Last fall, Xavier University celebrated the Ignatian Year with a week of events that culminated in the inauguration of their new president, Dr. Colleen M. Hanycz. Alumni chapters gathered for service projects; students explored the intersection between their majors and the common good; lay faculty shared how their work coincides with current Universal Apostolic Preferences of the Society of Jesus; and a Mass took center stage to bring the school’s Catholic identity into focus.

Dr. Debra Mooney, vice president for mission and identity and chief mission officer at Xavier, notes that the inauguration of the first lay president in the school’s history gave added reason to connect the event to the Ignatian Year, saying, “Had it been a Jesuit we were inaugurating, we might not have felt the need to connect it to the Ignatian Year. But because a transition to lay leadership might raise questions about our identity as a Jesuit institution, there becomes an intentionality about articulating who we are.”

CAN YOU BE A REAL UNIVERSITY AND NOT WANT TO DISCUSS RELIGIOUS QUESTIONS AND IDEAS AND TO BRACKET OUT THIS WHOLE DIMENSION OF THE HUMAN PERSON AND SOCIETY?

While the shift to a predominantly lay faculty at Jesuit universities has been in the making for the past 40 years, the shift to lay presidents has been more recent. Ten years ago, there were only four lay presidents at the 28 Jesuit colleges and universities in the United States, and now there are only four Jesuit presidents at those same institutions, a transition that accelerated in just the past five years.

Creighton University’s president Fr. Daniel S. Hendrickson, SJ, is the last Jesuit president of the universities in the Midwest Province. And Marquette University’s Fr. James Voiss, SJ, is the only Jesuit chief mission officer in higher education of these universities.

John Carroll University’s chief mission officer, Ed Peck, has taken an active role in the efforts to form lay leaders like himself, serving as the founding executive director for the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities’ (AJCU) Ignatian Colleagues Program, an 18-month formation program for faculty and administrators. Father Daniel McDonald, SJ, provincial assistant for higher education for the Midwest Province, says, “Here’s the thing that is interesting to me—when the lay presidents started assuming those roles, the theory was that if you have a lay president then you need a Jesuit to be the chief mission officer. That theory has been debunked in the practical realm, and those lay presidents and lay chief mission officers are doing a terrific job.”

As all Jesuit universities engage lay leaders to promote mission and identity, Xavier might be seen as a microcosm for long-term outcomes, as the school has been at the forefront of sharing Ignatian spirituality

PEOPLE USED TO ASK: CAN YOU BE A FAITH-BASED INSTITUTION AND TRULY BE A UNIVERSITY OPEN TO THE EXCHANGE OF IDEAS AND FREEDOM OF THOUGHT? I WOULD SAY THE QUESTION TODAY IS THE OPPOSITE: CAN YOU BE A REAL UNIVERSITY AND NOT WANT TO DISCUSS RELIGIOUS QUESTIONS AND IDEAS AND TO BRACKET OUT THIS WHOLE DIMENSION OF THE HUMAN PERSON AND SOCIETY?

among lay leaders on campus. In addition to each year’s student orientation, Xavier holds an orientation for faculty and staff called Manresa, which serves as an introduction to Ignatian spirituality.

The proliferation of Jesuit identity among faculty and staff creates a trickledown effect, reinforcing the Road Through Xavier, the core of students’ four-year path, with scholarship accented by reflection on vocation and experiential learning through service, culminating in senior capstone and research projects integrating formation with personal goals.

Dr. Mooney says, “We have shared the Road Through Xavier within the International Association of Jesuit Universities as a best practice, and we even made the case that it is a contemporary Ratio Studiorum,” referring the 400-year-old document that first established what makes a Jesuit school Jesuit.

Father McDonald notes that as Jesuit schools work to define what it means to be Jesuit, “We’re also beginning to return to the question of what does it mean to be Catholic.”

Regarding Xavier’s Catholic identity, Dr. Mooney stresses the importance of empowering faith leaders on campus, saying, “We have our Jesuits now on campus that are taking leading roles. We want to make sure we have Jesuits very active on our campus, and we do.”

Father Michael Garanzini, SJ, former president of Loyola University Chicago and current president of the AJCU, points to the growing significance of maintaining a religious identity at universities. “People used to ask: Can you be a faith-based institution and truly be a university open to the exchange of ideas and freedom of thought? I would say the question today is the opposite: Can you be a real university and not want to discuss religious questions and ideas and to bracket out this whole dimension of the human person and society? Can you be a real university and ignore those significant human questions that religion raises?”

This fall, Loyola University Chicago will inaugurate Dr. Mark Reed as the second lay president to follow Fr. Garanzini’s tenure at the university, continuing the trend towards lay leadership at the highest levels of Jesuit universities. But outcomes indicate this shift does not entail a loss of identity. Dr. Mooney notes that Xavier is ranked highly in surveys of student engagement—with an upward trend—in the category of making connections between their intellectual and spiritual life. She says, “We actually had a trustee say, when they were listening to this, ‘Isn’t that ultimately what we want out of our universities?’ We want our students to serve, and we want them to find God in all things, as the Jesuit motto says.”

A few years ago, Xavier reported nearly doubleding the number of priests on campus from eight to fourteen.

Father Brian Paulson, S.J., current president of the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States, and Midwest Provincial at the time, says, “I agreed that our Jesuit presence at Xavier was at a crossroads, and that a renewed team of Jesuits, with a primary emphasis on student formation, could make a high impact.”

Dr. Mooney admits this flourishing of Jesuit identity under lay leadership might seem counterintuitive, but notes that the focus on articulating identity with intentionality has been a success. “Intentionality means more people are invited to share and show the mission,” she says. “And our mission is alive and stronger than ever.”