When members of the class of 2025 arrived at the College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University as first-year students in the fall of 2021, the world was just emerging from a global pandemic.
Concepts like social distancing, remote learning and quarantining had become part of their day-to-day vocabularies amidst the challenges brought on by COVID-19.
Gradually, though, a sense of normalcy returned – led on these campuses by the seniors who celebrated their graduation in separate ceremonies Saturday.
“You are the class that re-established what it means to live and be in community,” CSB and SJU President Brian Bruess said in his remarks at both commencement exercises. “You are the class that showed resilience, grit and grace. You are the class that helped reinvigorate what it means to be a Benedictine campus.
“Your presence, your leadership, your spirit – you didn’t just endure these years. You transformed them.”
This marked the second straight year that commencement at the two schools was held on the same day – beginning with the 110th annual commencement ceremony at CSB Saturday morning in the Clemens Fieldhouse, followed by the 168th commencement at SJU Saturday afternoon in the Abbey and University Church.
At CSB, the cold and overcast weather outside meant graduating seniors began lining up inside Claire Lynch Hall prior the start of the ceremony as a crowd of around 1,761 friends and family members filed into the fieldhouse.
At SJU, the graduates mingled and gathered in the Great Hall while about 1,354 of their friends and family members took their seats in the Abbey Church.
In all, a total of 369 graduates (355 undergraduate, three master’s and 11 doctoral candidates) took part in ceremonies at CSB while 371 graduates (343 undergraduate and 28 graduate students from the Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary) participated in the ceremonies at SJU.
Finding ways to make a difference a common theme at both schools.
“I’ve heard that you – class of 2025 – are an extraordinary group,” said Fr. Bill Lies, CSC, a 1984 SJU graduate and the provincial superior of the U.S. Province of the Congregation of Holy Cross. He delivered the Saint John’s commencement address.
“Leaders, connectors, friends. People who have lived the Benedictine value of community in real and beautiful ways. Don’t leave that behind. Let it continue to shape your lives. Carry that mission forward. Welcome a stranger. Lift up the vulnerable. Heal the hurting. Remind others that they matter and build the bridges Pope Leo called us to build in his first words as Pope.
“Because that’s how the world begins again.”
The commencement speaker at CSB was Angela Jerabek, a 1990 graduate of the school who, while working as a high school guidance counselor, developed the BARR (Building Assets, Reducing Risks) Model, an educational system that provides teachers the opportunity to understand the whole student, not just the portion they are able to see in the classroom.
Last year, she received the prestigious James Bryant Conant Award – one of three awards that the Education Commission of the States (ECS) presents annually to celebrate outstanding commitment to public education.
“So where does a high school guidance counselor who couldn’t settle on a major get the idea that she can do something to change the world,” Jerabek asked the graduates. “I got that here.
“I’m here to tell you that you have great power – the power to navigate and thrive in a complicated and fast-changing world,” she continued. “So what are you going to use that power for?
“A while back, we noticed the educators in our BAAR schools were calling their students ‘most likely to change the world.’ I think that describes you too.”
Senior Lydia Mattern, a Fargo, North Dakota native who graduated with a degree in theology, was the student speaker at CSB. She also told her classmates the lessons they learned the past four years on campus will serve them well as they embark on what comes next.
“I am confident that Saint Ben’s and our four years together have instilled in us the qualities necessary to rise up and meet the challenges we will inevitably face,” said Mattern, who plans to begin a one-year master’s degree program in health care administration at Boston College.
“Ones we will face in education, business, health care, government, the arts, other careers we aspire to have, and also as wives, mothers, sisters and friends.”
Canaan Cooper of The Bahamas, who graduated Saturday with a degree in biochemistry, was the student speaker at SJU. He also spoke of the way he and his classmates have been shaped by the four years they’ve spent in Collegeville.
“We came as seedlings – uncertain and untested,” said Cooper, who was selected to serve as a sitting youth parliamentarian in the inaugural Bahamas National Youth Assembly. “I was a 17-year-old island boy traveling alone to rural Minnesota. And today … we walk out as oak trees, raised in this beautiful arboretum: weathered, rooted and unshaken.
“We’ve learned to thrive in the harshest conditions: With the Holy Spirit breathing life into our souls, Lake Sag pulsing through our veins, Johnnie Hot Bread filling our stomachs. And sunrises remind us that we’re still alive.”
- At Saint Ben’s, the invocation was delivered by Cindy Gonzalez, the director of CSB Campus Ministry. The final blessing was provided by Sister Karen Rose, OSB, the prioress of Saint Benedict’s Monastery. Abbot Douglas Mullin, OSB, of Saint John’s Abbey delivered both the invocation and final blessing at SJU.
- The top five majors among this year’s class of graduating seniors at CSB were nursing (55), biology (51), psychology (41), global business leadership (33) and exercise and health science (28). At SJU, the top five majors in the class of 2025 were global business leadership (100), accounting (51), computer science (21), biology (18) and economics (17).
