes a print edition and maintains this website. As a matter of institutional policy, the University administration does not review or edit Andersonian content prior to publication. The student editors are responsible for both print and online content. While the administration recognizes the role of the student press on a college campus and in journalism education, the views expressed in the Andersonian are not necessarily those of Anderson University.

© Andersonian 2017, All rights reserved · Site by Mere