Dignity

Seeing the Dignity of Every Person

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“Please continue to serve … with gentleness, respect, and cordiality, always seeing God in them.”  — Louise De Marillac[1]

One of the things I got to do over the summer was offer a few words of welcome and a prayer for incoming students at the Premiere DePaul orientation. I once heard a colleague observe that just as youth is wasted on the young, orientation is wasted on the new people. Without enough context to know what is important and hit with so much information in a short amount of time, it is not always clear how much information is retained. Having said this, I think orientations are wonderful. Being a part of them always awakens the hopefulness in me. While I may not remember the information from my orientation (to be fair it was over 30 years ago now) I still remember moments and emotions from it.

Perhaps that is why Premiere hits me differently. There are times when the thousands of students are numbers to be managed, event attendees to plan for, or, as the first day of class, when they are minds to be engaged. When I look out at Premiere at these students and their families, I just see hundreds of hearts: nervous, excited, playing it cool, bored, unsure, lost, confident, or triumphant. Like young plants, they seem so fragile yet so full of potential. It really calls out my desire to nurture, support, and protect them. I’m ready to be amazed by who they will become.

We are very familiar with the expression that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.[2] One contention here is that beauty is a subjective perception more than an objective reality. Our understanding of this can vary from simply acknowledging that people will differ on what they find beautiful to a suggestion that how we look will affect what we see. Irish poet and spiritual writer John O’Donohue suggests that “if our style of looking becomes beautiful, then beauty will become visible and shine forth for us.”[3]

O’Donohue goes on to say that beauty in fact is “present secretly already in everything” but one needs to beautify one’s gaze to see it. O’Donohue expands on this concept in his work Anam Cara, where he argues that our “style of vision” affects everything we see. To the fearful eye, everything is threatening, to the greedy eye everything can be possessed, to the resentful eye everything is begrudged and so on.

When we talk to students about our Vincentian mission and the legacy of Vincent and Louise, we focus on their honoring of human dignity. There are many profound implications to recognizing human dignity in all those whom we encounter. For Vincent and Louise there was no more profound way to express this in their Catholic Christian conviction that they saw the Divine in those whom they encountered. That was the style of vision they brought to their mission. This is captured in the advice in Louise’s letter to Sister Jeanne-Francois, who in difficult, lonely circumstances was serving the sick poor and orphans left as a consequence of civil war in seventeenth-century France. For some of us, this incarnational theology remains resonant today.

For others, we may find very different ways of capturing the dignity of every member of our community, as I did when I saw the students and families in front of me at Premiere as “hearts” and remembered how I felt when I was in the place they are now. Whatever ways in which you are moved to this recognition, my advice is to make it concrete as opposed to abstract. As we shape the vision with which we see each other, we will surely transform the ways in which we act toward one another and bring forth the beauty that is present all around us.

Reflection Questions:

  • How do I make the dignity of others in the DePaul community concrete for me?
  • How do the ways I see things affect what I see around me?
  • What are practices that shape my style of vision?

Reflection by: Abdul-Malik Ryan, Assistant Director, Religious Diversity and Pastoral Care

[1] Letter 361, “To My Very Dear Sister Jeanne-Francoise,” (June 1653), Spiritual Writings, 421. Available online at https://via.library.depaul.edu/ldm/.

[2] This wording comes from the 1878 novel Molly Bawn by Margaret Hungerford, but phrases with similar meanings go back very far and can be found in the writings of many including Shakespeare and David Hume.

[3] Beauty: The Invisible Embrace (New York: Harper Collins, 2004), 19.

From Oppression to Freedom: The Importance of Remembering

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Earlier this month, Jewish families around the world came together for Passover seders as they retold the story of the exodus from Egypt. Through symbols, rituals, and blessings, people celebrated the blessing of freedom and the reminder that since we were once slaves and were freed, it is our responsibility to work for freedom for all people everywhere. Passover is a joyous holiday that helps us remember a history of oppression with a celebration of freedom and feelings of hope to come.

Soon after Passover every year, we observe a more somber day of remembrance. Today at 5:00 p.m., the DePaul community will come together to observe Yom HaShoah, a day of remembrance for the six million Jewish people and millions of others who lost their lives during the Holocaust. During this event, we will mourn the loss of all who perished and honor those who survived. Together we will reflect, remember, and learn from this tragedy. We vow never to forget.

