Help for Keeping the Faith in College

Like many parents, I get a bit anxious about what will happen to my kids' faith when they go to college. We hear the stories of professors who make it their goal to tear down the religious beliefs of their students, and then there's the atheist roommate and the "spiritual but not religious" suitemate, not to mention the friends of various religions and lifestyles they'll meet. Given how many walk away from the faith in college (though that often begins in high school or before), these aren't empty fears. So when I saw I could get a (free) review copy of Michael Kruger's new Surviving Religion 101, I had to snatch it up. (Note to the reader, the title should be read as Surviving [Religion 101] not [Surviving Religion] 101.)

Kruger says he hopes his book "provides an intellectual pathway for Christian students so that they can keep their faith without sacrificing their intellectual integrity.” No one book can answer every question that a person may have, and this one certainly doesn't, but this "volume is designed to be [the] first step, an initial orientation for Christian students about the challenges they face and (hopefully) a reason for them to be confident that there are answers to their questions, even if they don’t have them yet.”

Again, it doesn't cover every possible objection skeptics raise, but it does answer many, and it covers some specific challenges and doubts college students face, such as "I'm worried about this, can I survive?" and "My professors are really smart; isn't it more likely they're right and I'm wrong?" These were all very good. Then it covers objections to Christian exclusivism ("How can we say Christianity is the only right religion?"), homosexuality, hell, evil and suffering, "science explains away God", and various objections to the Bible. Again, they're all well done, but nothing that hasn't been done just as well elsewhere, though I particularly enjoyed his response to "tolerance" and moral relativism.

The book is comforting in places, assuring readers, for example, that non-Christian professors aren't usually evil and your fellow students aren't generally out to get you. But, he reminds us, we shouldn't have "naive overconfidence," either. And, though it may surprise us, "there’s a certain spiritual depth, and a certain spiritual strength, that we will never reach without going through an intense season of doubting and struggle.”

Who is this book for? It's not written to convince the unbeliever but to shore up the confidence of the believer whose faith is being assaulted. This is not a good choice for an unbeliever, even though it may contain answers to their questions. It's written for college students; I don't know if it would be well-received by teens not going to college, even though they'll meet most of these objections in modern society.

Also, it's written as a series of letters to the author's daughter Emma. It creates a conversational tone, keeping the book from feeling too much like a lecture, but I don't know if that format will turn off some readers.

So the book is not unique, and it's not for everyone, but it does what it does well. Churches could do worse than hand a copy of this to every student heading off to college. (Let's be honest, most do much worse — nothing.)