Soul Searching

‘Ways to Keep Growing’

Dan Milbrand ’08

Growing up Catholic, Dan Milbrand ’08 attended Mass mostly at Easter and Christmas time.

“Religion was something that was there, but there wasn’t a lot of stress placed on it by my parents,” he explains. “It was more something they knew I would be able to fall back on later in my life.”

That is something he has done gradually since attending the University. As a freshman, he enrolled in an Asian Search for Self class, where he experimented with the tenets of Buddhism and Hinduism to try “to find my faith.” By his junior year, however, he was still searching for a meaningful spiritual practice. When a friend encouraged him to attend a three-day Catholic retreat with other students, he agreed.

“I typically stuck to my circle of athletes, and they weren’t people I usually associated with,” recalls Milbrand, a forward on the Yellowjackets basketball team. “But as I got to know them more, we had similar stories to tell—their journeys to get to where they were, the questions they asked themselves, all those types of things.”

When he returned to campus with many of his questions clarified, Milbrand joined the Catholic Newman Community and began attending Mass regularly, a commitment that continues. Some weeks he attends services more than once (in part to make up for the weeks he misses for out-of-town basketball games). Indebted to the community, he is working to help it expand. “I think it’s really important that we find ways to keep growing, so students can see that they have the opportunity to talk about and kind of confront their faith here at the U of R.”

Last fall he brought two friends along to a Catholic retreat and found it rewarding to watch them have their questions—many of the same ones he use to have—answered.

Milbrand, a double major in English and film and media studies, still has questions, of course. “Just the ones we all have,” he says. “What am I going to become in my life? Where am I going? How am I going to find the right person to be with? Things that everyone asks themselves.”

But he has found confidence in his spiritual journey. As a member of the St. Sebastian Society, a group of student athletes who participate in community-service and spiritual events, Milbrand this year earned the title of Captain of Spirituality, a role that finds him leading prayers and religious discussions at meetings.

Looking recently for a job as a teacher, Milbrand applied to two programs—one more prestigious than another and, he felt, better for his career. When he got accepted into the lesser-known program in New York City, he couldn’t help but feel some disappointment, though he had “a gut feeling” he would be more comfortable there. It was another sign, he figured, that everything happens for a reason.

“There’s a lot less doubt and I’m starting to see God everywhere in my life,” he says. “I’m able to look at things with a much more positive perspective, and that’s been a result of my faith.”