According to Burkhalter. Not every church appreciates the same worship forms, whether it's the style of music, or the kind of liturgy-formal liturgy or charismatic liturgy. There is already tension between congregations and within congregations. A contributing factor to a skeptical perception of spiritual life at GC is the fact that no matter what place a student decides to call home during the collegiate years, the undergraduate years are ones of significant change. In addition to a new living situation and a switch from home-cooked meals to a cafeteria line with unlimited access to ice cream, a student is exposed to new ideas, either from professors, textbooks or their peers.
Students leave for college with a suitcase, a stereo and a set of ideas.
When they return home, quite possibly they have a suitcase with newly acquired clothing from Goodwill, a stereo that plays a new breed of CDs, and a head full of ideas that are new to the brain. Though parents and other members of a home congregation might see this change as a rejection of their ideals and beliefs, Don Blosser, chair and professor of Bible and religion, sees the transformation as more of an extending and reshaping of ideas based on the set of beliefs they learned from their parents and home congregations. Blosser said students in the '90s are increasingly interested in faith issues, even though their parents may be skeptical. Students, however, adapt their faith around a bigger, more diverse world. There are more and more students who are trying to find a way to get a spirituality underneath them that they can live with.