Zachor, the Hebrew word for remember, is found in the Hebrew Bible nearly 200 times. This includes the commandment to remember the exodus from Egypt, along with remembering to keep the Sabbath and other commandments. The Baal Shem Tov (Jewish mystic and founder of Hasidism) taught, “Forgetfulness leads to exile while remembrance is the secret of redemption.”[1]

Remembering our past is important, but it is not enough. In a White House briefing on Yom HaShoah last year, President Biden wrote, “Remembrance is our eternal duty, but remembrance without action risks becoming an empty ritual.”[2]

During this season of remembrance, I challenge you to consider those on campus who may not feel free to be their authentic selves. Students may not feel truly free because of antisemitism, Islamophobia, racism, classism, or other forms of hate and oppression.

The mission of the university states, “DePaul compassionately upholds the dignity of all members of its diverse, multi-faith, and inclusive community.”[3]

How do we live out our mission so that all feel free? In our daily lives, what can we do to help move from the oppression of our past to the hope of freedom in the future?

Reflection by: Dr. Jennifer Goldberg, Jewish Life and Interfaith Coordinator, Division of Mission and Ministry

[1] Avinoam Patt, “Zachor: Why Jewish Memory Matters,” My Jewish Learning, https://‌www.‌myjewishlearning.‌com/‌article/zachor-why-jewish-memory-matters/.

[2] “A Proclamation on Days of Remembrance of Victims of the Holocaust, 2022,” the White House, April 22, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2022/04/22/a-proclamation-‌on-days-of-remembrance-of-victims-of-the-holocaust-2022/.

[3] “University Mission Statement,” Division of Mission and Ministry, DePaul University, March 4, 2021, https://offices.depaul.edu/mission-ministry/about/Pages/mission.aspx.

What is Vincentian Hospitality?

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Last week, DePaul University’s new president, Rob Manuel, shared a message in honor of the Feast Day of St. Vincent de Paul. He detailed the concepts of radical hospitality and service as deeply connected to the spirit and life example of Vincent de Paul, an ongoing inspiration for us today. While the connection between mission and service is familiar to most at DePaul, in subsequent conversations I observed that the idea of radical hospitality was new to many. This was especially true in articulating the present day meaning of DePaul’s Vincentian mission. The concept of such hospitality, however, has deep roots in our Vincentian heritage and is rooted in the life example and testimony of Vincent de Paul. There is great spiritual depth to the practice and experience of radical hospitality, particularly when considering our mission.

A common Vincentian story told at DePaul is often referred to as the story of the white tablecloth. In the foundational documents and rules established for the Confraternity in Châtillon-les-Dombes in 1617, Vincent de Paul explained the careful attention necessary when seeking to serve those in need. He recommended that missioners lay out a white cloth before serving food to a person in need, and that they engage in kind and cheerful conversation to better understand the context of that person’s story.(1) The attentive care communicated through gestures such as these reflect a recognition of the sacred dignity of those being served, as well as the essential relational dimension of human interaction, breaking down the distinction between “us” and “them.”

When Vincent established the Congregation of the Mission, he recognized the importance of establishing “a community gathered for the sake of the mission.” This community would not be based upon individual action, it would be built on the collective interdependence of those sharing a common purpose. Vincent took this further in establishing the Daughters of Charity alongside Louise de Marillac. Louise invited young peasant women into her personal space and formed a community. She recognized their potential and taught them to read and write, equipping them to be catalysts of change in their communities. Such hospitality was unprecedented at the time. Louise created entirely new opportunities that did not exist previously for women in society. With Vincent she shaped an intergenerational community, gathering women across all boundaries of social class. The Daughters believed that the “streets are our chapel,” and they continue to carry a spirit of personalism, openness, and hospitality outward, wherever they go.

In 2016, a special edition of the journal Vincentian Heritage was devoted to the theme of hospitality. It was inspired by our Vincentian spirit, so urgently needed in today’s world. The articles in this virtual compendium of Vincentian hospitality contain many insights on the transformative power of the practice of possibility.

The preface describes Vincent de Paul as a “hospitality practitioner” due to his desire to serve and care for others in the way that is best for them.(2) Subsequent articles further develop the theme through the lens of Vincentian tradition, emphasizing hospitality as a “sacred” experience that reflects the very nature of God. Vincent and Louise’s attention to the quality of the services they provided is singled out as a reflection of their deep, faith-based commitment to offering the best care possible to others, particularly those that society forgot or diminished.(3) An encounter of hospitality as a transformational event is highlighted “because we are engaging in new relations and opening ourselves to deep change.” In the process of encountering others, we must simultaneously address the harmful or unjust structures that get in the way of the effective care that hospitality demands.(4) Cultivating friendships and learning to listen deeply to oneself and the needs of others in the manner of Vincent de Paul is emphasized, as is the practice of hospitality to students of all faith traditions. We must recognize the importance of our words and actions in welcoming and caring for students, and in helping them to feel at home.(5) The intentional practice of hospitality, and how it effectively passes on the Vincentian mission and charism in the relational encounter between students and community partners, is also detailed.(6) Vincentian hospitality has been successfully used to address some of today’s most pressing societal issues.(7) Other articles discuss Vincent’s attentive care and concern for the sick and indigent, prisoners, and foreign migrants, and all those whom society tends to marginalize.(8) This edition truly illustrates how the practice of hospitality can serve as a catalyst for both inner and outer transformation.

