At age 11, Janet Fuller sits in a dark hallway surrounded by her family. Although they haven’t seen actual daylight the entire summer, Fuller knows it is dreadfully hot outside. This shouldn’t come as a surprise — the country of Jordan easily reaches oppressively hot temperatures during the summer months.

“It’s interesting how in the Middle East all the wars begin in the summer, when it is excruciatingly hot. Unbearably hot,” Fuller said.

Fuller, who is now chaplain of Elon University, lived through her first war when she was only a child: the Arab-Israeli War of 1967.

When many American families fled the area, Fuller’s parents chose to stay. Jordan was their home, and it is difficult to imagine where to go when you no longer have a home.

Due to increased anti-American sentiment during the war, the U.S. State Department asked Fuller and her family to hide. So during the summer of 1967, Fuller spent a long and hot summer sleeping in a hallway.

Despite her young age, Fuller said she was able to recognize the dire situation surrounding her family. Her biggest concern was being the last one left alive, all alone.

“I was 11,” Fuller said. “I was old enough to know that we were in grave danger. And I was old enough to be scared.”

Putting faith first  

While the worst parts of her childhood will never fully escape her, Fuller has learned to embrace her past to shape her future. Today, Fuller is an ordained Episcopalian priest.

“I knew at 14 I wanted to help people,” she said. “I didn’t know where that would lead me. But if I can prevent some other child having to live in a war, I think that would be a meaningful life.”

In 1981, Fuller was originally ordained in the Baptist faith. But only five years later the church decided it no longer recognized women as priests. Her feelings of alienation eventually led her to the Episcopal Church, where she was ordained in 2010.

On Sept. 15, Fuller celebrated her second year as Elon University’s chaplain. During her year of adjusting to life on Elon’s campus, she was uprooted and moved multiple times on campus before finally making her way to the Numen Lumen Pavilion, which Fuller said is finally starting to feel like home.

As the chaplain of a university with more than 5,000 undergraduate students, Fuller often has her hands full. Still, she somehow makes her job seem simple.

“My job is to oversee all of the religious and spiritual life in the university,” she said.

Anyone who attends Elon recognizes this is no easy task. Aside from supervising everyone who works with students in the network of spiritual life, Fuller places a great emphasis on rooting students in their traditions, religions and worldviews.

Senior Opal Patel first met Fuller while planning Holi, a traditional Indian celebration, on campus. Patel spent her entire spring semester planning the event and working out the logistics under Fuller’s guidance.

“It was so great to work with Dr. Fuller,” Patel said. “She is always so happy to help anyone with anything they might need.”

Fuller said she has made it her commitment to help guide students in not only their own faith, secular beliefs or traditions, but those of others, as well.

Patel said she believes Fuller is a great advocate for a large presence of cultural, traditional and religious events on campus.

“She is very generous and always ready to establish more religious events on campus,” Patel said. “And she does it in a really awesome way, one that is never mediocre.”

Dealing with disappointment 

During a typical day, Fuller might respond to crises on campus, speak out on issues of justice and lead public prayer. Up until recently, she was also planning a Winter Term study abroad program for students to Israel, Palestine and Jordan. Unfortunately, due to a lack of student involvement, the trip was canceled.

Fuller said she received phone calls for many weeks regarding questions of the Middle East’s stability, as well as if the trip would be safe for students.

“What you see on the news is not what you get,” Fuller said. “The news can make it sound like every street corner is very dangerous. Anybody who has lived in a country like that knows that the instability or the fighting is maybe in one region or another. If you know the language and the geography you can make smart decisions.”

Junior Emily McCachren, who was going on the program, said she was not only upset about the cancellation, but surprised it stemmed from a lack of student involvement.

“Dr. Fuller is one of the most inspirational and interesting people at Elon,” McCachren said. “So you can imagine my surprise when I found out not enough people were interested in studying abroad with her.”

Despite her canceled Winter Term plans, McCachren said she is more concerned about her teacher, and she simply wants more student participation so students will get the chance to work with Fuller.

