By Hoon Choi, Ph.D.

 

Bellarmine seniors often mention “the people” in their answers to the question, “What is the Bellarmine difference?” I suggest that it is because our mission is centered on our vision of the human person as sacred and dignified. 

 

Through various initiatives, including introducing our new core curriculum, the Bellarmine community is making a concerted effort to recognize, love and care for the human person as a central expression of our mission. Delivering on that mission boils down to what the Rev. Daniel Hendrickson, a Jesuit priest who is the president of Creighton University, calls “study” (a movement inward), “solidarity” (a movement outward) and “grace” (of God).

 

To put Hendrickson’s definition in Bellarmine terms, our mission first helps students to study, cultivate and grapple with who they are, with the end goal of discovering their “True Self.” Thomas Merton was convinced that if we look deeply into our true selves, we will discover God’s own presence. No matter who we are or what we believe, we are born with that proximity to our creator. Just by existing, we are beautiful, dignified, engraced and sacred, precisely because God resides in us.

 

When we learn to recognize our true selves in this way, we become better equipped to see God’s presence in others, too. Merton understood this divine indwelling in others as “a spark… the secret beauty of their hearts…the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes.” When he saw his fellow human beings in this way, he said it was as if they were “all walking around shining like the sun.” 

 

When you have this sacramental vision of the world, you will be moved to compassion, mercy and solidarity with others, particularly with the most marginalized, the most minoritized and “the least among us” (see Matthew 25:40).

 

Bellarmine cultivates a shared vision of each person’s unique dignity, sacredness and grace. That vision empowers all members of our community to love one another, to be in solidarity and to give themselves in service to others, starting with the Day of Service for all first-year students. Through our repeated efforts, we begin to experience something beyond ourselves, something transcendent—even, perhaps, the Ultimate. In words from Les Misérables, we learn that “To love another person is to see the face of God.” 

 

This is a vision of God’s ongoing incarnation and continuous presence in others, attained through selfless acts of love for our neighbor. Indeed, in the Christian tradition, “giving of oneself” is the definition of sacrificial (agape) Love by which God is described (1 John 4) and through which God is exemplified and incarnated in the crucifixion and the person of Jesus. Living out such a call to love selflessly is often the “difference” at Bellarmine. I once heard a professional nurse say, for example, “Bellarmine nurses are different,” as shorthand for how compassionate and unselfish they are.

 

Bellarmine University, and its mission as a Catholic institution, therefore, is “different” from many institutions of higher education. Veritas! (Truth), Harvard University claims. Lux et Veritas! (Light and Truth), Yale University adds. At Bellarmine, none of that matters if there is no love. In fact, our mission affirms that one cannot genuinely get to the Truth except through Love—In Veritatis Amore. 

 

The Catholic intellectual and liberal arts tradition—the tradition upon which Bellarmine University’s mission is based—is designed to recognize Love’s imprint (grace) that is inherent in creation by studying and paying attention to it. The more aspects of creation you study, therefore, the more visible and audible the Ultimate Mystery of God becomes.

 

Of course, we are not perfect. No one is. Like many universities, our Bellarmine community is emerging from a few rough years following the pandemic. We have responded in ways that moved us forward, but there are still opportunities to grow and live out our mission more fully exactly because we are not perfect. 

 

So, how do we go beyond our shortcomings, mistakes and deficiencies? We must ask ourselves tirelessly, “Are we loving?” When we come up short, when we make mistakes, even when we sin, are we giving each other opportunities for grace, invitations to restore and reconcile, to be merciful and loving?

 

A common mistake in how institutions of higher education think about their mission is to imagine that it is only about the students. In truth, our mission applies to everyone: administrators, staff, faculty, students, donors and alumni. Yes, students are essential, and their preparation for successful careers is immensely important. However, Bellarmine’s mission calls us beyond the measure of career success (which we reliably attain), and into the deeper territory of living meaningful lives. 

 

We can live up to this mission by encouraging each person to find their own gifted ways to help and live for others. That requires love. It is love. At the end of the day, then, Love that seeks Truth is, and ought to be, the “Bellarmine difference.” For even when we achieve all else “…but do not have love, we are nothing” (John 13:2).