Details of a $1 million gift to Religious and Spiritual life were announced last week, marking the largest single donation ever given to the department. The gift, given by 1944 Elon graduate Edna Truitt Noiles and her husband, Douglas, will endow several new programs, including seven student internships and a new study abroad course.

Coinciding with the gift, the department will move to a bigger location, and, in honor of Noiles’ mother, be renamed the Vera Richardson Truitt Center for Religious and Spiritual Life.

The changes are expected to start next fall, with relocation of the department (the location is to be determined) and the hiring of student interns for Chapel, vespers services and the five programs established by the gift – a spiritual leaders-in-residence program, workshops focusing on the spirituality of life choices, workshops focusing on after-college transitions, an interfaith speaker series and a winter term or summer session study abroad course to different pilgrimage sites.

The Noiles, who, along with Edna’s five sisters, established the Ashton P. and Vera R. Truitt Scholarship Fund in 1997, decided to make the $1 million gift to Religious and Spiritual Life after reading an article in the spring 2003 Magazine of Elon profiling the department.

"It seemed like students were thinking about spiritual issues which they weren’t thinking about before 9/11," Noiles said. She said the new programs created with the gift will help continue such reflection.

In the context of the new programs, reflection can take the form of pilgrimages to sites such as Jerusalem, Mecca and Camino de Santiago de Compostela in Northern Spain – made possible by the study abroad course – as well as traditionally less spiritual endeavors, such as managing personal finances – to be covered in the after-college transition workshops.

"Our lives can be more effective if we can make choices that reflect our deepest values and commitments," said Chaplain Richard McBride of the eclectic nature of the programs.

In addition to the $1 million gift to Religious and Spiritual Life, the Noiles contributed an additional $100,000 to the Ashton P. and Vera R. Truitt Scholarship fund.