On Tuesdays and Thursdays of every week, Madison Winn can be found sitting in the back of a windowless University of Idaho classroom, waiting for her communications course to begin.
Winn rarely dresses up for the class. Her most common outfit is something comfortable — leggings and a hoodie.
Winn enrolled in the fall communications course, despite not wanting to be there.
She tried to get out of taking the class and had almost dropped it two weeks into the semester, but later decided to stick it out because she wasn’t the only older student in the room.
Even though Winn had grown up as a self-proclaimed “theater kid” and choral performer, she had hoped to bypass the class since freshman year. She said she enjoys public speaking, but felt like the class wasn’t necessary.
However, the weekends are much different for Winn, especially Sundays.
Rather than sitting in class, Winn sits in the pews of the Episcopal Church of the Nativity in Lewiston, Idaho.
Born in Seattle, Washington, Winn moved to Lewiston — where she still lives — with her family as a young child.
Most of her family is spread across the United States, and her one sibling — a brother — lives in Michigan. Winn, herself, still claims Seattle as her home despite living in Lewiston for most of her life.
Olivia Heersink | Argonaut
“I really hold on to the culture there,” Winn said.
Her life in Lewiston took a different turn her sophomore year of high school when her best friend invited her to his church — the Episcopal Church of the Nativity.
Winn, who did not grow up in a religious family, had only been to church a few times as a child. Her best friend and his sister were both church musicians, so Winn found herself sitting alone during the service. Less than a year later, she was baptized.
“My church family is the most important thing to me, besides my actual family,” Winn said. “From my church and church family came my passion for music.”
Her involvement with the Lewiston church led her to become involved with several music productions and choirs, including the Episcopal Church of the Nativity’s choral group.
The church’s former priest, Gretchen Rehberg, sent church choirs to San Francisco, California, and Portland, Oregon, in the summer of 2014 to sing in a variety of churches and cathedrals.
The experience led Winn to try out for the Vandaleers, UI’s traveling honor choir. She has been a part of the group for the last four years.
The beliefs Winn has cultivated during her time with the church also helped her find a political “niche,” which is a stark contrast from her family’s conservative beliefs, she said.
In 2016, Winn led a Black Lives Matter rally in the Lewis Clark Valley with the support of her church family.
“There was intense backlash involving death threats and a lot of law enforcement involvement,” Winn said. “But I liked stirring the pot. I wanted to start discussions that the people in our valley didn’t usually have.”
Winn describes the rally as a turning point in her life, prompting her closer to the Episcopal priesthood.
She had been interested in the church’s leadership role because of her closeness to Rehberg, who is now the bishop of the Spokane Episcopal Diocese, but she said she was unsure whether she wanted to follow her into the priesthood.
Last April, Winn came to a decision after seeing Rehburg again for the first time in two years, during the celebration of the Lewiston church’s new priest, Rev. Mary Ayers.
“When I saw Gretchen that day, I heard a voice that didn’t sound like hers or mine, but the voice said ‘I want to be like her,’” Winn said.
Now at 21-years-old, Winn is graduating from UI in May 2019.
She plans to travel the world before going to seminary. Winn said she wants to experience as much as she can before hopefully attending the University of California Berkeley’s seminary —the College Divinity School of the Pacific.
But for now, she’ll continue to spend her time in a windowless UI classroom, dreaming of the future.
Lauren Orr can be reached at [email protected]