In Charity & Truth: Mission, Memory, and the Renewal of Our Common Life
Mission Week Address, Loyola University, Baltimore
March 17, 2026
I. Introduction
A. Good afternoon Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
It is a joy to be here at Loyola University.
Thank you, President Sawyer, for inviting me.
Long before the Wall Street Journal ranked Loyola
as one of American’s top universities,
the entire Baltimore community ranked Loyola
as one of its premier institutions.
I thank you for you for partnering with the Archdiocese & the wider community
in serving the greater Baltimore community faithfully and effectively.
B. It is a special joy to be with you during Mission Week –
a time when you pause as a university community
to remember who you are and why you exist.
Mission Week is not simply about history. It is about identity.
And a people grounded in their true identity
can walk confidently towards their calling.
C. As we approach the 250th anniversary of our nation,
we find ourselves in a moment of both gratitude and concern.
Gratitude for the extraordinary blessings of liberty and opportunity
that have marked the American experiment.
Concern because we sense –
perhaps more deeply than at any time in recent memory –
that our civic culture is strained, divided, and in need of renewal.
It is precisely in such moments
that a Jesuit, Catholic university has something indispensable to offer.
II. Remembering Our Roots: Faith and Freedom in Maryland
A. Here in Maryland,
the relationship between Catholicism & American democracy has deep roots.
Long before the founding of the United States,
Maryland was an early experiment in religious toleration.
That experiment was imperfect and fragile, but it planted a seed:
that faith and freedom need not be enemies.
B. Jesuits were part of that story from the beginning –
missionaries, educators, pastors.
They believed that education forms conscience.
And conscience, properly formed, is essential to the health of a democracy.
C. As we approach our nation’s 250th anniversary,
we must ask not only what we have achieved, but who we are becoming.
A great nation is not sustained by structures alone.
It is sustained by virtue. And virtue must be formed.
That is why your mission matters.
III. A Wounded Political Culture
A. In my recent pastoral letter, In Charity & Truth,
I wrote about what I called a wounded political culture.
We see signs of that wound everywhere:
Public discourse marked by anger rather than argument.
A tendency to reduce people to positions.
The erosion of trust in institutions.
A growing inability to disagree without despising.
B. This is not merely a political problem. It is a moral and spiritual problem.
When truth is manipulated for power, we lose our way.
When charity is dismissed as weakness, we harden our hearts.
Yet the Christian Tradition insists that charity and truth belong together.
Charity without truth becomes sentimentality.
Truth without charity becomes cruelty.
C. The renewal of our civic life depends upon holding these two together.
And that work must not only begin in legislatures and courts,
but in families, parishes, and universities.
IV. What Mission Demands of a Jesuit University
A. During Mission Week, you rightly reflect
on what it means to be a Jesuit, Catholic institution.
Let me suggest three contributions, which, in my humble opinion,
you are uniquely positioned to make to our common life
as we approach America’s 250th year.
1. Forming Conscience
B. Democracy depends on citizens who can reason morally.
A Jesuit education does more than convey information.
It forms the whole person – intellect, will, imagination, and heart.
In a polarized culture, the temptation is
to react quickly, to categorize hastily, to speak before listening.
2. Discernment
C. Ignatian spirituality teaches something different: discernment.
Discernment requires patience. It requires interior freedom.
It requires the humility to admit
that no political party or platform fully embodies the Gospel.
If Loyola forms students who can think critically, pray deeply, and act justly,
you will have given our nation an extraordinary gift.
3. Defending Human Dignity Without Exception
D. At the heart of Catholic social teaching is the conviction
that every human person is made in the image of God.
This dignity does not depend on status, achievement, nationality, or ideology.
It applies to the immigrant and citizen. To the prisoner and the policymaker.
To the unborn child and the elderly parent.
To those with whom we agree and those with whom we profoundly disagree.
If we are to renew our political culture,
we must recover the habit of seeing the person before the position.
A Catholic university should be a place where that habit is practiced daily –
in classrooms, residence halls, faculty meetings, administrative decisions.
Dignity is not an abstraction. It is a discipline.
V. Cultivating Civic Friendship
A. One of the great losses in our political culture is forgetting
how to be friends with those whose convictions differ from our own.
We increasingly live, learn, and communicate within ideological silos.
The result is suspicion and caricature.
But a university is one of the few places
where people of different backgrounds and beliefs still share life together.
You have an opportunity here that is rare in our society: to model a better way.
B. Civic friendship does not mean the absence of disagreement.
It means the refusal to let disagreement destroy relationships.
