Potential Touchy Subject!
 

I'm going to rush in a little less than a month, and my major is religion. I have extremely personal reasons for this choice, and I'm a very devout Christian. However, I don't want anyone to feel uncomfortable! (I'm not pushy, I promise. :]) If they ask about my major, is there a way I can discreetly discuss my reasons without stepping on any toes? I live in the South, deep in the Bible belt, and so I'm not TOO scared, but I would hate to make anyone uncomfortable.

By the way, I apologize if this is the wrong place or a repeat, I'm awful new and I'd be happy to fix whatever error I made.:)

Say your major is theology.

:) Just be prepared to answer the question "So why did you choose religion as a major?" Everyone has personal reasons for selecting their major. You could respond with something along the lines of "Well, I hope so someday be a ____________, or have a career as a ______________." And that should take care of that. Best of luck!

Thanks muchly! :] I'm really new to the Greek scene, none of my family has been in it, and so answers like these are really helpful. I really appreciate it!

"I'm a theology major because the subject really interests me. I think I'd like to do X with it when I graduate but I'm not sure yet!"

Or replace the last sentence with "I'm not sure what I'll do with it when I graduate yet, I guess I have to figure that out."

Please browse through the recruitment section, and if your school is one of those where RECS are a must have, make sure you have them.

Drolefille - Okay! Thanks so much. :] That works perfectly.

IrishLake - Haha, it is indeed. It's a very competitive rush, and I've got four so far, but there's a few that I'm still struggling to find. Trying to reach all my resources, though!

Reach out to the nearest local Alumnae Panhellenic group ASAP, thought it's better to have personal recs and not just info only recs.

Then ask neighbors, friends parents, friends of your parents, people from church, teachers, sunday school teachers, people you work with, etc. Then don't be afraid to ask the women who have written you recs if they know of any women who might write a rec for you from the groups that you're missing. And ask the men in your life too, they may know women who are greek.

Oh, wow! Haha. I never thought of church.. Thanks!

Religion as a course of study isn't the same thing as theology.

Religion isn't that unusual of a major, is it? I know a number of people who majored in it (my brother, a doctor, minored it in so that he'd be better equipped to relate to his patients), and I've never known anyone else to give it a second thought.

Well, I think there's six or so other girls studying it as the incoming class. I've just read that religion being discussed is a no-no during recruitment!

THE
 

I've often said to ask whomever puts the bulletin together to include you in the prayer list, or say that you've graduated from high school, are going to Competitive University, and would greatly appreciate anyone who would be willing to help you with a rec. Your house of worship is probably THE biggest pool of cheerleaders for you that you'll ever had. I know that half of my recs unknowingly came from my church.

Don't forget your teachers, too!

honeychile - Oh, man! The bulletin is just about my favorite idea ever. I'm really close to my church, and multiple other churches in the area, and so I'll keep an eye out.

But teachers haven't been all that helpful, haha! I'm VERY close to quite a few of them, but I'm in a very small town, and many women and even some of the men stayed quite far from the Greek life for maaany different reasons. I have gotten a few connections from them, though, so fingers crossed. :p

What is meant by not discussing religion is to not discuss the particulars of a specific religion. The same for politics. If you were majoring in political science you could certainly tell them that. It's getting into the specifics of your politics or religion that may cause an issue. So since you could say I'm majoring in poli sci because I find the ins and outs of the political system in our country to be interesting, you could say you are interested in the religions of the world as a historical perspective, or whatever.

Yes. I think the idea of sort of off limit topics is so that you don't end up alienating your conversational partners, putting them on the defensive, or even just boring them.

But I'll note that it has always struck me as much more awkward for people to all of a sudden clam up when they realized they nearing a forbidden subject than it is just to go forward with sort of normal questions, but not focus or probe on the controversial.

There's no reason to force a topic on someone, but don't make something that's not usually conversationally weird suddenly loom really large simply because it's recruitment.

Ahh. Thanks for clarifying. I was really stressing, because it's such a HUGE part of my life, and I'd feel awful having to not allow myself to chat at least casually about it.

I might stay away from "Jesus is my personal savior. How do you feel about Him?"

But it's totally fine to talk about being active in your Church, how that's been a support system for you, and how you've met greeks there, or expressing interest in religious groups on campus. And of course, your major is 100% OK to talk about. When I went through recruitment, one of my major leadership activities was through a religious group. That is fine to discuss.

I would consider myself a pretty serious Christian as well and I was very, very involved with my youth group and church in high school and Campus Crusade in college. During recruitment the things I did in youth group and Campus Crusade (I rushed as a junior) definitely came up, but I always just said how it grew me as a person and gave me a wonderful, close community and how I was looking for that in Greek life as well. It only gets weird if you're talking about how much Jesus means to you when you're talking to a Buddhist (or devout atheist). Just be respectful and if you're unsure about whether or not it would be awkward to say, err on the side of caution. Obviously if you end up joining you'll probably have more in-depth conversations about deeper and more meaningful things, but there is a time and a place for that. If you wouldn't talk about it during a job interview or first date, it might also come off as strange or off putting while you're meeting these women for only 5 or so minutes each during recruitment. Best of luck to you, let us know how it goes! :)

Yep, that's how I see it too. Recruitment is no place to evangelize or proselytize, but you don't have to hide who you are either. Since you will be trying to gain membership in a primarily social organization, however, you probably want to make sure that your conversational topics are varied.

While I doubt being strongly religious would be a problem at very many chapters, being the recruitment guest who can talk only about religion might be.

Yeah, don't say your major is something it isn't. That would make you sound like an idiot. It's called what it's called.

Theoretically, you can be a religion major and be an atheist.

My biggest rush crush was a mortuary sciences major. Speaking of things you shouldn't discuss during rush! My bump wanted to kill me, but what was I gonna do?

If you keep in mind that the person you're speaking with may not have anywhere near the same views as you and address the issue accordingly, you should be fine. And you will absolutely positively be asked what's your major and why. Now is the time to come up with a clear, concise answer that shows your passion without sounding like The Church Lady.

Yes, I was only going with theology as I've not heard of a Bachelors in Religion. If it's Religious Studies or something similar, or whatever it is actually called use that.

You can major in religion at many schools. The degree will probably be a bachelor of arts, as it's considered part of the humanities.

Well yeah a BA in religion is what I meant. I guess I've only ever seen 'religious studies' or theology but then my selection of schools has probably been biased on those lines.

It certainly one of those things different schools call different things. I've seen "religion," "religious studies," "religion and culture," "comparative religion" and others. In the schools I'm familiar with, theology would be a different, more specialized course of study, as theology usually implies a Judeo-Christian focus, whereas the more general "religion"-related terms do not.

Bottom line: The OP should refer to her major however her school refers to it.

Agreed.

Haha. At my school, it is indeed religion. But I intend on going into the ministry after college, so either way it's sort of Christian-based. Thanks, y'all!