On October 24th, Bishop Vasquez met with Catholic Faculty and Staff Members from The University of Texas at Austin. A copy of his prepared remarks follow. If you are on faculty or a staff member at UT and would like to be informed of future events like this, contact Lindsay Wilcox.
photocredit: Diocese of Austin
I want to begin by expressing my thanks to the Paulists for their long time service and dedication to Catholic campus ministry in the Diocese of Austin. I especially want to thank Fr. Ed Nowak, the director of the University Catholic Center; his assistant, Fr. Jamie Baca; and Deacon John De La Garza. I thank all of you, the staff, for your service and ministry to the university students here at UT-Austin.
This is my first opportunity to speak with you; please know that I am impressed with how the Diocese of Austin has supported and maintained the importance of Catholic campus ministry throughout the diocese. We have strong Catholic campus ministry at Texas State University in San Marcos; Baylor University in Waco; and St. Mary’s at Texas A & M in College Station. I’m pleased to have priests working in each of these centers with strong lay staff to support their efforts to keep a Catholic presence strong and alive at these universities. I believe the Diocese of Austin continues to be the diocese with the largest number of university students in the United States.
Because of this, the Church in Austin continues to be a young church with a lot of vitality. Not only is there a strong presence of Catholic students at these universities, there are also students who are not Catholic and join our RCIA programs and become Catholic. This happens because there are students who are witnessing their Catholic faith.
Importance of Campus Ministry
I’d like to cover a couple of points that should be important to you as clergy and lay people serving the university students.
Campus ministry exists to support Catholic students in their faith journey. That is to say that many of the young people who come from different parts of the country or world have left home for the first time. Thus, the Catholic center should be a place where Catholic students can find support and opportunities to socialize, but most importantly how to strengthen their faith. It should be a place of welcome and hospitality for those who are Catholic and non-Catholics as well.
A place where christ is found
Most importantly, the UCC, and all Catholic university centers, should be a place where people find Christ. A place where Christ can be seen in the priests, deacons, religious and lay staff to the people they serve.
In August, our Holy Father gathered with more than a million youth in Madrid for World Youth Day. In his homily at the closing Mass, the Holy Father mentioned what has been a constant theme for him throughout his papacy. Speaking about faith he said, “Faith is not about understanding a series of facts, it is an ability to grasp the mystery of Christ’s person in all its depth. Even if it feels like a struggle at times, faith is not about people working out their thoughts about God; it starts with the gift of God’s love and God reaching out to each person.”
Pope Benedict has spoken very strongly on these points because Christian faith means we have to have a personal relationship with Christ, a surrender of the whole person, which includes our mind, our feelings, and our will. This is exactly what we heard in yesterday’s gospel of St. Matthew when Jesus is asked the question, “…which commandment in the law is the greatest?” and he responds, “”You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.” This personal encounter with Christ becomes the defining moment in each of our lives.
The Holy Father went on to explain that this personal encounter with Christ is not sufficient in itself but requires a commitment in the life of all Christians. Making Christ, the Son of God, the center of our lives is essential but this requires a commitment on our part. He said, “We cannot follow Christ on our own. Those who try to approach the life of faith with the kind of individualism so prevalent today risk not encountering the real Christ or following a counterfeit Christ.” What the Holy Father is highlighting in our relationship with Christ is our commitment to a community, the Church, which extends to solidarity with the world. It’s within the community that we keep strengthening our faith. As Catholics we do this weekly, if not daily, through our celebration of the Eucharist.
I think that many of our young people are searching for God, though they may not know this is what they are doing. There is a deep hunger among our young adults who want to find God. There is dissatisfaction with the things that do not answer the important questions: What’s my purpose? Why am I here? How can I make a difference in the world today? These are the questions that many young people want answered.
You, as staff, have a great opportunity to listen to these young people and offer them a safe context in which they can address these questions and how to lead them to discover the answers. This is only possible when you yourselves have asked these questions and pondered them deeply and have discovered that Christ is the answer for the deepest longings of human beings.
The manner in which you can answer some of these questions are by providing diverse opportunities for strengthening the Catholic faith:
- retreats
- catechesis/RCIA
- presentations/talks
- methods of prayer
- support groups
- Bible studies
Catholic universities are a great place to promote vocations – to speak to young people about making a commitment to serve the Church as a priest, deacon, or as men or women religious.
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