“I hope the program continues to grow so students will have the opportunity to get to know Dr. Fuller in the future through this study abroad experience,” McCachren said.

Fuller said she looks at the cancellation as a mere roadblock and plans to rebuild the trip again next year. She hopes to visit the same areas, taking students to visit grassroot peacemakers to understand the conflict. Fuller said she believes this could teach a lesson in mutual respect, as the conflict will not just end itself.

“I don’t believe that peace in that region is going to be made by political processes,” she said. “I think it will be made by people who figure out how to live together.”

Remembering the past 

Fuller speaks from experience. She had already lived through two wars by the time most teenagers get their first car.

But it wasn’t as if her parents planned for their children to live through the wars, hiding in hallways and learning to speak in hushed voices. Both of Fuller’s parents were Baptist missionaries. They left California and moved the family to Lebanon when Fuller was only an infant.

In 1965, the Fullers moved to Jordan for five years, where Fuller would experience not one, but two wars.

Despite her tumultuous childhood, this was the life she knew. Fuller said the Middle East was her home, and she didn’t know anything different. In fact, she said she thinks it was a wonderful place to grow up.

Although her first 10 years living in Lebanon and Jordan were relatively stable, the years that followed placed a heavy burden on her parents. Fuller said she realizes the struggle they faced in making decisions that directly affected their children.

“We make decisions, and maybe they aren’t the best decisions, but we do the best we can,” she said.

After Fuller finished eighth grade, there was a break in fighting. Her family decided to leave Amman — the capital of Jordan — and move to a small village called Ajloun.

At this point in time, Fuller aspired to be a doctor. She began volunteering at the local hospital, where she worked a brief stint in the labor and delivery room. It was when the fighting moved closer to the hospital that Fuller realized she no longer wanted to be a doctor.

As the fighting grew near, injured soldiers and civilians flooded the hospital. Fuller realizes now that — in many ways — she had seen too much.

“I just thought, ‘I can’t smell human blood anymore,’” Fuller said. “I was a child. I was 14, and that’s a child. I’m thinking I shouldn’t have been seeing that stuff, but you know ... I did.”

Living for the present 

Fuller has spent her entire life recovering from post-traumatic stress. Though she has learned to accept it as part of her identity, she admits she will still never celebrate an event with fireworks. Even tornado sirens send shivers down her spine.

[quote] I’m at home in this blended culture that doesn’t really exist anywhere except in my mind, or at least in my own family. So I struggle. I hold together Arab cultures and American cultures and blend them up in my own life, but I’m not really at home in either place." - Chaplain Janet Fuller [/quote]

It is the remembrance of her childhood that creates feelings of hesitancy for Fuller in regards to the Syrian conflict. While the United States has promised the bombings will be limited, Fuller said she remembers what it is like to experience bombings. She said she still remembers the people who died.

But the “Crisis in Syria: Prospects and Perspectives” panel, held Sept. 11 in Numen Lumen Pavilion, changed her mind. Fuller said the powerful account of Haya Ajjan, assistant professor of management information systems, made her think limited air strikes might be the right decision after all.

She said her original point is still crystal clear: There will be a heavy cost no matter how many lives are lost.

Today, Fuller lives her life in the present yet keeps strong ties with her past. For someone who still dreams in Arabic, this will most likely never change.

She is still best friends with Jumana Sharabi, whose parents rescued Fuller’s family from their home during the first war. Today, Sharabi lives in Atlanta. Their friendship has lasted more than 50 years.

Twenty years ago, Fuller adopted her son Samuel from Lebanon when he was only 10 weeks old. Last month, she and Samuel celebrated his homecoming day, which the family has made an annual event. With her friendships and her family, Fuller makes a point to remember both sides of her unique background. She has coined herself a “third-culture kid.”

“I’m at home in this blended culture that doesn’t really exist anywhere except in my mind, or at least in my own family,” she said. “So I struggle. I hold together Arab cultures and American cultures and blend them up in my own life, but I’m not really at home in either place.”