There is an old saying that says, “There are no atheists in a foxhole.” As a medical student, I have come to see there aren’t any atheists before a summative exam either. If you look around an exam room on a fateful Friday morning, you’ll notice a variety of frantic rituals and recitations in the seconds before the proctor releases the start code. Hands waiving the cross, palms pressed together, heads bowed down low. Even the most stoic student, upon seeing a diagram of the Kreb cycle, may whisper “Dear God.”

Medical school is a like a marathon, for which you are both grateful and terrified to run. For the first half, you are force fed from a fire hose seemingly every factoid about human genetics, embryology, physiology and anatomy, all summarized in the 30,000 Anki cards you will commit to memory. You cram your brain with mnemonics and mental maps, you rehearse patient scripts and OSCE checklists and you even remember to wash your hands after starting the encounter. You do all of this, resulting in you passing STEP or COMPLEX, and basking in a wave of sweet euphoria. And yet, nothing you do for those first two years will prepare you for the day a few weeks later when your pager wakes you up at 3 a.m. in the call room on trauma surgery. For the day when you run down to the emergency room only to find yourself preforming CPR on a motorcycle crash victim while 100 people with lines and medications scramble around you. You’ll look down at this man, and he will look like someone you recognize, and you’ll commit his tattoo to memory. Then, in an instant, the trauma surgeon will call the code, and he will be no more. And when you look around the room, you’ll find yourself alone, not entirely sure what just happened, but certain something in you has changed. Eventually, you will wander catatonically to the chapel, sit in front of the cross and cry.

I’ve heard it said that medical school is not a place for the fantasy or fairytale of religion. The most generous secular academic might classify faith as a coping mechanism, and the least a façade for the foolish. Yet, as any practicing physician knows, medicine is more than just the comprehension and regurgitation of 30,000 separate facts. It is more than even the algorithms we find on UptoDate or the guidelines our professional societies put out on a biyearly basis. A physician is not merely a mechanic for the body. We are healers, advocates and defenders of embodied souls. It is a fact that every medical student eventually faces, regardless of their personal belief at the time. The science of medicine cannot always lead us to the right decision.

For some, medical school can be the first time a student wrestles with the big moral questions of the world. In embryology, we learn how life begins at conception, only to be later shown in gynecology how to end that life via an abortion. In psychology, we study ways to recognize and prevent suicide, but then later are shown videos on physicians assisting the elderly and ill in ending their own lives. What makes one wrong, and the other right? Why should we fight for the lives of complete strangers, and why do their deaths impact us? What lays on the other side of life? What do we tell our patients approaching the end? The science can’t help us answer.

I believe this is why communities of faith like CMDA have flourished, not only on my campus, but across our nation’s medical schools. Medical students are hungry for an environment where they can be honest with each other—honest about the joys they are experiencing, honest about the burdens they are carrying and honest about the questions they have.

When I first helped start our chapter, we ran through the Alpha course during our evening gatherings. I never ceased to be amazed at the depth of the conversation our members would engage in. Complete strangers were willing and eager to enter into community and fellowship with one another. While some student organizations in the post-COVID world struggle to meet twice a year, our CMDA chapter meets once a week. Our students report leaving refreshed, rejuvenated and ready to tackle whatever the next week had in store.

Engaging in faith during medical school makes us better students, and it makes us better healthcare professionals. There has not been a rotation I have participated in where I haven’t prayed with a patient at least once. As other students can relate, there are frequently situations where our ability to assist someone medically is limited to holding a retractor. And yet, we often have the most amount of time to actually sit and listen to patients. While the resident or attending is leading the team, students are the ones most available to minister to our patients through our presence.

It is why discussions of how to perform that ministry are so important in medical education. Even willing students may find themselves unprepared to have spiritual conversations with patients or not understand how to do so in a graceful manner. Campus chapters across the nation are bridging this gap by offering practical tools, such as training on taking a spiritual history. Even our secular institutions are starting to take note of the benefit that spirituality plays in health and its importance in medical education. Earlier last year, one of our student leaders helped organize a panel on faith in medicine during a required class for all second-year students. One of our affiliate faculty mentors offers an advanced elective on spirituality and healthcare, which includes the book Hostility to Hospitality by Dr. Tracy Balboni in its curriculum. Through global health initiates, some schools permit students to engage with mission hospitals and faith-based clinics locally and abroad.

There is also a profound role for strong mentors in training who can display the nuances of living out the Christian faith in healthcare, be that faculty, staff or other students. I will never forget the day I showed up for a simulation on having difficult conversations with my CMDA pin attached to my white coat. As I was leaving an encounter, our director of palliative care stopped me and pointed to the pin. “I’m a CMDA member too!” he announced, smiling. Based on that chance encounter, he is now our chapter’s faculty leader. We need more people who are willing to make their presence known and show Christian students they are not alone.

The road to becoming a physician, much like to road of being a disciple, is never easy. Numerous misconceptions still plague the Christian medical student. I once had a resident in a mock interview tell me that talking about my faith in my personal statement would cause all the residency programs to reject me. Having ignored that advice completely, I’m happy to announce I still received interviews. That resident was right about one part: I did receive comments about it. Every time, it was the same theme. We can tell you take your faith seriously, and we can tell you care. We want people who care.

My fellow Christian students, your hard work will not go unnoticed. Your love for Christ will not lead you astray. No matter how difficult training is, know you are the benefactors of a mighty tradition of faithful healthcare professionals who came before you. You stand in the shadow of Farmer and Brand, of Carrel and Osler, Nightingale and Jenner, Harvey and Vesalius, St. Roch, St. Basil and St. Luke the Evangelist. Most of all, you walk in the footsteps of Jesus, the Great Physician, serving as representatives of His love, peace and healing. The role of faith is medical training is not dead or obsolete. It is the very heartbeat that shapes us as the future healthcare professionals of a world in desperate need of physical and spiritual healing.