Who is your Hidden Chaplain? The team of students organizing this initiative have asked this question of the Princeton community every year since its launch in the Fall of 2017, sparked by a conversation between Kyle Berlin ’18 and Associate Dean of Religious Life Matt Weiner about ways to cultivate compassion on campus. A Hidden Chaplain could be the card swiper at the Yeh/NCW dining hall who always greets each student by name with a crooked smile, the stolid Frist late meal worker who goes around the food gallery taking students’ trash from their hands without being asked to, or anyone on campus who offers love and care to students in informal ways. The initiative seeks to recognize these individuals and let them know how crucial they are to students’ wellbeing and sense of home at Princeton. Hidden Chaplains “offers an opportunity to celebrate people who are often not celebrated in person and in the open, as a public and almost official honor,” says Lilia Burtonpatel ’27, a student organizer of this year’s programming.
This longitudinal study of which unsung angels take time out of their days to make students happy has always yielded a crop of diverse answers, from various locations across campus. The Chaplains of Spring 2025 are more diverse than ever. 144 students nominated 76 Hidden Chaplains (with 38 students nominating two Chaplains at once): 44 from Dining Services, 12 from Facilities, 4 from Eating Clubs, 15 from Academic Support (different academic departments), and 1 from Transportation and Parking Services. The last Chaplain on this list is Darryl Shears, a TigerTransit bus driver, who is the first ever to be nominated from his fleet.
Each year, Hidden Chaplains invites all nominated Chaplains to gather in a public space for a celebratory dinner, which provides Chaplains and students the chance to snag another good conversation that serves as a moment of respite during a busy finals season. Students share stories about their Chaplains (and vice versa), explaining the other’s positive impact on their lives. This year’s dinner took place on April 30th, at Chancellor Green Rotunda. Burtonpatel ’27 recalls being “so struck by the elegant handling and how communal and familial and celebratory” last year’s dinner was, and this year’s gathering was marked by the same energy.
Mr. Shears, the first ever TigerTransit Hidden Chaplain who drives Route 1 (from Grad College to Stadium Drive Garage), was enjoying food with his wife at a round table before the official programming started. He says there is “no reason why [we] shouldn’t treat each other with kindness and respect.” These words mirror the love that he and all the other Chaplains gathered in the space have for Princeton students. “Anybody who is here, I think what we all share is love in our heart,” says Mia Gonzalez, another Hidden Chaplain. Unsurprisingly, many students see their Hidden Chaplains as parental figures. Caroline Brown ’27, a student nominator, says that her Hidden Chaplain – Magdalena from Forbes dining – is “basically [her] mom on campus.” Magdalena checks in with Brown ’27 about her dogs, her weekend plans, and makes Brown feel “like a princess” even when she shows up to grab food in her pajamas.
Like any other significant relationship, the student-Chaplain relationship is cultivated over years, with mutual care and effort. Maureen Behr, an administrator of the Center for Jewish Life, and Jacob Unger ’25 were sharing a lively conversation that was no doubt an example of how the pair cherished each other over the three years since they met. Behr says that she likes getting to know students on “more than a transactional basis” when the opportunity arises, and it is clear that she and Unger ’25 are familiar with each other’s lives. When holidays come along, Behr asks Unger “Okay, Jacob, where are you going this holiday?”, knowing that the answer would be either Boston, where his family lives, or Maryland, where his grandmother is. Behr says these relationships are “things that you carry with you for the rest of your life,” and that she hopes to see her “special students” when they come back for reunions time and time again. Reyna Perelis ’27, another student organizer of this year’s Hidden Chaplains programming, expresses a similar hope: that “from year to year, more and more students and Hidden Chaplains will connect with each other, with the Hidden Chaplains event serving as a catalyst for those relationships.”
Hidden Chaplains are all around us, many more than the ones who gathered in Chancellor Green Rotunda. While some students may see Hidden Chaplains in their peers, and vice versa for staff, nominations are mainly for members of the community who are outside of either group. Year by year, the list of nominees changes due to a variety of reasons. Some Chaplains may be nominated more than once. Students, while caught up in the busy pace of the semester, may forget to nominate their Chaplains. To address these unseen nuances that unfortunately, often determine who gets nominated that year and who does not, the Hidden Chaplains student organizers give out two pins to each Chaplain – one to keep for themselves and one to give to their own Hidden Chaplains – with the hopes that everyone who serves the community in quiet, behind-the-curtain ways may know that their work is seen and appreciated.
To view all the photos from this event click here. All photos must be credited to Tiffany Tsai '25