30 Years of Impact
30 YEARS OF IMPACT
Q: What do you tell people who don't know anything about Catholic Studies? A: If people could understand the impact Catholic Studies is having—the caliber of professors, the caliber of students, the joy that the students are living, how they're building their faith and how they're being formed—what's not to love? I am honored to be a part of it.
Q: Where will Catholic Studies be in 30 years? A: My favorite business model is to think big, start small, and ramp up quickly. Catholic Studies had a great big vision that started small, classroom by classroom, student by student. As we grow that over time, I think it's a great opportunity that can be perpetuated down the road. And I think as the more tension and the darker points of society get flushed up, I think it's even more important that Catholic Studies brings light to the world.
E ight people, representing a broad spectrum of Catholic Studies alumni and friends, were interviewed for the 30th anniversary video. They are corporate and nonprofit leaders; they are lawyers, clergy and religious; they are parents and educators. While they each have a different Catholic Studies story to tell, they share something profound: they have been impacted by the interdisciplinary exploration of the Incarnation. As a result, they are making an impact on the world. Portions of their interviews are edited here for Lumen . The full video can be viewed by scanning the QR code.
Katie Danielson ‘08 double majored in Catholic Studies and International Studies. She worked as a teacher and then administrator at Ave Maria Academy in Maple Grove, Minnesota, until she stepped away to raise seven children with her husband, Mike.
Emery Koenig has served as chair of the Catholic Studies Advisory Board since 2018. He is a retired Vice Chairman and Chief Risk Officer of Cargill, was elected to Cargill’s Board of Directors in 2010, and was a member of the Cargill corporate leadership team. He and his wife, Karen, enjoy spending time with their children and grandchildren in Minnesota, Florida, and Colorado.
Q: What are some of the qualities of Catholic Studies that helped you? A: There are three things about Catholic Studies that stick with me. First, the sense that every part of who we are as human beings and every part of what we can pass on to the next generation is integrated. Second, there is a unity of knowledge in everything that we learn, both about the world around us and about ourselves. And third, the importance of becoming authentic disciples of Christ. Q: How did your Catholic Studies semester in Rome impact you? A: I didn’t know at that moment what was happening, but I look back and realize how these little movements were happening inside of me that
later allowed me to be open to running a Catholic school, to having a large family, to truly live as God intends me to live: with compassion, with drive, and yet with acceptance as well. Q: Do you think the Catholic Studies program enhanced your desire to be a teacher? A: Yes. Catholic Studies really prepared me intellectually and spiritually to be a good teacher. Without the program, I would not have received the formation necessary to understand the human person, to understand the children that I was charged with teaching and forming. Q: What makes Catholic Studies unique? A: I think Catholic Studies is special because it is pursuing the truth. It believes in the ability to pass on the truth to the next generation.
Q: When was your first encounter with Catholic Studies? A: My first encounter was when Dr. Michael Naughton asked me to give a talk on subsidiarity and how that is played out in the business world. First, I had to go home and find out what subsidiarity was. And as I got into that, I recognized there were a lot of things that were applicable to how I was operating in a global environment.
Q: What came next for you and Catholic Studies? A: Dr. Naughton invited me to join the Advisory Board, and the first thing we did was plan a trip to Rome. Even though my wife and I had lived in Europe and had been to Rome many times, a Catholic Studies pilgrimage to Rome was a very different experience. I got to know Dr. Naughton and Dr. John Boyle, and I got exposure to the students. Their faith and the joy that they were expressing was profound. The hand of God was at work, and I really was attracted to that.
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Lumen Winter 2024 Page 11
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