Dr. Patricia Joan Austin served as the chaplain of Elizabethtown College from 1981-2001. Joan was presented with the Four Chaplains Legion of Honor Award for her “outstanding service to all people regardless of race or faith.” A professor of psychology with a postdoctoral fellowship in cognitive therapy from the University of Pennsylvania, she maintained a private counseling practice, worked in counseling services at Etown, and significantly contributed to making interfaith cooperation and religious diversity a social norm on campus. The origins of Etown’s disability and learning services, counseling services, civic engagement and service-learning initiatives can all be traced back to Joan’s leadership and vision.
How did Etown hire the first woman chaplain and the first person not ordained as a minister in the Church of the Brethren for this role? From 1899-1948, Etown required students to attend daily chapel services. After the Second World War, many students attended Etown on the G. I. Bill. These military veteran students expressed dissatisfaction with attending chapel. They were not too keen on listening to sermons about pacifism, hearing personal testimonials from conscientious objectors against war, or joining in prayers admonishing U.S. foreign policy makers for rejecting making peace through international détente. In response, beginning in 1948, Etown integrated nonsectarian chapel services, occasionally hosting clergy guest speakers from a variety of denominations and eventually faith traditions.
In 1967, students protested mandatory chapel services, requested chapel services be renamed assemblies and called for limiting the number of assemblies required. In 1967, Etown issued this statement: “The College does not expect the total faculty to be Christian or reflect any one point of view”. In 1968, Etown reduced chapel services to once a week, introduced a weekly nonmandatory ecumenical worship service and required students to attend six out of ten credit-bearing convocation lectures per semester. Later, the convocation series became the one-credit First Year Seminar Colloquium, which is today the fourth hour component of FYS.
From 1973-1980, Dr. Jay Gerald Griener (class of 1964), a minister in the Church of the Brethren, served as Etown’s chaplain. During his tenure, responding to student resistance, mandatory chapel services ended. Attendance declined sharply at weekly ecumenical worship services. Students voiced their dissatisfaction with convocation program topics. At this time, the President of Etown was Dr. Mark Ebersole ‘43, minister in the Church of the Brethren, who previously was the Vice President of Academic Affairs at Temple University, where he worked with Joan Austin.
Joan Austin, recipient of Temple University’s Outstanding Woman Graduate Award, was a professor of Psychology who, in 1977, created Temple’s Office for the Disabled. The Education Division of the International Television Association gave first prize to Joan for a film she created in 1978 entitled, “To Help Ourselves”. This was a training film for campus architects about removing barriers to making education more accessible to the physically and emotionally disabled. Joan served on the Governor’s Council for Physical Fitness and Sports for the Disabled.
President Ebersole hired Joan Austin to be chaplain specifically because she was not a minister or a member of the Church of the Brethren, and she would introduce a nonsectarian counseling approach to the role of chaplain. She would bring a special concern for addressing students with disabilities. Her record on social justice and service learning resonated with Etown’s mission. Essentially, President Ebersole was listening to the students, and he found a chaplain who would bring leadership to a strategic plan for religious life on campus consistent with what mattered most to the students.
In 1981, when Joan arrived at Etown, various religious groups operated independently. Joan created the Religious Life Committee to establish collaboration among all campus religious student clubs. This committee replaced the weekly ecumenical worship service with a new format, based on the model Etown used for chapel services from 1899 to1948, which was to have the students lead the worship service. Every faith tradition represented among the students took part in leading worship, thus attracting a wider audience across campus. In 1994, students requested the weekly interfaith worship services to be eliminated and instead students became involved with the local community, attending worship services off campus, and engaging with local congregation’s service projects. This was the origin of the program called “Into the Streets”, which started on October 29, 1994.
Simultaneously, the Religious Life Committee, responding to student requests, renewed its commitment to providing campus wide nondenominational worship services for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. Attendance at on-campus holiday worship services increased to between 800 and 1200 students, faculty and community members. This was responsible, in part, for the growth of informal Bible studies, prayer meetings and interfaith religious discussion groups in the residence halls. Student clubs for several faith traditions emerged during these years, and in 1996, when Lefler Chapel was built a meditation/prayer room was incorporated into the design as requested by the students.
In 1982, the senior class asked Joan if they could have a baccalaureate service on the Friday night before commencement. Initially, it was called the “Senior Service”, rather than the Baccalaureate, and Etown did not officially sanction it. The service was held off-campus at the Elizabethtown Church of the Brethren. 10 years later, in 1992, Etown officially incorporated the Senior Service into commencement weekend activities and renamed it Baccalaureate, but only on the condition it kept its unorthodox sectarian format. Rather than a religious service with a notable theological speaker, students lead the baccalaureate service at Etown, with several seniors giving personal reflection presentations. In the same year, the Board of Trustees issued this statement: “The Church of the Brethren cannot and should not control the college and the college cannot and should not expect the church…to assume all of the legal responsibilities of ownership.” Thus, the baccalaureate service at Etown remains nonsectarian.
As we approach the 2024-2025 academic year and celebrate the 125th anniversary of the founding of Etown, I am reminded of the 1999-2000 academic centennial year. In 2001, part of the 100th anniversary celebrations included Etown publishing a collection of every public prayer written by Joan for all campus services held in her 20 years as chaplain. The book is entitled, “To the Ends of the Earth: Prayers for a College Community in a Global Society”. I know many people who read this book of prayers as part of their daily devotional meditation. Joan’s voice is still inspiring us.
Joan Austin died on January 29, 2024, at 92 years old. Personally, I miss having conversations with Joan. She read constantly, and our interdisciplinary discussions about the books we were reading and sharing were important to me. It was a privilege to work with Joan for the last eight years of her tenure at Etown when I served on the Religious Life Committee. In 1998, it was delightful working with Joan when my wife Amy and I created a campus organization for Episcopal students called the Canterbury Club. Joan’s passion for literature, art, music, theater and travel abroad was contagious. Joan often joined Amy and me on trips to New York to go to the opera. When she retired in 2001, Amy and I took Joan with us on a trip to Rome. Exploring Rome and the Amalfi Coast through Joan’s eyes was an extraordinary experience.
Indeed, Joan Austin was extraordinary, and her lasting impact on Elizabethtown College is a powerful testimony to her magnificent style of inclusive interfaith leadership.
