Most would agree that Harding is a wonderful place to be. From dwelling in a Christian community to hashtag blessed, we might not be in love with chapel or all the rules but we have to agree with one fact: At Harding most of the people are inherently good. I could not be any more honored to be in a place where most people strive every day to meet high standards of honesty, loyalty and integrity.
As a journalism major I had to do an internship between my junior and senior year and since I wanted to be back home in Rome, Italy, I looked for an internship in the capital. Many emails, phone calls and resumes later, I ended up at a small newspaper in the heart of Rome. Proud that I could finally get my two-hour-credit class, I showed up to the first day of my internship with high hopes and great intentions, my pen and notebook, ready at the service of journalism.
The good thing was that the office was in the heart of Rome, a few steps from the Pantheon and the Colosseum. The bad thing was that the office was the worst cutthroat environment I could possibly find myself in. After three years at Harding, surrounded by godly people and a great Christian community, needless to say that the culture shock was inevitable.
Faith in humanity: lost.
I hoped to find a mentor among the older journalists who worked there, but it seemed like nobody could waste their time with me. I saw plagiarized articles getting published and people doing things borderline illegal to obtain a story. My only anchor in this merciless place was my cousin, who is my age and had the same broken dreams after the first month.
I doubted I still wanted to be a journalist anymore after six weeks immersed in such a dishonest and competitive business. I was about to quit my internship and try again next summer, when I thought that maybe the reason I was there was more important than my two hours of credit.
It’s no news that this world needs more honest people. We’ll never have a perfect world (that’s called heaven), but we can at least try to make a change in the community we live in by actively exercising the standards of integrity and honesty.
We cannot do much good to this falling world by spending the rest of our life surrounded by only Christians. Humanity is not divided between missionaries and lost souls. You can definitely spend your whole life in the same neighborhood and still make a difference in the decisions you make, the way you treat people. If we are the light of the world, we need to go out in the darkness to make our flame have a purpose. A candle is pretty useless in a fully illuminated room.
That’s what I’ve learned from my internship. If this is a fair world (and life has not yet been rough enough with me to not make me believe so), good overcomes bad and even if ruthless people might overcome at first, we, the honest, we, the humble and loyal, will have the last say. I might have been unlucky to find myself in such a cutthroat office as my very first experience in the world, but I’m sure I improved in my writing skills and with my emotions. We need to build our spiritual and emotional muscles while we are in a safe place like Harding. It’s going to be tough outside of Harding. I hope you’ll always be surrounded by people, Christians and non-Christians, who will always encourage you and push you into the right direction. If at first you don’t have this opportunity, take heart: that’s when your light has to shine even more.
