The spirit of Pope Francis—that pope “elected from the ends of the earth,” that “pope of surprises,” that “pope of the poor”—has without doubt shaped life at Saint Vincent in the dozen years that have passed since that day. Certainly, Pope Francis buoyed my own path back to Saint Vincent as a faculty member and even provided my son with his middle name.

His programmatic 2013 apostolic exhortation Evangelli Gaudium—which placed Christ, joy, and love for the poor at the center of evangelization—gave me marching orders as an eager graduate student in theology. Its vision matched Boniface Wimmer’s own missionary boldness.

I ended up writing my dissertation on his 2015 encyclical on care for our common home, Laudato Si’; that would later lay the foundation for my first book. The seriousness with which Saint Vincent College has taken Laudato Si’—as shown in its decision to sign a 2015 letter of public commitment with other institutions of higher education, various curricular programming, and our current strategic plan—is clear. In many ways, I owe my job to that commitment.

Saint Vincent College Campus Ministry has hosted mission trips and global encounters in the spirit of the late pope’s 2020 encyclical on fraternity and social friendship, Fratelli Tutti. During this past academic year, the Saint Vincent Center for Catholic Thought and Culture organized a lecture and reading group on his 2024 encyclical on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Dilexit Nos.

Most recently—and most notably—Saint Vincent’s April 2025 conference on the founding of Fu Jen University opened with a personal letter from Pope Francis. There, he expressed his “hope that this commemoration will serve to inspire, amid the challenges of today’s world, a renewed commitment to the Benedictine vocation to the pursuit of holiness, the witness of fraternal charity, and the spread of the saving truth of the Gospel.” Signed March 17 from Gemelli Hospital, that exhortation counted among his last public words.

Pope Francis declared 2025 to be a Jubilee Year of Hope. As Saint Vincent College prepares students who belong to “the anxious generation” for lives of curiosity, service, and purpose, perhaps the best way it can continue the legacy of Pope Francis is by serving as a bastion of hope that confidently proclaims the joy of Truth.