Gaps and transitions

The original Pentecost novena was, for the Apostles, absolutely a period of withdrawal from the world, and a period of preparation and transition to a new way of living. The Apostles were hidden in the Upper Room for ten days before embracing publicly their mission under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

There is a sense in the life of every student that their studies offer them a period of separation, preparation and transition, away from the usual demands of life, and in order that they can be better prepared to contribute to the life of the world after they graduate.

Today, gap years offer recourse to some young people before University, who sense that they are not yet ready for such a period of preparation. Others sense the need for a gap year after University in order to fill out and complete that period of preparation and transition. And of course, as we know, there are some who, even then, do not feel ready to embrace a concrete role in life.

At Campion College, this sense of embracing a period of separation, preparation, and transition marks the whole ethos of the life of the College. The content and format of the study program, its relationship to the maturing of the personality and to the emerging adult Christian life of the students, enables Campion College students to really engage in a formative way with this era in their lives.

At the beginning of his Encyclical Letter "Fides et Ratio", Pope John Paul II spoke of how "the admonition Know yourself was carved on the temple portal at Delphi, as testimony to a basic truth to be adopted as minimal norm by those who seek to set themselves apart from the rest of creation as 'human beings', that is as those who 'know themselves'."

Our students at Campion are preparing themselves, during this rich 'interlude' in their lives, to become mature men and women, mature Christian men and women; Christian men and women who can enter into secular society as bridges to Christ, agents of Christ and of Christian living in a secular and often pagan milieu.

The life and the study of Campion College students, who enter into the three-year degree period of intellectual, spiritual and personal growth and formation, is a rich antidote to much of what contemporary culture impedes: knowledge of self and knowledge of Christ. These are the foundations of life.