Help us to build love on justice and justice on love.

I cried the entire weekend of my graduation from Loyola.

I cried at Baccalaureate mass, when I sang the final note of my college career with the Chapel Choir. I cried at Hail and Farewell where all of my friends’ parents were reminiscing about dropping us off as timid freshmen. I cried the morning of Commencement as I was doing my hair at 6 a.m. I cried as I listened to Dana Matthews perfectly describe my four years at Loyola College. And I cried as I packed up my apartment in Lange Court and drove away from the Evergreen Campus.

I was crying because I loved my four years at Loyola. And I love Loyola. I love the students, I love the Jesuit mission, I love the staff and the faculty, and I love every building, every walkway, and every little nuance that makes Loyola what it is.

I still love it. I love walking across the campus, I love sitting in the Chapel, and I love running into old professors and old friends, current students and fellow alumni.

And so I can’t even imagine what the Virginia Tech community must be going through today.

There’s something about your college. All of you who loved Loyola know what I am talking about. There’s something about living and working and going to class in community with hundreds of fellow students that makes college this incredible microcosm. There is a sense of pride … of devotion … of loyalty. We are Loyola.

And down in Blacksburg … yesterday morning … this morning … they are Virginia Tech.

Their sanctuary has been shattered.

Their friends and classmates and roommates and professors have been senselessly killed.

To some, their school has failed them. To others, their school will sustain them.

I had been on Loyola’s campus for 10 days on September 11, 2001. Ten days into my freshman year the largest tragedy in American history befell this country. And although I had only been at Loyola for 10 days, and I hadn’t met even a fraction of the people I would meet in the coming years, I was immediately immersed into the Loyola community. In the chapel at prayer services, in classroom discussions, on the quad at a candlelight vigil. Loyola united at a time of tragedy. And at that time – filled with fear, and uncertainty, and disbelief -- Loyola was the biggest comfort to me of all.

The same was true a little more than three years later, when the deaths of college president Harold Ridley, S.J. and college chaplain Greg Hartley, S.J. rocked Loyola’s campus. It was with my fellow “Greyhounds” that I sought comfort, insight, prayer, and peace. And it was in that community that I ultimately found it.

And so I hope that in this tragedy, which has hit so much closer to home for the Virginia Tech community, students, professors, alumni, family and friends can find solace in solidarity with one another. That Virginia Tech … their school, their community … will provide them with the comfort and healing that they are so desperately seeking.

Because for them, Virginia Tech will always be “home” – their school, their college experience. While the rest of the country may identify Virginia Tech in the light of tragedy and history, the Hokies will make every effort to remember their favorite teachers, their best friends, fall football games, their freshman dorm room, their chosen spot to study, the tree that blooms the brightest on the quad, and every little nuance that makes Virginia Tech what it is to them.

For everyone who loves Virginia Tech, that, and not the tragedy that occurred one April morning, is what they will keep with them.

To all of the students, faculty, staff, alumni, parents, and friends of Virginia Tech University, you are deeply held in my prayers. I grieve your tremendous loss, as do so many across the country.

Lord, we are your people, the sheep of your flock.
Heal the sheep who are wounded.
Touch the sheep who are in pain.
Clean the sheep who are soiled.
Warm the lambs who are cold.
Help us to know the Father's love through Jesus the shepherd,
and through the Spirit.
Help us to lift up that love, and show it all over this land.
Help us to build love on justice and justice on love.

Help us to
believe mightily,
hope joyfully,
love divinely.

Renew us that we may help renew the face of the earth.

Amen