At Phillips Exeter, a World of Religious Diversity

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Phillips Exeter students and faculty at a Shabbat dinner. In the past, one teacher said, “Being Jewish was a hidden thing here.” Credit Cheryl Senter for The New York Times

APRIL 11, 2014
By MARK OPPENHEIMER

EXETER, N.H. — “Money, prestige, success — they have become slave masters,” Milton Syed, a slight 18-year-old from the Bronx, told his audience. He was wearing a necktie with his collared shirt, as required by the dress code here at Phillips Exeter Academy, alma mater of Daniel Webster and Franklin Pierce, of Gore Vidal and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. Mr. Syed, a senior, was preaching a khutbah, the Friday sermon after Muslim prayers, to a group of 10, including several fellow Muslim students, a Muslim math teacher and a blond girl who was not Muslim, just curious.

“Once you are in your grave,” Mr. Syed continued, “Allah is going to ask you, ‘What did you do with your life?’ ”

I was visiting in late March, on a rainy, northern New England Friday. Friday is the busy day at Phillips Church, the spiritual hub of Exeter, as this boarding school is known. On Sunday morning, there are Protestant sermons here, by the school minister. But Friday is when the Muslim students pray (and then have lunch), when the Jewish students bless Shabbat candles (then have dinner), and when the Buddhist students meditate (then have evening tea). There is Bible study for Christians on Friday evening, too.

No matter the lingering, and inaccurate, stereotype of New England boarding schools as warrens of Anglo-Saxon, Protestant preppies: A Friday at the Phillips Church is a multicultural adventure. You could — and I did — spend the whole day eating, praying, studying and discussing life’s big questions, as seen from a variety of world traditions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/12/us/at-phillips-exeter-a-world-of-religious-diversity.html?_r=0