St. Joseph Business Guild
(Above) Katzie and Ben Nelson; (Right) Andy ‘10 and Mal Gikling wedding in the Chapel of St. Thomas Aquinas.
students are encouraged to pair their major with another degree that reflects a career path. For students graduating and moving into the professional world, participation in the common good through business is an important part of their vocation. “Work does not exhaust a vocation,” Naughton says. “Their first vocation is to be holy. The second vocation is to participate in a state of life: priestly, religious or lay …But they’re also called to work. They’re called to animate the public order, the temporal order that we live in, through the incarnation and through the spirit of Christ in everything they do.” He notes that a key aspect of the guild’s mission is that it is an environment where members can integrate faith and work.
“So many of us, we often divide our lives. We have faith over here, and business over here. I think the guild is trying to provide an organic relationship between one’s faith – and the importance of that faith, which has a social dimension to it – and what one does, spends one’s time, in terms of the day-to-day living that you get from business.” A RESOURCE FOR FAMILIES Guild members and 2015 St. Thomas alumni Ben and Katzie Nelson are a husband-wife teamwith a wedding photography business, Katzie and Ben Photography. The two met as Catholic studies undergraduates and started dating after graduation. Katzie, who also works in the St. Thomas IT department, had been a
photographer since high school. Ben started helping out at her gigs, and turned out to have a knack of his own with the camera. They joke that as their courtship moved through “relationship promotions,” Ben got “business promotions” – “After we got engaged, I got my name in the business,” Ben says. They now have a young son. Often clients seek them out specifically because they’re Catholic, knowing Ben and Katzie will understand and highlight what’s truly important about the wedding day. Katzie appreciates being able to suggest the guild as a resource for other wedding services, given that those couples already are looking to do business with fellow Catholics. She hopes the guild connections will provide support not only on the wedding day, but beyond.
Page 10 stthomas.edu/catholicstudies
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