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ARISE, REJOICE, GOD IS CALLING YOU (Cardinal Arinze's Commencement Address at Georgetown)
Georgetown University | 17 May 2003 | Francis Cardinal Arinze

Posted on 05/29/2003 7:05:14 AM PDT by eastsider

ARISE, REJOICE, GOD IS CALLING YOU

(Commencement Address at Georgetown University,
WASHINGTON, D.C., May 17, 2003)




God be praised for this major event today in the life of Georgetown University. Near a thousand young people are graduating. To you, dear young friends, I say: Allow serious religion to lead you to lasting joy. Happy parents and friends surround their loved ones. With them I say: Let us thank God for the gift of the family. The Company of Jesus, the Jesuits, initiated and nourish this University. With them I rejoice at the patrimony of St. Ignatius and especially that the Catholic Church is God’s gift to the world. To all I say: Arise, rejoice, God is calling you.

1. Serious Religion leads to lasting Joy.

My dear graduands, at this turning point in your lives, it is helpful to keep to essentials. One of them is to locate in what happiness consists. Everyone wants to be happy. Every human being desires lasting joy.

True happiness does not consist in the accumulation of goods: money, cars, houses. Nor is it to be found in pleasure seeking: eating, drinking, sex. And humans do not attain lasting joy by power grabbing, dominating others, or heaping up public acclaim. These three things, good in themselves when properly sought, were not able to confer on Solomon, perfect happiness. And they will not be able to confer it on anyone else! (cf. Eccles1:2-3; IIKing11;1-8; Mt20:24-28; IJn 2:15-16).

Happiness is attained by achieving the purpose of our earthly existence. God made me to know him, to love him, to serve him in this world and to be happy with him for ever in the next. St. Augustine found this out in his later age after making many mistakes in his youth. He then cried out to God: "You have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you" (St. Aug. Conf. I, 1). My religion guides and helps me towards this. My Catholic faith puts me in contact with Jesus Christ who is the way, the truth and the life (cf. Jn14:6). God’s grace helps me to live on earth in such a way as to attain the purpose of my earthly existence.

My dear graduands, allow your religion to give your life its essential and major orientation. In our lives. religion is not something marginal, peripheral, additional, optional. My Catholic faith gives meaning and a sense of direction to my life. It gives it unity. Without it my life would be like an agglomeration of scattered mosaics. It is my religion, for example, that inspires my profession, that teaches me that there is more happiness in giving than in receiving (cf. Acts20:35), that helps me to appreciate that to reach the height of my growth potential, I must learn to give of myself to others as I practise my profession as lawyer, doctor, air hostess, congress member or priest (Vatican II: Gaudium et Spes, 24).

Allow your religion to give life, joy, generosity and a sense of solidarity to your professional and social engagements. In a world of religious plurity, you will of course learn to cooperate with people of other religious convictions. True religion teaches not exclusion, rivalry, tension, conflict or violence, but rather openness, esteem, respect and harmony. At the same time you should keep intact your religious identity, your distinction as a witness of Jesus Christ.

2. Thank God for the Gift of the Family.

As I see joy and just pride reflected on the faces of the parents and friends of these graduands, I think of God’s goodness in giving the gift of the family to humanity.

It is God himself who willed that a man and a woman should come to establish a permanent bond in marriage. Marriage gives rise to the family. In this fundamental cell of society, love grows. There the exercise of sexuality has its correct locus. There human maturity is nurtured. There new life utters its first cry and later smiles at the parents. There the child is first introduced to religion. Is it any wonder that the Second Vatican Council called the family "the church of the home" (cf. Lumen Gentium, 11)?

In many part of the world, the family is under siege. It is opposed by an anti-life mentality as is seen in contraception, abortion, infanticide and euthanasia. It is scorned and banalized by pornography, desecrated by fornication and adultery, mocked by homosexuality, sabotaged by irregular unions and cut in two by divorce.

But the family has friends too. It is nourished and lubricated by mutual love, strengthened by sacrifice and healed by forgiveness and reconciliation. The family is blessed with new life, kept united by family prayer and given a model in the Holy Family of Nazareth of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Christian families are moreover blessed by the Church in the name of Christ and fed by the sacraments, especially the Holy Eucharist. It was beautiful that at the beatification of Mr. and Mrs. Luigi and Maria Beltrame-Quattrocchi in St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City on October 21, 2001, three of their children were present.

May God bless all the families here present and grant our graduands who will one day set up their own families his light, guidance, strength, peace and love.