Interestingly, an earlier Vincentian Heritage article by Sioban Albiol in DePaul’s College of Law points out that Vincent was himself a migrant and therefore he maintained a special concern for foreigners. This was reflected in the hospitality he provided to others.(9) The article states:

Saint Vincent de Paul must have felt the blessing and the pain of migration in his own life. Like so many economic refugees, at some personal cost to himself and his family. His father’s selling of two oxen to finance Saint Vincent’s studies is recounted by several authors. He left his home in order to pursue educational opportunity and economic security that could not be found in his place of birth. The land where he was born would have provided a bare existence.(10)

Vincent’s frequent reflection upon and practice of charity connects closely to the concept of hospitality. While today charity may sound soft and ineffective in the face of large, structured inequities, it also might be understood as the critical affective and relational dimension to justice. In fact, Vincent’s emphasis on charity was about action and generativity beyond the surface level.(11) Vincent advised his followers that charity involved the willingness to endure risks for the sake of offering hospitality to those in need: “If you grant asylum to so many refugees, your house may be sacked sooner by soldiers; I see that clearly. The question is, however, whether, because of this danger, you should refuse to practice such a beautiful virtue as charity.”(12) Enduring risks and vulnerability means extending ourselves beyond our comfort zone for the sake of others. Vincent’s charity, and his personal transformation over time, began by responding to the needs of those in front of him. He saw it as a virtue and an imperative of his Christian faith to be approachable.(13)

The resources above may help to shape a distinctive Vincentian hospitality vitally integral to sustaining and energizing the daily practice of our mission as we engage students, colleagues, community partners, and guests and visitors within our DePaul campus and community. However, in the spirit of Vincent de Paul, we will only learn radical hospitality and understand its profound meaning through concrete actions and experiences.

How might a radical Vincentian hospitality become concrete and real in our day-to-day interactions and encounters?

How might the practice of hospitality lead to both inner and outer transformation—within us and within the communities of which we are a part?

Reflection by: Mark Laboe, Associate VP, Mission and Ministry

1) See Document 126, Charity of Women, (Châtillon-Les-Dombes), 1617, CCD, 13b:13; and Document 130, Charity of Women, (Montmirail – II), CCD, 13b:40. At: https://‌via.‌library.‌depaul.‌edu/‌vincentian‌_ebooks/‌38/.

2) Thomas A. Maier, Ph.D. “Preface: The Nature and Necessity of Hospitality,” Vincentian Heritage 33:1 (2016), available at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/1.

3) Thomas A. Maier, Ph.D., and Marco Tavanti, Ph.D., “Introduction: Sacred Hospitality Leadership: Values Centered Perspectives and Practices,” Ibid., at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/2.

4) Ibid, p. 5.

5) Annelle Fitzpatrick, C.S.J., Ph.D., “Hospitality on a Vincentian Campus: Welcoming the Stranger Outside our Tent,” Ibid., at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/9.

6) Joyana Dvorak, “Cultivating Interior Hospitality: Passing the Vincentian Legacy through Immersion,” Ibid., at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/16.

7) J. Patrick Murphy, C.M., Ph.D., “Hospitality in the Manner of St. Vincent de Paul,” Ibid., at: https://‌via.‌library.‌depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/12.

8) See John E. Rybolt, C.M., Ph.D., “Vincent de Paul and Hospitality,” Ibid., at: https://‌via.‌library.‌depaul.‌edu/‌vhj/‌vol33/iss1/5; John M. Conry, “Reflections from the Road: Vincentian Hospitality Principles in Healthcare Education for the Indigent,” Ibid., at: http://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol33/iss1/14.

9) Siobhan Albiol, J.D., “Meeting Saint Vincent’s Challenge in Providing Assistance to the Foreign-Born Poor: Applying the Lessons to the Asylum and Immigration Law Clinic,” Vincentian Heritage 28:2 (2010), at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol28/iss2/20/.

10) Ibid., p. 282.

11) Conference 207, Charity (Common Rules, Chap. II, Art. 12), 30 May 1659, CCD, 12:223, at: https://‌via.‌‌library.‌depaul.edu/vincentian_ebooks/36/.

