<p>I was wondering what the religious presence is like on the Swarthmore campus. Particularly, that of the Christian community, since I myself am a Christian. Is there a strong campus church, and if not, is there a strong neighborhood church around?</p>
<p>There certainly seems to be a pretty strong Christian organization (if not several) on campus. They have services (err, whatever they're referred to by you guys - I'm Jewish, we call them services, haha) every week.</p>
<p>They host a lot of events on campus, too. When I did my overnight I went to an event hosted by one of the Christian groups. The bottom line is, it seems like if you want to get involved, you'll find a good community there for any religion, particularly for with the Christian and Jewish groups.</p>
<p>Like most colleges, I don't think you'll find that college age kids set records for weekly church attendance. However, there are active student groups with weekly services on campus for Catholic, Christian, Protestant, Jewish, and Muslim students.</p>
<p>You can get links here, scroll down the page:</p>
<p>You might be most interested in the Protestant community:</p>
<p>The protestant advisor's e-mail is there. She would be a good person to contact for more information. If it's not current, e-mail the Deans Office and ask.</p>
<p>The church located on Swarthmore's campus is the Swarthmore Friends Meeting House. The school was founded by some prominent Phila area Quakers, although it is now non-denominational.</p>
<p>The college is surrounded by residential neighborhoods and, therefore, churches of just about every faith within walking distance:</p>
<p>Catholic, Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, AME, etc.</p>
<p>It looks like the nearest synagogue is about a mile and half from campus. It's right on the main bus route:</p>
<p>It's possible to be very involved with the religious community on campus. Two of my close friends are part of Christian groups, although the groups themselves are rather different. </p>
<p>One is a member of the Swarthmore Progressive Christians (SPC). This is the group with a more liberal-ish bent. They host Pizza and Parables once a week, where the whole group gets together for, well, you guessed it. They're very welcoming and fairly casual.</p>
<p>The other friend is a member of the Swarthmore Christian Fellowship (SCF). SCF is associated with the national Inter-Varsity organization (I think I got that right). They're more conservative than SPC, a bit more toward the evangelical side of things, but still very friendly. They organize Bible studies in both large and small groups, and meet on Friday evenings.</p>
<p>There are religious services of all stripes offered either on campus or within easy traveling distance. </p>
<p>I'd be happy to try to answer any questions you've got.</p>
<p>One of my daughter's good friends has become involved with one of the local (non-campus) churches.</p>