Each fall on a college campus is a new beginning, charged with potential and ripe with opportunities for discovery and growth for students and faculty alike. And every year, I try to make a point of reminding our students — and myself — of the responsibilities that come along with the privileges of being part of this remarkable community we call a university.
At the Mass of the Holy Spirit in August, I shared a reflection on unity. Unity, I am convinced, is a gift from God, and is essential if we are to live out our vocation to be a university. To commit to a common purpose and live with one another in charity is not something we can achieve (much less sustain) by sheer ingenuity, administrative ability, or persuasive power. Rather, we experience unity as the fruit of how faithfully we pursue the truth, the divine Logos, “in love” (cf. Eph 4:15).
In the pages that follow, you will find beautiful stories of our faculty, students, and alumni finding ways to overcome the disharmony that seems to pervade modern life. Two alumni share their experiences of friendship, despite long careers on opposite sides of the political aisle (p. 24); a student writes of her transformative nursing immersion program in Peru (p. 31); and business students share how they found a sense of vocation in their career development (p. 40). They point the way beyond the alienation we often experience and toward the greatness we are made for.
We should certainly commit ourselves to fostering unity on our campus and in every place life takes us — but not as superficial conformity, or in simply being nice and compromising in our disagreements. Instead, we ought to discover it as the fruit of our fidelity to the truth in charity. Let us support one another in this pursuit, remaining open to wherever He leads.
Peter Kilpatrick, President
The Catholic University of America
