Liviu Andreescu

My one-year stay in the States

I would like to be able to claim that my experience as a junior Fulbright research scholar at the J.M. Dawson Institute for Church-State Studies, Baylor University (TX) was, first and foremost, academically enriching and eye-opening. After all, this is what I had set out to achieve in the United States. In truth, however, academic achievement comes second (or perhaps third) on the list of what I cherish most about my one-year stay in the States. The more time goes by, the more strongly I feel that the chief benefit was meeting a number of men and women quite unlike myself – I went there, after all, as a non-religious student of American religious higher education – in a culture quite unlike my own. The sheer delight of talking to, debating with, and arguing against a group of similarly committed, unlike-minded but like-spirited individuals is the feeling that persists to this day. The rest – an academic cornucopia of books and courses – is still sorely missed, but almost of minor importance by comparison.