If students graduate from Loyola having learn
how to engage opposing views with clarity and respect
— without surrendering conviction—
they will help rebuild what has been fractured in our public life.
VI. The 250th Anniversary: A Threshold Moment
A. An anniversary is not merely a commemoration. It is a moment of examination.
At 250 years, we must ask: Have we used our freedom wisely?
Have we protected the vulnerable? Have we pursued justice with integrity?
Have we fostered unity without demanding uniformity?
Our nation has accomplished remarkable things.
But we must also acknowledge failures – including injustices
in which Catholic institutions themselves have sometimes been complicit.
Honest memory is not self-condemnation. It is the beginning of conversion.
B. The Church understands this well.
Every Lent calls us to examine, repent, and begin again.
Perhaps America at 250 is invited to something similar:
a civic examination of conscience.
And institutions like Loyola can help lead that effort –
not by partisan alignment, but by moral clarity.
VII. Humility and the Courage to Acknowledge Wrongdoing
A. Authentic examination of conscience requires something deeper still: humility.
Humility is not weakness. It is the strength to face the truth about ourselves.
The Church herself has had to learn this lesson in painful ways.
In recent decades we have had to confront
grievous wrongdoing within our own community –
failures that wounded victims, scandalized the faithful,
and damaged the credibility of our witness.
B. Acknowledging these failures has not been easy.
Yet the Gospel leaves us no other path.
Repentance is not merely an individual act: it can also be communal. Institutions, like individuals, must sometimes say:
we were wrong, and we must change.
C. In this regard, the Society of Jesus has offered an important example.
The Jesuits have taken meaningful steps
to confront difficult chapters in their own history,
including their historical involvement in slavery and other injustices.
Through public acknowledgement, historical study,
and efforts towards reconciliation, they have shown
that fidelity to the Gospel sometimes requires looking unflinchingly at the past.
That kind of humility is not about diminishing the Church.
It is about purifying her witness.
And it is a lesson not only for religious institutions, but for nations as well.
A society that cannot acknowledge its failures cannot grow.
But a society willing to face its past honestly can move
towards a more just future.
VIII. Charity and Truth on Campus
A. Let me bring this closer to home.
For faculty: Your vocation is to pursue truth. But how you pursue it matters. Intellectual rigor must be accompanied by intellectual humility.
For staff: You sustain the daily life of this community.
The culture of a university is shaped
as much by ordinary interactions as by grand statements.
For students: You are being formed not only for careers,
but for service and discipleship.
The habits you cultivate now – of listening, questioning, praying, serving –
will shape the society you inherit and influence.
Mission Week asks you
not simply to reflect on Jesuit identity but embody Jesuit hope.
Hope grounded in Christ.
Hope that believes conversion is possible – personally and culturally.
Hope that insists polarization is not inevitable.
IX. A Moment of Global Uncertainty – and a Call to Peace
A. We also gather this evening, in a moment when the world itself feels uncertain.
Our war with Iran raises the specter of a wider war in the Middle East.
Viewing this conflict with alarm and dismay,
we are reminded how fragile peace can be.
History teaches us that wars rarely begin with a single decision.
They emerge from long chains
of fear, miscalculation, and unresolved grievance.
When war comes, it is always the innocent who suffer most:
families displaced, cities damaged, lives forever changed.
B. The Christian tradition speaks with clarity on this point.
Peace is not merely the absence of conflict.
It is the fruit of justice, restraint, dialogue, and moral courage.
The Church prays always
that leaders will choose the path of wisdom before the path of violence.
C. At moments like this, universities have an unheralded but essential role to play.
They form the leaders, diplomats, analysts, and citizens
who will shape the decisions of tomorrow.
If those leaders are formed in truth, charity, and respect for human dignity,
then the prospects for peace are strengthened.
So tonight, we pray – sincerely and fervently – that peace will prevail.
X. A Word of Encouragement
A. The challenges before us are real. But so are the resources of our faith.
The Gospel has endured empires, revolutions, wars, and cultural upheavals.
It endures because it speaks to the deepest truth of the human heart.
As we approach our nation’s 250th anniversary,
I urge you to see this not primarily as a celebration of the past,
but as a summons to the future.
B. Let Loyola be known as a place where:
Freedom is ordered to truth.
Truth is expressed in charity.
Disagreement does not destroy communion.
Education forms not only minds, but consciences.
If that is so, then this university will not simply observe America at 250.
You will help shape America at 300.
C. May God bless you during this Mission Week.
May He strengthen your commitment to your Jesuit, Catholic identity.
And may He renew our nation – in charity and in truth.