3. The Patrimony of St. Ignatius of Loyola.

We rejoice with the Jesuit Community that set up and keeps up Georgetown University. In the patrimony of St. Ignatius of Loyola, love of the Church is prominent. It is a joy, an honour and a responsibility to belong to the one, holy catholic and apostolic Church. This Mystical Body of Christ, this largest of all religious families that ever existed, is the divinely-set up family for all peoples, languages and cultures. This Church has produced Saints from every state of life, men and women who, open to God’s grace, have become signs of hope. But this same Church also has sinners in her fold. Far from discouraging and rejecting them, the Church offers them hope, wholesome Gospel teaching, saving sacraments and the invitation to abandon to food of pigs, make U-turn and return to the refreshing joy of the Father’s house, like the prodigal son (cf. Lk15:14-24).

This Church has inherited from Christ, the Apostles and her living tradition, a non-negotiable body of doctrine on faith and morals. The tenets of the Catholic faith do not change according to the play of market forces, majority votes or opinion polls. "Jesus Christ is the same today as he was yesterday and as he will be for ever" (Heb13:8). This is the Church which St. Ignatius invites all his spiritual children to love and cherish. This is the Church to which we have the joy to belong.

My dear graduands, parents and the Jesuit Community of Georgetown, arise, rejoice, because God is calling us. And may God’s light, peace, grace and blessing descend on you and remain with you always.

Frances Card. ARINZE
May 17, 2003


TOPICS: Catholic; Religion & Culture
KEYWORDS: catholiclist
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To: kitkat
***recognize with certainty that those who are invincible in ignorance of the true religion are not guilty for this in the eyes of the Lord.***

Note to all, please correct the following biblical passages to read...

"I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by Me, except those who are invincible in ignorance of the true religion. "

"Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved, unless you are invincible in your ignorance of the true religion."
41 posted on 05/29/2003 1:16:03 PM PDT by drstevej
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To: eastsider
If I remember correctly, stewardess is American usages, and Air hostess is british usage.

Africans in Nigeria learn British English,and Arinze is Nigerian.
42 posted on 05/29/2003 4:56:52 PM PDT by LadyDoc (liberals only love politically correct poor people)
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To: eastsider
Cardinal's antigay comments upset faculty at Georgetown
43 posted on 05/29/2003 10:24:20 PM PDT by SMEDLEYBUTLER
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To: eastsider; RobbyS
I was one of the Georgetown University students graduating two weeks ago when Cardinal Arinze delivered his speech.

To clarify - yes, the "mocked by homosexuality" line was read at the ceremony. Moreover, the text of the speech posted here is incomplete - my suspicion is that the copy sent by the Dean was a draft rather than a transcript. The Cardinal expounded upon issues of homosexuality, divorce, and premarital sex to a degree that is not reflected in this version of the speech.

A large percentage, if not the majority, of the graduates at that ceremony had probably read _Nichomachean Ethics_ during their time at Georgetown. Many of Georgetown's professors of philosophy and ethics - and all of the best of these professors - include NE on their syllabi. When reviewing Georgetown's incorporation of and emphasis on ethics, it is important to note that the University consists of four distinct schools (Arinze spoke at the commencement for the College of Arts and Sciences; the other schools are the Business School, Nursing School, and School of Foreign Service), and that each of these schools have their own requirements. In the college, it is required that all students complete a minimum of one course in ethics and one philosophy course.
44 posted on 06/03/2003 2:30:52 PM PDT by maryallyson
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To: maryallyson
Congratulations! And thank you very much. One further question: How much theology is now required in the colleges?

Re: homosexuality. I was just reminded of the old term marriage in jest , an occurance that seems common these days even between man and woman. Among homosexuals it seems to be the norm. So mockery is the right word.
45 posted on 06/03/2003 2:49:24 PM PDT by RobbyS
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To: maryallyson
Welcome to FR, maryallyson, and congratulations on your recent graduation! : )

I am encouraged to hear of the extent to which Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is read at the College of Arts and Sciences, and thank you for telling us about the College's ethics requirement.

As for the manual strikethrough of the Cardinal's "mocked by homosexuality" remark that appeared on the truncated version I received from the Office of the Dean, I would remain as bewildered as ever why it should have singled it out for deletion had I not received a Jesuit education myself.

God bless.

46 posted on 06/03/2003 3:02:13 PM PDT by eastsider
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To: RobbyS
In the College (and I believe the other schools as well, but I am not as sure about them) a minimum of two semesters of Theology are required. The first course must be either "The Problem of God" (taught by many different professors so each section has its own spin) or Introduction to Biblical Literature. For the second semester students may choose an intermediate-level elective; there is quite a broad range of these, so while many students choose to focus on Christianity a/o Catholicism, many others study other world religions or a variety of religions.
47 posted on 06/03/2003 3:14:16 PM PDT by maryallyson
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To: maryallyson
Sound like thin gruel to me. It is hard enough to get a handle on one religion, much less several. Like the old description of the river Platte: a mile-wide and an inch deep. By the way, did they use The work of Professor James Collins in the "God" course?
48 posted on 06/03/2003 3:33:21 PM PDT by RobbyS
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