12) Letter 1678, Vincent de Paul to Louis Champion, Superior, In Montmirail, November 1653, CCD, 5:49, at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vincentian_ebooks/30/.

13) See Robert Maloney, C.M., “The Way of Vincent de Paul: Five Characteristic Virtues,” Via Sapientiae, (DePaul University, 1991), at: Five Characteristic Virtues; also Edward R. Udovic, C.M., Ph.D., “‘Our good will and honest efforts.’ Vincentian Perspectives on Poverty Reduction Efforts,” Vincentian Heritage 28:2, at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vhj/vol28/iss2/5.

On Uncertainty, Stories, and the Coziness of Hobbit Holes

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“Do not be upset if things are not as you would want them to be for a long time to come.”– Louise de Marillac[1]

“I’m going on an adventure!”– Bilbo Baggins[2]

I’ve always been fascinated with stories and the ways we use narrative to experience and structure the world. Growing up, I devoured ancient and modern myths, from the Greeks to the Lord of the Rings, to Star Trek and beyond. The more twists and turns the better. However, in my daily life I’m more of a hobbit than anything else, preferring the certainty of a nice cozy home and a cup of tea to return to. On occasion, I’m even guilty of reading spoilers just to make sure my favorite character makes it to the end.

Life, though, is not always so accommodating; you can’t read ahead, as there is always more to be written. Uncertainty abounds. Ironically, it’s the one reliable truth—we don’t know what’s next and nothing is really certain. While each of our lives is our own story, each tale is influenced by countless other authors (sometimes frustratingly), whether they be humans, impersonal forces of nature, or, for some, providence. By the very act of being, our lives are a collaborative act of storytelling.

As such, our lives don’t always go the way we think, hope, or even dread. You start the day with a flat tire on your morning commute (I’m currently waiting for my tires to be replaced as I write this!). You receive unexpectedly good or bad news from an email or phone call. You lose a loved one or gain an unexpected friend. Your coffee is free because the barista accidentally made the wrong order, but then it tastes terribly burnt.

While we’ve all felt such uncertainties on a small scale, for many there used to be a general sense that the macro of our bigger institutions and social fabric would continue to hold without disruption due to unseen powerful authors plotting history. That somehow, by its sheer scale and the unwritten social norms and rules underpinning it, society’s meta-narrative could absorb risk and uncertainty and plod along towards the future. Yet, the past few years have revealed (if not caused?) a fraying of our lumbering story. Pandemics; the climate crisis with its inhospitable heat, drought, famine, and floods; economic uncertainty; authoritarianism, bigotry, and hate: all act as accelerants in unraveling the “old normal” even as we yearn for the stability of a “new normal.”

With that said, movements like those for racial or climate justice can be positive forces for rewriting the course of our collective adventure. These inclusive drives recognize that every person should have a hand in crafting the tale of human history, especially those that are often left out, marginalized, and treated as nameless extras. Just because the story was unjustly written in the past, doesn’t mean it has to be now. Our namesake, Vincent de Paul, called upon us to treat everyone with sacred dignity, and to realize that there are no extras superfluous to our human narrative. We all matter.

As we live out our Vincentian mission at DePaul, although we too live in uncertainty, we live in a community committed to a common story. Our mission is, at its heart, a tale we tell and retell. We can be different here, we can live not just for ourselves but for others, and we can transform the world through education, compassion, and a recognition of each other’s sacred dignities. Ultimately, we can own our stories, and our mission. As fall and a new academic year full of countless tales begins, the path before us may feel uncertain. Let’s not dread the winding road ahead. Let’s walk it together, for our future is nothing more than the unwritten pages of a collective book. Let’s embrace the adventure.

Reflection Questions:

  • If you could read ahead, would you?
  • Who are some of your favorite “co-authors” in DePaul’s ongoing story?
  • Where would you like DePaul’s story to go next?

Reflection by: Alex Perry, Program Manager, Division of Mission and Ministry

Register here: https://vhw-breakfast-2022.eventbrite.com

[1] L.519, To Sister Anne Hardemont, (1658), Spiritual Writings of Louise de Marillac, 614-615. At: https://‌via.‌library.‌depaul.edu/ldm/.

[2] The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, directed by Peter Jackson (Warner Bros. Pictures, 2012).

