Regis College - Ranger Yearbook (Denver, CO)

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FOUR YE. HUNDRED RS OLD By Very Rev. Robert M. Kelley, S.J. In the United States the celebration of a centenary is a notable event. After all we have been a nation only a little over a century and one-half, a mere youth in the family of nations. Last year when Regis College had its golden jubilee the alumni, faculty and friends felt that the College had become of age. Yet considering the age of most insti- tutions of higher education such an anniversary is not considered distinc- tive. This calendar year, however, an event closely concerned with the Col- lege is being commemorated which is both ancient and unique. It is the four hundredth anniversary of the estab- lishment of the Society of Jesus, i his event calls attention to the fact that this College, manned by Jesuits throughout its existence, is fifty years young and four hundred years old. The Year Book of the College, al- though dealing mainly with the pass- ing events of the previous academic year, should not let such a venerable anniversary pass without notice. The mere fact that an organization has ex- isted for four hundred years is in itself a significant thought. The sifting proc- esses of time have a way of disposing of trivial and unsubstantial enterprises. The further fact that this organization has continuously played a vigorous and influential part in world history, partic- ularly in the fields of education and for- eign missions, for four hundred years, is a tribute to the wisdom of its founder, Ignatius Loyola, and the religious in- spiration which guided him in writing its constitutions. After all many are the governments which have failed within four hundred years and many are the constitutions which have been rewritten. While the membership of this Society, nearly twenty-six thousand scattered throughout the world with Very Reverend Robert M. Kelley, S.J. PRESIDENT over five thousand in the United States, is more numerous than it has ever been through the four centuries, it is still loyal and faithful to the ideals em- bodied in its rules and its constitutions. These facts have a practical bearing for the faculty and student body of Regis College and Regis High School. It should inspire the faculty, religious and lay, to rededicate themselves to the high purpose of Christian education; it should give the students assurance that the education they receive at Regis will fit them, as it has fitted so many thousand other Jesuit boys and young men, for the real and difficult warfare of life and for the desirable victory which should crown their years of ef- fort in the army of their divine Leader. In the course of this coming academic year it is planned to celebrate this note- worthy anniversary in a way somewhat worthy of its importance, to revive and renew the spirit which has caused the Society of Jesus to be both loved and hated but never to be ignored. Page 7

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Reverend John J. Flanagan, S.J. DEAN •A- W Page 9