Have you ever had a friend from Kenya? Germany? Japan? Indonesia? Alaska? Alabama? Get one, or two, or 200 at Principia. Principia friendships span decades and oceans. That kind of thing happens best when you get to have a bunch of different roommates in your four years here. And you will.

But it’s not just teammates, classmates, and housemates you’ll call friends at Principia. “I think with Christian Science you get that aspect of a community that really cares for each other, where you might not anywhere else,” says one junior. “I always hear people on our campus who aren’t Christian Scientists — the housekeepers and facilities workers —saying, ‘We would only work here because everybody is so nice.’ It’s good to hear that. It’s like there is a whole different aspect to just being a Christian Scientist you express that doesn’t have to relate just to Christian Science. Everybody says hi to each other, whether or not you really know somebody walking down a path.”

A senior adds, “Well, Principia is a different community in that one might think it’s fairly sheltered, but at the same time it is a place where people can just be themselves without any fear of judgment. You can just be natural. You have a very diverse group of individuals here. A lot of international students, and a lot of domestics, and a lot of people from completely different backgrounds. And because it is a smaller community, it’s easier to know people.”

Principians are philanthropists, and they want to share with friends off campus whenever they can. Several trips by Principia’s Humanitarian Relief Club to New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina preceded a faculty-led 10-week field program including academic coursework and internships in New Orleans.

Of the nine Principia College student-humanitarians who went to New Orleans in November 2006, four were from the U.S., two from Australia, one from Cameroon, one from Germany, and one from Nigeria. The group completed the gutting of one home and began work on another in New Orleans East.

“It was an amazing experience,” says sophomore Ingrid Yitamben from Cameroon. “There was no reward for what we were doing. Just a smile on the faces of the people we were helping, and the realization that we did something for them.

“I learned a lot during that time. I think I grew a lot. I feel like I had another view of people after that. It wasn’t easy every day. You go to a house, you gut it, you see all those memories, and at the end of the day you just want to cry. And you pass by all the other houses that haven’t been gutted yet.

“We prayed a lot. I think each of us came with something we wanted to share — articles, ideas. Every morning we took an hour just for that and decided what quality we wanted to express. That was really what supported us. . . . It was a rush of love. We needed to share what we have.”