My name is Kristyn Bochniak. I was pleased and honored to be asked to speak today on reconciliation; specifically how I see reconciliation in my work. I am the Associate Dean for Residential Life and Education at Hope College. In this role, I oversee all the students living on campus and all the staff working in the halls, cottages, and apartments. While I’ve been at Hope 4 years, I have been engaged in residential life work at different colleges and universities for about 18.
A couple understandings you need to know about this work, and ultimately me, before I talk about reconciliation.
Everybody wants to belong. While I was in graduate school, I was struggling to write a paper about diversity in the classroom. It was Sunday, and my husband said leave it and let’s go to church. Grumpily I went. That day the main theme to the sermon was: “behind every face is a story; And within every story is a search for belonging.” This turned into the thesis of my paper and really a cornerstone of my work and life. So if people feel the need to belong, they need and desire to be in community.
The core role of Residential Life is to form community and give students a place they feel like they can belong. We will never accomplish this. We know that, but this doesn’t mean that we will ever stop trying. And in the midst of community and trying is broken promises, harsh words, unintended discrimination and bias, actions done as a result of peer pressure, lack of action from fear of judgement, and many under-developed-brains making underdeveloped choices. Which all leads to hurt, brokenness, conflict, and MANY opportunities for reconciliation.
As I have thought about this, I have gotten insights from colleagues and students. What emerged was not a single story of reconciliation but lessons we have learned about reconciliation.
Each one of these lessons I have anchored in a comment/belief that a Hope student made after being a part of a reconciliation retreat facilitated by one of my colleagues a few years ago. Each lesson is accompanied by a story with changed names and details.
1) “I believe Hope can be a mode of reconciliation when we choose to lament, choose to forgive, choose to act and practice resurrection.”
Choice – People have the power of choice. They have the power to do things that will cause hurt, and they have the power to choose to move through a process of reconciliation. Sometimes people are not ready to move through that process. That is okay and that is hard.
Joe had a judicial meeting that my colleague didn’t feel comfortable doing on his own. I agreed to join him for what I thought would be a 30 minute meeting. 2 hours later Joe had heard how he scared and hurt one of his closest female friends, and he wasn’t allowed to have contact with her until this situation worked through the judicial process. He had gone through a gauntlet of emotions, he was planning on going home for the weekend, and we had a follow up check in meeting scheduled for the Monday morning.
A lot of processing and three check in meetings later, all Joe wanted to do was talk with her and clear things up. Reluctantly, Joe realized he might be ready to choose to start that reconciliation process, but she was not. They both have the power to choose and both have to be ready to engage to move into reconciliation.
2) “I believe that in relationship we find forgiveness through grace. A residue of pain remains, yet people are set free.”
Internal reconciliation – Many of my stories of reconciliation begin with a painful walk alongside students who first need to recognize, process, react, lament, and reconcile something within themselves before they can reconcile with another person. A process that leaves a “mark”, but ultimately “frees” the person to seek reconciliation and have comfort with themselves.
Sue has a mental illness. Sue was newly diagnosed, was struggling with cultural stigmas around mental illness, and saying and doing things that were taking an unfair emotional toll on her friends. I talked to Sue about her impact on her friends and community members and that she needed to move because of that impact.
Over 3 years, Sue and I continued to meet, checking in, ensuring she was connected to the mental health resources she needed, processing what it meant for her to live with and understand her mental health in the context of living in community. With the help of her counselor, she struggled through understanding her illness, what she needed to do to manage it, the responsibility she had for the impact on the community and the broken relationships and friendships along the way, so she could seek reconciliation with the people she needed to.
3) “I believe that reconciliation is an active process not an abstract idea. It changes cultures, transforms lives, and broadens perspectives.”
Process and time – As all of these quotes and stories say or suggest, reconciliation is a process that takes time. Often there are many different choices, emotions, and experiences that need to be made, felt and had before you can move into reconciliation. Sometimes that does go relatively quickly, but other times that can take years. What is true is that people need to go through their process and it will take time.
Jamal was a RA. I watched him grow as a student and in his identity as a gay man. His supervisors processed with me the hurt, and resentment of his family’s disapproval of him being gay. From a distance, I saw how this impacted how he viewed himself, presented himself to others, and how he was involved on campus. Jamal is also a science minded person, so he approached his understanding of himself and his relationship with his family intellectually and analytically which has looked very different than many others I know who have made this journey. As a senior, I developed a relationship with Jamal and heard from him his years of not being happy with himself, years of trying to figure out what his identity meant to him, years of trying to understand his relationship with his family, and the new found peace he discovered for himself and his family.
Lastly, “I believe that pain is real, that anger is justified, and that response is necessary. But most of all, I believe in the driving force of Hope.”
Ultimately, belonging is a need, community is necessary, but it is messy and hurtful. Reconciliation is a vital way we can help pick up the pieces and repair the holes in our communities and ourselves and give us hope.
Thank you.
~Kristyn Bochniak, Hope Church Member