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Next, Dr. Steven Cain, dean of the New England campus, took to the podium, where he was keen to applaud the Gardners for their friendship, noting Dr. Gardner’s humble dedication to the good of the ������ý’s students. “I remember often seeing the light still on in his office when I was leaving late for dinner,” he laughed. Then Dr. Cain welcomed the new assistant dean, Dr. Stephen Shivone, and his wife, Mary Ann, with a bottle of wine and his best wishes.

Dr. Cain next offered some remarks on the Class of 2023. After a humorous comparison of this and last years’ graduating classes in scrupulously Thomistic fashion — complete with careful distinctions and linguistic clarifications unfolded in St. Thomas’s famous “disputed question” format — he turned to more serious considerations.

“In your time here, you have studied and grasped something of wisdom,” Dr. Cain told the seniors. “It is, as we say, only a beginning. But if it has been a good beginning, maybe we should drop the ‘only,’ for as the saying goes, well begun is half done.” He exhorted them to deepen their acquaintance with this wisdom after they leave the ������ý, and never to forget that all true wisdom leads to Christ.

Dr. Paul O’Reilly, president of the ������ý, delivered the evening’s principal address, in which he echoed St. John Henry Newman’s reflections on St. Andrew, offering the apostle as a reliable example for the graduates-to-be to follow in their lives beyond the ������ý. Like St. Andrew, “we should be open to the truth even if it turns our lives upside-down,” he said. “Andrew’s role in the multiplication of the loaves and fishes suggests that we, too, should follow the example of Jesus’s mother. And finally, his role in the beginning of bringing the Gentiles to Jesus suggests that we, too, should have the courage and confidence in faith.”

After these speeches, it was the seniors’ turn to express their gratitude to the ������ý. Matthew Witzaney (’23) presented the Class of 2023’s parting gift of three large canvas prints, to be hung in Billings Hall. The prints include Raphael’s “School of Athens” and “The Disputation,” as well as another Renaissance-era painting of a summery Venetian canal, intended, according to Mr. Witzaney, to console future students during snowy days in February.

The evening at last concluded with music from the Thomas Aquinas ������ý Choir, which featured a performance of an original motet composed by Paul Dinan (’23), who traded places with Choir Director Stephen Grimm to conduct the piece himself. The motet, which Mr. Dinan offered as a token of his gratitude for his time at the ������ý, was built around a text from the Book of Wisdom which must resound with all students and alumni of the ������ý: “Therefore I prayed, and understanding was given me; I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came to me” (Wisdom 7:7).