By William Van de Planque | On Mission
Photos by Mike Roemer/St. Norbert College
DE PERE — St. Norbert College (SNC) held its 126th commencement ceremony in the Mulva Family Fitness & Sports Center at 2 p.m. on Sunday, May 18. The Baccalaureate Mass was also held in the Mulva Center at 10 a.m. on Sunday.
Multiple speakers at the Baccalaureate Mass and commencement ceremony spoke of the integration of Norbertine and Catholic values into student life on campus.
Abbot Dane Radecki, O. Praem. (Class of ’72), the seventh abbot of St. Norbert Abbey, began his homily at the Baccalaureate Mass in gratitude for the students making what he called the right decision and living out one of the core values of the Norbertines.
“Now, to be totally transparent and honest with you, I never attended my college commencement here at St. Norbert,” he said. “I now know this decision disappointed my parents. So, thank you, graduates, for making the right decision for your family, for your class, and standing together as witnesses to communio.”
According to the St. Norbert College mission statement, “…Communio is the ideal of a community united as one, grounded in the Christian understanding of God as Trinity” with a prime example being found “in the common life, prayer and service of the early Christians.”
Fr. Michael Brennan, O. Praem., (Class of ’99), who has been back on campus as a chaplain since 2017 and as pastor of St. Norbert College Parish since 2022, spoke in an interview with On Mission about the integration of Norbertine spirituality and values in student life.
“There’s a communio class, which the executive director of mission, Dr. Emily Thelen, teaches, and she does an excellent job of teaching the history of St. Norbert, the history of the order and the history of the Norbertines here in De Pere,” he said.
Samantha Brienza, a graduating senior who read the universal prayer during the Baccalaureate Mass, was overcome with emotion and unable to finish the prayer. She was then assisted by Fr. Brennan, who came and stood by Brienza and delivered the rest of the prayer for her.
When asked about his role as a chaplain and a spiritual father serving on a college campus, Fr. Brennan said that a good visual was what happened during the universal prayer at the Baccalaureate Mass on Sunday.
“That is my role,” he said. “I just want to walk with them where they are, and I want to lead them to the Lord. I tell them every time I can that they are loved. I want them to absolutely know that they are loved by our God…”
Lacy Geurts (Class of ’25), an elementary education graduate, spoke to On Mission after the commencement ceremony on Sunday about the interaction between students and chaplains.
“It’s his presence on campus,” she said of Fr. Brennan. “He’s seen everywhere. You don’t just see (priests) at the church. You see them as being an integral part of the community.”
Jack Vires (Class of ’25), who delivered the student reflection at the Baccalaureate Mass, spoke about what it meant to graduate from a Catholic, Norbertine, liberal arts college by addressing the integration of each of the four pillars of Norbertine spirituality: communio, contemplatio, actio and stabilitas loci.
“It has been a life-changing experience to be a part of a group of people who have so centered their lives around God and expressed this through love of one another and common prayer,” he said.
President Laurie M. Joyner, Ph.D., will soon begin her second year as the ninth president of St. Norbert College. During her greeting at the start of the commencement ceremony, she recognized the perseverance of the graduating seniors.
“During the past four years, there have been times of great excitement and achievement as well as instances of disappointment and doubt,” she said, addressing the graduates. “Your class has navigated it all with grace, courage and resilience.”
“They lived through COVID back in 2020, so they were able to adapt and, often that meant, for many of them, their senior year in high school was completely online,” Joyner said during an interview with On Mission following commencement. “There are also tremendous challenges facing the higher education sector, and St. Norbert College has not been immune to that.”
Joyner also spoke about the emotions she saw in the students and families throughout the day.
“I think their emotion about it just proves how much they love this place,” she said.
Fr. Dennis H. Holtschneider, C.M., Ed.D., was the commencement speaker. He is a Vincentian priest, educator and advocate for Catholic higher education, and from 2004 to 2017, he served as the 11th president of DePaul University in Chicago.
Fr. Holtschneider told a story about the summer after his own graduation, when he went to Panama for a summer to learn Spanish. During that summer, he said he lived in an extremely poor area of the country which was controlled by the then dictator of Panama, General Manuel Noriega.
He said that Noriega had built a casino on the side of the mountain near the town where he was living, but the residents of the surrounding towns — few of which had electricity — kept their heads down and refused to see what was right in front of them as a way of surviving the oppressive living conditions.
“Now that, of course, was the exact opposite of the purpose of your education,” Fr. Holtschneider said, addressing the graduates. “…You didn’t know it at the time, but St. Norbert (College) was training you to see what was always in front of you, but could be easily ignored altogether.”
He concluded his commencement speech by saying, “That’s the purpose of a liberal arts education at a Catholic university: to see the world truly for what it is, to understand it, to build your skills, then to commit to do something about it.”
Macy Edwards (Class of ’25), who majored in biology and minored in Spanish, was the student speaker at the 2025 commencement ceremony.
She shared about a class that she took her junior year, Professor Benjamin Menghini’s “Character and the Moral Life” class, which Edwards called “the epitome of a liberal arts education.”
“As a biology major, I would have not taken a theology course like this at any other university, which is one of the many reasons why I love SNC,” she said.
President Joyner concluded her greeting at the commencement ceremony with a line borrowed from the prayer of St. Norbert: “Go forth, with zeal!”
St. Norbert College’s newest alumni stepped out of the Mulva Center and each rang the college bell in celebration.