Crossing Thresholds: The Making and Remaking of a 21st-Century College Chaplain

by Lucy A. Forster-Smith, Martin B. Copenhaver (Foreword)

With candor, passion, and deep love for her work, Lucy Forster-Smith takes us across the threshold as a chaplain on a college campus. This vocational narrative braids the story of her faith journey that began on a porch when she was a four-year-old, was shaken by a sexual assault as a seminarian, and through healing and grace brought her to claim a call to ministry with students. With delightful humor and an infectious love for her work, Forster-Smith invites the reader into her world. Crossing Thresholds is a theological narrative, weaving together the story of faith in the context of the professional life of a college chaplain. Lighting on the power of spiritual awakening at a college, once named as the number one institution of higher education that "ignored God on a regular basis," Forster-Smith jars loose the assumptions about the avowedly secular campus. Her journey of healing and grace illuminates and guides to cross the threshold of the campus's soul.

160 pages, Paperback

First published August 12, 2015

Reviews

[Leon O'Flynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad book. At times I was a little unsure what the author was attempting to do, part autobiography, part narrative instruction, part theology, etc. I read this thinking that there might be more application to the world of chaplaincy, which is kind of there. However it really is aimed at those in the private US university world- a rather narrow target.

[Bobbi Kraft · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read during seminary. Re-read as a teaching tool with a fellow discerning their call. Worked well as a study tool this time around thanks to the first person accounts.