Siena College - Saga Yearbook (Loudonville, NY)

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Page 12 III Dear Members of the Class of '48: Greetings. I have been requested to address you through the pages of your Yearbook. Looking over the list of graduates this year I realize that my words can not be just an expression of congratulations on your achievements during your scholastic years here at the college and a mere token of good will for your success in the future. Were I speaking to young men and young women graduating from college in a period between the First World War and the actual conflict of the Second, I might have dwelt on the cloistered life you have led within these halls of learning and of the problems that would confront you upon leaving college. There are some in your ranks who commenced their college career just four years ago chronologically speaking, but there are others who are com- pleting four years of college life now who commenced their college career before the outbreak of the Second World War or while it was being waged. The majority of you have faced life and its problems. Some have faced death for their country, and that means for all of us. However, you have re- turned to college or you came to it with a definite purpose and, I dare say, as you reach the end of your college life in the classroom and on the campus you are aware of the opportunities that were offered to you here in our lecture halls and laboratories; you are going forth as men and women with a definite end in view, with a broader outlook on life and a set of principles that will enable you to meet the problems that will beset you on life's way as well as enable you to enjoy the fruits of a liberal education, at the same time earning a living both for yourselves and for your families should it be in the designs of God for you to be the fathers and mothers of the coming generation. Cardinal Newman in his work, The Idea of a University, writes as fol- lows concerning a liberal education: The object of a liberal education is to open the mind, to correct it, to refine it, to enable it to know, and to digest, master, rule, and use its, knowledge, to give it power over its own faculties, application, flexibility, method, critical exactness, sagacity, resource, address, eloquent expression. In following the caurses outlined for you here whether in Arts, Science, or Business, it has been the aim of the college to develop your faculties, to teach you not merely the subject matter, but to open up your mind to the acquisition of the true, the good and the beautiful through the development of your faculties of mind, will and memory. Certainly you have come through this process not merely for utilitarian reasons, for our purpose of receiving a college education is primarily in developing the whole man and all his tacul- ties. And, where is the youth, young man or young woman, who has not known pleasure of the spirit and the joy of knowing not merely in the laboratory, but in the reading of books the joy of knowing the thoughts and wisdom of others in the literature and poetry of the ages? In developing the whole man and his facultieswe aim at preparing you to be good citizens too. In our way of life, the democratic way which acknowledges the people as the source of authority under God for our legislators, the life demands an educated people who will be strong not only in technical specifications, but through the use of solid principles of right and wrong and their true philosophy of life will be able to adapt themselves to new circumstances that may arise and confront them all through life. Ours is a Christian country, based on our western traditions and civiliza- tion, which has come down to us from Mount Sinai through Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It is for us educated people, as good citizens, to preserve this civilization based on the dignity of man and the rights of Almighty God Who has bestowed this dignity upon us. In your studies in Arts, Sciences, and Business, you have come to know the eternal principles governing right conduct as well as the subjects that free your souls for the enjoyment of the things of the mind and for the things that will be useful for you in the struggle for existence. Secular education denies, or, what amounts to the same thing, ignores, the existence of God, but our education both by word and example here at Siena has been to acknowledge God's rights over man and our obligations to Him and to our fellow man. Your entire course of education, I am sure, has liberated you, made you liberal men and women in the true sense and it is with this thought in mind that I greet you, the members of the Class of '48, knowing that whatever position or rank you may hold in life, the eternal principles and the spirit of Siena that you have learned through.the intercourse with your professors and fellow students will remain one of the deepest experiences of your life, serving to guide you in all the circumstances of life. V In my own name, then, and in that of the Faculty of Saint Bernadine of Siena College I congratulate you on your attainments and I personally thank you for the part you have played as students and as scholars in the academic and social life during these four scholastic years and on your accomplishment in producing this beautiful yearbook that will be a record of these achieve- ments. Father Mark Kennedy, O.F.M. President

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Joseph A. Grafton Associate Editor Arthur A. Acosta Associate Editor Chester F. Pachucki Photo Editor Peter McCardle Feruccio Morondi Michael Mryczko George Panfely Walter Pappin Martin F. Kenny Joseph Powers Treasurer Ornello Rinaldi Raymond Roohcn John Short Edward Tatro Peter A. Fiore Page I l

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