Sorority Recruitment
 

I'm a Seventh-day Adventist and that means i observe the Sabbath on Saturdays. Is it possible to still join a sorority? Would they be accomodating in any way or is it totally a lost cause??? Some advice would greatly be appreciated. =/

Most of the time, mixers and things are on Thursdays or Fridays and chapter meetings are on Sundays or Mondays. Honestly the only things I remember being on Saturdays were formals, and that was only once a semester (if that - sometimes formals were on Fridays). So you should be good to go. :)

No offense, but it really depends on the chapter and the school culture. This could be the norm for a lot of schools, but mine is nothing like this (and who knows about the OP).

Maybe it would help if you could clarify what you mean by "observe the sabbath". What exactly can you participate in on a Saturday?

Right.

If "observing the Sabbath" for you = not going ANYWHERE or doing anything other than attending services/worship, it MAY be difficult for you to be a part of a sorority IF that chapter is one that holds alot of events/meetings/etc on Saturdays.

I know that rush is usually over a weekend or 2, but that isn't something that happens all the time. My impression was that the OP was asking about events that happened on a regular/weekly basis.

Yeah, definitely see what the norm for your school is because as you can tell from even this few answers, it fluctuates wildly from campus to campus.

A lot of our mixers, formals and other social functions were on Saturday, as well as many Greek week events (our Greek Week events were spread out throughout the year).

As stated above, without knowing how you observe the Sabbath, it's difficult to tell you. If you can't do anything on Saturdays, you're going to feel left out of a lot.

Well, when i say I observe the Sabbath, I'm not really allowed to do anything until sunset Saturday, which marks the end of it.

I couldn't do a lot of things on Saturday when I first joined, not for religious reasons but due to my sport. At first it seemed like I was always missing stuff but now it's gotten better and we don't seem to do as much on Saturdays. It would just depend on the individual chapter and it's probably something you could investigate. My chapter was fine with me missing different things and they understood/still understand when we do have things on Saturday that I usually can't go.

Are you familiar with the Greek Life on the campus you are considering? As stated above, activities vary from campus to campus. One thing that does come to mind, though, is initiation which usually occurs over a weekend...that might be a problem.

When I was in chapter, we had two girls observe the Sabbath because they too are Seventh-Day Adventist. One of them's my pledge sister!

Initiations usually took place Saturday mornings, but we moved it to Saturday evening after sunset to accomodate them. We kinda had to, for reasons I can't say because it pertains to Ritual. Whenever they'd miss an event because it fell during the Sabbath, they were not penalized or fined.

Since you're not in a sorority yet, it's best to just focus on recruitment first. However, I do agree with the others who have said that it really depends on your school. Has the recruitment schedule been posted for your school yet? Do any of the recruitment events fall during the Sabbath? I wouldn't worry about it just yet. When you meet your Rho Gamma (Recruitment Counselor), this would be a good time to ask her about members with religious observations. Chances are you won't be the only one.

Hey. I know how you feel since I'm Jewish and I went through the same issue when choosing a sorority. I found one that has a Jewish-interest and by doing so we rarley do things on Saturday and when we did (like a Shabbat dinner) we always make arrangements for the dietary restrictions and observances of our members (like holding it on campus so people who lived in dorms could walk or allowing members to sleepover at the location so they wouldn't need to drive). I don't know where you go to school (feel free to private message me and I can let you know where my sorority has chapters) but I know sorority life has been a lot easier for me by being in a Jewish-interest group. Perhaps there are seventh day adventist sororities out there too...it might be worth looking into.

A girl that used to post on GC is a member of one, Zeta Lambda Psi. I thought I recalled her mentioning it was founded as a Seventh-Day Adventist organization.

http://www.geocities.com/ladiesofexcellence1987/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4zV4PCR48k

The only events that we typically had on Saturdays during the day were Pre-Games and Greek Week (optional), and Formal Recruitment (mandatory). Initiations for the larger pledge classes were held on Sunday afternoons; a lot of the initiations for COB classes were on a week night. Formals were typically Friday or Saturday night, again optional. Philanthropy events varied. The first round of Formal Recruitment was always an all-day Saturday event and even the three traditionally Jewish houses participated.

We didn't have any Seventh Day Adventist members but we did have Jewish Members, and we did the best we could to accomodate everyone. However, with over 100 in the chapter, we could only do so much.

I don't recall that we fined anyone for missing something due to religious reasons. I do remember that when I roomed with a cheerleader, she was excused from many events when she was traveling with the Football and Basketball teams and they girls that were on the Synchro Swim Team were excused from events when they were at Nationals.

I think a lot of it will come from you. Are you willing to possibly miss events (even optional) such as recruitment?