Emily, Christian Science Reading Room, Wisconsin Avenue

            I had no idea what to expect when I walked into the Christain Science Reading Room, but I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. Emily was sitting placidly behind a desk and, after we introduced ourselves, told me to pull up one of the comfortable airchairs in the front room. The small room, with an office in front and a tiny library complete with carrols, was cool, quiet, and inviting. Checking her BlackBerry occasionally and absentmindedly, Emily talked happily with me, listening attentively whenever I spoke.

“Hi, my name is Emily Kendrick and this is the Christian Science Reading Room on Wisconsin Avenue. I volunteer here a couple times a month. It is a place that people can come and ask about our religion, Christian Science, and can talk about their religion, can talk about world issues, how we see them and how we can help. It’s an interesting place to be, lots of people your age come in, working people come in during their lunch times and just chat.      

       
         So for lots of people, they see a Reading Room and they think only Christian Scientists can walk in here. We also do work in prisons, and I didn’t feel quite ready to go there, so I serve in here.  It’s an open space for anybody to come to, but people don’t come to do emails or do homework or stuff like that. It’s a place to talk about religion and world issues and how I as a Christian Scientist view it and how somebody maybe from another religion views it. So it’s supposed to be an inspirational place to come. Also a place to come for peace and quiet.

We’re not really well understood. We’re a Christian religion. So it gives us a good opportunity to reach out without proselytizing, without going out onto the street, without coming and tapping people on the shoulder. We’re just here if they wanna know about it.

      
            I was born a Christian Scientist, but you have to make it your own.  You have to really decide, as in all religions, ‘this is what I believe, this is what works for me, I get it.’ And to work here in the Reading Room or in the prison you have to understand it well enough to explain it to others and not be offended if they don’t like it.

     
          [When I was in high school,] I was very athletic. I was a member of both soccer and hockey varsity teams. I was just into my sports and I had some good friends. So we all sort of buddied up and went to football games and stuff. College I probably came out more as being an artist. All my life I kind of vacillated between art and being an educator. So maybe I should have been an art teacher.

         So anyway I got married and had a couple kids. And then I got to trail around after them while they did their sports and went on their varsity teams. It’ll probably be a few years till I turn the corner. I might go back and do a combination of educating and art stuff. I threw pottery for a while, then I switched to hand building for a while, I did photography for  a while.  I worked as a photographer for a park, went out to California and met Ansel Adams, the famous black-and-white photographer, took a summer course there.

I went to college, I was an artist and an educator. I got a degree to teach elementary children. I taught for years and volunteered in schools. So my skill is children and people and talking and teaching- I consider myself an educator. So I kind of fit here.

       
         It’s always been really clear to me that I’m a good educator. So I think kids and educating and art and then just being naturally athletic, it was just who I was. It gets lost for a little bit when you parent because it’s about them, and you have to step aside. And sometimes you step aside so much that for a while you forget who you are and you have to rediscover it. At least that’s what happened to me. But my passions have remained the same. They just were there.

            Having faith really has guided my life. Having kids, having a marriage. For me I’ve needed it. It’s taught me reliance on God, reliance on something bigger than me as a self-person to solve it. Humility, to step aside, to compromise, to bend. Without it, I think I would be a mess. I need a bigger picture. For me, I need to know, ‘ok God, what do I do here?’

         I don’t think of God as a person, I think of God as a principle. God is love, God is life. So for me to just step aside and listen and think about the Bible, think about people that got thrown into lion’s dens and got mistreated. And they just listened to God’s will. So I’ve been glad to be a Christian Scientist, I’ve been glad to be a Christian. That doesn’t mean that I’m any better than anybody else, though. The multitude of different religions, races, kinds of people, colors, variety of who people are- I can accept it all. It’s just what works for me.

     
        I think you must pursue your inside most passion. Cause now I’ve read articles about- and there’s a quote and I can’t quote it perfectly and I don’t know the author- ‘Where your glad heart meets is where the world needs you most.’ You must give, you must go, you must travel the world, you must try new things, you must see things, but you must compromise. You must meet, you must be ready to help the world because things are broken all over the place. The world needs freshness, it needs new views, it needs what youth has to offer. It needs you guys going to college, or not going to college, and pursuing your passions. Because the world needs what’s inside you. It doesn’t need you looking and analyzing, ‘oh, in the future, we’re gonna need this many of this and this many of that.’ What it needs is that innermost love that you have, because that’s your gift. That’s your gift, what you have to give to the world. "

"You must give, you must go, you must travel the world, you must try new things, you must see things, but you must compromise"