Seattle University - Aegis Yearbook (Seattle, WA)

Page 15 text:

Faculty

Page 17 text:

Father SSIDENT’S Mess A1 INETEEN hundred years ago. in the open air. beside (he Galilean lake, the first Christian ■'College'’ was begun. The pupils were few in number—only twelve. The influence of the College was felt all through Galilee and Judea. I he Master of that College is universally recognized as the world's greatest leather: the Builder of our civilization: the Author of our temporal—no less than of our eternal concern. His doctrines are at once the foundation of our political order, the key-stone of our social stability, the inspiration of our ethical principles and the guarantee of our moral conduct. If Culture could have saved the world. Athens would still be the centre of civilization. If militaristic Imperialism had the power to save. Rome would not be remembered now by broken arches and crumbling ruins. If the cult of Beauty in letters and arts could have brought salvation. Italy of the Renaissance would be the savior: if godless philosophies, eighteenth century France: if Commercialism. England with her world wide galleons: if Industrialism. Germany of the nineteenth century. But. none of these things have had the power to save. Not even the swollen prosperity of present-day America can account for a single step forward in the path of genuine human progress. The only stirring progress made in recent years is. strange as it may seem that of Bolshevism, but. it is a progress toward chaos and the tomb. Spiritual regeneration through Christ was—a.nd is the only guarantee of perdurable institutions. For fifteen hundred years. Christianity marched at the head of civilization and culture—-and. during subsequent centuries down to our own day. She has been the only stabilizing influence on earth. This is why—in spite of her financial weakness—Seattle College has remained in the educational field of this great Northwest for thirty-five years. We have neither the intention nor the inclination to compete with our secular, tax-supported institutions: but. in an humble, respectful, persistent way. we arc a protest against the godless education and spiritual illiteracy of our non-Christian educators. Our protest is based not on Christian principles alone but on those too that are distinctively American. The infidel. Thomas Payne, left our country, because he found its atmosphere uncongenial to infidelity. Unfortunately, he would feel far more at home here today. Secularism has blasted at the Rock of Ages.” It is now endeavoring to gain the throne in the Collegiate world, to develop an absolute monarchy in things educational, to ignore, as far as possible, the very existence of Catholic Colleges, to exile Jesus Christ from the world of thought, and to spurn God Almighty Himself. Such godlessness has gone so far that, in some States feeble efforts have been made to legislate against it. Godlessncss will never be cured by legislative enactments: the only remedy for spiritual illiteracy, social anarchy and moral degeneracy is to be found in Christian education, which stands immovably on that foundation which no established fact of science can weaken, the immemorial belief of mankind, that beyond all and above all and in all there is an Eternal Creator, to Whom science and letters no less than Religion itself can offer the tribute of proud obedience and humble adoration. Ii !.