St. Vincent de Paul Heritage Week

Join us this fall as together we embrace the adventure and ownership of our mission during St. Vincent de Paul Heritage Week. Among our many events in the last week of September, we are inviting the entire DePaul community to gather on Friday, September 30th, for the annual Heritage Week Prayer Breakfast. This year, we welcome new DePaul University President Dr. Robert L. Manuel, who will speak about his vision of the Vincentian spirit and its impact on these complex and uncertain times.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.: “We are on the move now… Our God is marching on”

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“Today I want to say to the people of America and the nations of the world, that we are not about to turn around. We are on the move now…. Let us march on segregated schools until every vestige of segregated and inferior education becomes a thing of the past, and Negroes and whites study side-by-side in the socially-healing context of the classroom.” – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. March 25, 1965[1]

The words of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whose memory we celebrate in the coming week, are an eloquent reminder for all races and ethnicities that dreams have not been defeated. This is not a post-utopian era. Utopias are alive in the hearts of all who struggle to build true democracies in which all people, especially the “most abandoned” (as Vincent de Paul called them), can finally live with dignity. The memory of Dr. King should always awaken a belief that a better world is still possible.

History is a continuum—in the utopia of yesterday, the reality of today was incubated, just as new realities will breathe from the utopias of today. The utopia of one century often becomes a simple fact of the next century. Utopian vision is the beginning of all true progress and the design of a better future. I believe it’s not too late to make real Dr. King’s utopia of a just world in which people of all cultures and races are treated equally and given the same opportunities to flourish.

In our encounters within the Vincentian Family, we constantly realize that our creativity is not exhausted and that we are still too far away from the realization of a world in which all forms of life are respected and protected. We must ensure ‘the most abandoned,’ as Vincent called them, are taken care of, and provided with everything they need to live with dignity.

In a 1965 sermon, Dr. King explained that the “majestic words” of the Declaration of Independence, “all [people] are created equal,” were the foundation of the Civil Rights Movement.[2] He did not see that document as a lie but as an unfulfilled promise, “raised to cosmic proportions,” that the movement was now struggling to realize. When we see the unbearable suffering of so many people in the United States, especially so many people of African descent, we understand the current challenges of the movement Dr. King championed.

DePaul University is built on top of this same foundation, this universal truth. Vincentian understanding recognizes the dignity of every human story, and especially those persons that are broken because of systemic injustice, structural poverty, inequity, exclusion, or social and racial discrimination. We recognize the essential equity among all human beings of so many diverse backgrounds.

In many places of the world, I have seen a growing movement of intersectional liberation and social transformation. We, the Vincentian Family, are bearers of just part of this seed of life that has been entrusted to all races, religions, cultures, social classes, and nations of the earth. This seed is hidden in the heart of the Vincentian charism, a charism that belongs to the reign of God and his justice. It is deeply connected with all the other seeds entrusted to humanity to make dignified life on our planet possible and sustainable. The vitality and relevance of the Vincentian spirit can only be guaranteed if a connection with this universal movement is kept alive.

The Vincentian charism is pro-cultural. We are at the crossroads of history alongside the excluded of the earth, and of the earth itself, and our horizon is the same that the universal movement of justice and peace envisions: “a new heaven and a new earth”![3] The systemic racial justice of Dr. King’s utopia is a Vincentian issue that we embrace from our own convictions and for our vocation. His dream is not strange to us. Our Vincentian sociology, theology, and anthropology naturally bring us to this cause. We are on the move, marching with God for a world free of hate. DePaul should be a school where the equitable new world is designed, where students of all racial identities and diverse cultural backgrounds come together “side-by-side in the socially-healing context of the classroom” as Dr. King envisioned in 1965. That is the dream.

In 2022, the memory of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. can give us all the elements we need to understand that the emancipatory movement is urgent today and needs support from every angle. It is deeply connected with all social and environmental movements of liberation and transformation.

We are on the move, we cannot stop marching, and we won’t turn around now! We will continue resisting the hegemonic ego- and capital-centric narratives that are destroying our planet, making life unsustainable, and oppressing human beings. It is an urgent necessity that all human, social, and environmental movements of systemic change work together side by side to be effective. As Dr. King said, “The battle is in our hands. And we can answer with creative nonviolence the call to higher ground to which the new directions of our struggle summons us. The road ahead is not altogether a smooth one. There are no broad highways that lead us easily and inevitably to quick solutions. But we must keep going.”[4]

Reflection by: Guillermo Campuzano, C.M., Vice President, Division of Mission and Ministry

[1] Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “Our God is Marching On,” speech, March 25, 1965, Montgomery, AL, transcript, https://‌kinginstitute.‌stanford.‌‌edu/‌our-god-marching.

[2] Ibid.

[3] For biblical examples, see, e.g., Isaiah 65:17-19, 2 Peter 3:13, Revelation 21:1, and Isaiah 66:22.

[4] Ibid.