Nurturing Faith and Young Minds on Campus

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Feb 21, 2000 | by Michael Rust

DO: I've always been involved in the work of education, from the very first moments of ordination -- high-school teaching, college teaching, seminary teaching, university administration and now the CEO of this university. For me, the whole of my priesthood has been trying to incorporate the life and ministry of a priest with the work of education and vice versa.

I think it's a very good place for a priest to be because it does provide him with a pulpit from which he can preach not only by words, not only by teaching in the classroom, but also by example of life, by commitment to the student and interaction with the student. Where else but in a school setting is a student going to be exposed five days a week to the priest or to the religious or to the deeply devoted or deeply committed Catholic person, many of whom are involved not only in teaching but in campus ministry? Where else are you going to have those contexts? Within a Catholic educational setting those contexts generally are part of the deal.

Insight: It sounds like an awesome responsibility.

DO: It is an awesome responsibility. I like to think of this as a sacred trust that is given to us, that was placed in our hands. If there is one thing I would want to call people to reflect upon who are engaged in this work, it is how sacred that trust is. In these years, which still are considered formative years, the influence of a priest or religious, the influence of a teacher or professor, can be very dramatic in a young person's life.

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Currently: President of the Catholic University of America in Washington.

Born: 1955, in Philadelphia.

Education: Master's degree in divinity and moral theology, Mary Immaculate Seminary in Northampton, Pa.; master's degree in philosophy, Niagara University in New York; doctorate in canon law, Catholic University.

Career: Academic dean and dean of faculty, St. John's University College of Arts and Sciences, 1990-98; associate vice president, St. John's; academic vice president of Niagara University; tribunal judge in the Diocese of Scranton, Pa.

Hobbies: Reading, walking, theater, movies.

Influences: St. Vincent de Paul: "He was centuries ahead of his time." Pope John Paul II; Pope Paul VI; parents. "My mother had to endure a lot in her life. Her fidelity and practice of her faith, her humor and teaching certainly have been inspiring and influential in my life."