Hope in our times

A message from Vice President, Father Anthony Casamento csma.

I’m sure that, like me, many of you were glad to see the end of 2020 and the start of a new year. But just to make sure 2020 reminded us of what a year it was, it imposed restrictions on many of us in the way we gathered to celebrate Christmas and the new year. Nevertheless, with a new year we have a new beginning.

The start of 2021 had me thinking about how we nourish a hope in a new beginning that is genuine and substantial in the midst of the pandemic we are living in. Well, maintaining perspective is, I think, the first step. We are not the first generation to face a pandemic. We are better equipped to understand the science of COVID-19 than any previous generation. Nor are we the first generation to face social unrest. Perspective clears our thinking!

Vaclav Havel, the Czech writer and statesman once wrote in Disturbing the Peace that hope is above all: “a state of mind, not a state of the world. Either we have hope within us, or we don’t... Hope is an orientation of the heart. It transcends the world that is immediately experienced and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons.” 

As we begin 2021, I think it is important that we remember this. 

While 2020 certainly had its challenges, and we now wait in anticipation for a new year that is much improved from the last, as a Catholic university, our hope is anchored in the person of Jesus Christ. There is never a question of God giving up on us! Our hope as a Christian community gives us the strength to live, to be faithful to our deepest values and commitments, and to learn from the times that we are living in.   

Happy new year.