Marquette Mission and Ministry recently celebrated its annual “Mission Week” from Feb.4 to Feb.9.
This year’s Mission Week theme- ‘Act with faith’- goes hand-in-hand with Mission and Ministry’s overarching theme for the year: ‘En Todo Amar y Servir,’ meaning “to love and serve in all things.”
Mission Week is an annual celebration that promotes Ignatian ideologies of reflection on one’s daily life.
Rev. John Thiede, acting Vice President of Mission and Ministry, said that this year’s Mission Week has kicked off with a record attendance of almost 500 people coming to mass at Church of the Gesu Feb. 4.
Thiede said that Mission and Ministry had also extended into the local community, such as reaching out to local businesses for catering Mission Week events and inviting local Catholic high schools to Sunday’s Mass.
Mission Week 2024 began with Mass at the Church of Gesu. Other activities included a rosary prayer led by University President Michael Lovell, ‘Soup with Substance,’ which featured a panel of faculty, students and community leaders to discuss refugee resettlement with students over a meal, other panels and social events such as free lunches for students.
Rev. Nathaniel Romano, Assistant Director for Liturgical Programs in Campus Ministry, said that it is important to have a variety of events so they can cater to as many different people in the Marquette community as possible.
Thiede said that several faculty members have also attended Mission Week events such as a luncheon that honored Marija Begovich-Weidman, a professor from the College of Nursing for receiving an Ignatian Educator of Distinction award.
Romano said to make graduate students feel more included, they hosted “Java with the Jesuits” in the law building.
Romano said that the diversity of events being held helps embody one of the Jesuit core values of ‘Cura Personalis’ or caring for the whole person.
“You might have somebody who’s incredibly devout and feels secure in their spirituality, but is struggling academically, and so having a talk like ‘One Thing Led to Another’ where faculty are talking about or explaining how they landed in their areas can be really helpful,” Romano said.
Lovell said that Mission Week is a reminder of what Marquette is as a Catholic Jesuit institution, and it helps to incorporate Marquette’s mission in everything one does.
“I have really appreciated this week because ‘Act with Faith’ is something we can all understand and it should relate to all of us,” Lovell said.
Lovell said that he partook in several events this week such as talking to a group of student–athletes, attending mass, leading the rosary and handing out bracelets to students in the Alumni Memorial Union.
“The things I have participated in I have found really transformational and have helped me think differently,” Lovell said.
Thiede said the main goal that Mission and Ministry is hoping to achieve with their overarching theme of “En Todo Amar y Servir” is encourage the Marquette community to love one another through service.
Romano said the theme comes directly from Saint Ignatius of Loyola.
“The idea that is ‘everything we love’ and the love is through service. Love ought to show itself more in deeds than in words,” Romano said.
As their website states, Mission Week reiterates to students Marquette’s core Jesuit principles and services a variety of people, inspiring them to ‘go, set the world on fire.’
This story was written by Ellie Golko. She can be reached at [email protected].
