Commencement Speech

0:00Carl Anderson is a lawyer and educator who served as Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus from 2000 to 2021 after a distinguished career in government and academia, having served as a special assistant to President Ronald Reagan, a member of the United States Commission on Civil Rights, and founding dean and vice president of the Pontifical John Paul the second Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family in Washington, DC. He is a trustee emeritus of the Catholic University of America and former board member of the National Catholic Education Association. During the pontificate of Saint John Paul the second, Benedict the fort Benedict the sixteenth, and Pope Francis, he served as member of the Vatican's Pontifical Academy for Life, Pontifical Council for the Laity, and the Pontifical Council for the Family.

1:02He is a best selling author whose books have been translated into eight languages and has an Emmy award winning executive producer of documentary films. He holds degrees in philosophy and law. We are very honored to award Carl Anderson an honoris causa degree and to invite him to say a few words as our main speaker today. Well, thank you very much. May it please your excellencies, bishop Chieszczylinski, bishop Keith, bishop Laverde, Father Sikorsky, Reverend Fathers and religious, members of the Board of Trustees, distinguished members of the faculty, alumni, family and friends, and most importantly, our graduates. I'm honored to be with you and now to be part of the DMU community. I thank you very much, for the privilege of now joining the DMU community and the honor of joining with you and congratulating our graduates.

2:56This is a great day, not only for our graduates, but also for our church and our country. We have heard for many years that Catholics should have a missionary spirit and to go to the peripheries. But what does it mean for a Catholic professional to go to the periphery? What does it mean especially in the profession of psychology? Where are the peripheries in psychology? Until now, this question may have seemed to our graduates theoretical. But now and in the days ahead, it is a challenge that you will face in the day to day reality of your professional practice. During the next few minutes, I would like to suggest to you why it is that our graduates are uniquely qualified to make an historic contribution.

3:56In the nineteenth century, America was missionary territory. The history of Catholicism in The United States has been largely written by missionaries. And those who had a missionary attitude. Men and women who were willing to go to the peripheries. And not just the geographical peripheries. Catholics in America needed sacraments. And they needed also those institutions that made possible a Catholic way of life. Catholics came together to form courageous, creative minorities, communities that built great churches and cathedrals, great schools and colleges and universities, orphanages and hospitals, and even fraternal brotherhoods like the Knights of Columbus. They built a network of institutions that Catholics needed to become who they were called to be.

5:00Again today, Catholic families need new institutions. Again today, Catholics need courageous missionaries. And again today, Catholics need creative minorities. Saint John Paul the second saw this very clearly. And that is why in 1981, he established the Pontifical Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family. And several years later, he authorized its extension into The United States. Again, today, another creative initiative is Divine Mercy University, unique in the way it brings together theology and psychology. DMU is one of the most important initiatives in Catholic education in our time. DMU can influence the lives of millions of families. And as Bishop Burbage has suggested in his recent pastoral letter, by opening up the medical health mental health care profession to the healing presence of the divine physician.

6:14Next year will mark the one hundredth anniversary of Sigmund Freud's The Future of an Illusion, possibly the most influential book on the subject of religion in the twentieth century. In it, as many of you know, Freud described religion as, quote, the universal, obsessional neurosis of humanity that brings with it a quote disavowal of reality. Similar, he said, to quote a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion. Freud told the world that religion was an illusion. And he lamented the plight of those who since childhood had been administered what he called this bitter sweet poison. Freud did much to set the scientific foundation for modern atheism. Modern psychological practice may not explicitly endorse Freud's idea, but it just frequently proceeds on the basis that true science acts as though God does not exist.

7:37Or as Freud put it, quote, our science is no illusion, but an illusion it would be to suppose that what science cannot give us, we can get elsewhere. This has been the paradigm for much of the last century. But Christianity is not about projecting our ideas or creating an illusion to escape reality. Christianity is the recognition that God has revealed reality to us. First, by revealing to us who he is, and in so doing, revealing to us who we are. As pope John Paul the second told us, do not be afraid. Christ knows what is in man. He alone knows it. The decisive point here is that in Christianity, we find a vision of the human person illuminated by the love of Christ. And because love is present, mercy must follow, because the God who loves us is rich in mercy.

8:57Today, we need an approach to psychology that is free of illusion. We need Catholic therapists who will bring the whole truth about the human person in diagnosing mental disorders, conducting research, and practicing therapy. One extraordinary example of this is the work of Edith Stein. Stein proposed an alternative to Freud's model of id, ego, and superego by suggesting a new therapeutic model of soul, mind, and body. Her work in phenomenology, psychology, and spirituality is just one example, one example of the opportunities that exist today for Catholic mental health professionals. Obviously, many nuance are required here. Therapies and spiritual interventions must respect freedom, autonomy, and the religious and cultural diversity of patients.

10:05Yet, it is precisely here why Catholic inspired approaches to therapy are so necessary. Because they will enable a more culturally sensitive care for the millions of Christians who too often find their personal and their family culture disrespected by those who regard religious faith itself as some kind of mental illness. John Paul the second found in the Christ centered anthropology of the second Vatican council the key to understanding the human person and human action. According to him, the human person cannot live without love. Life is incomprehensible and senseless if we do not experience love. And so because of this, John Paul the second insisted that only a civilization of love is adequate to respect the dignity of each person.

11:15And he contrasted the civilization of love with what he called the civilization of technology, in which a technocratic logic and utilitarianism defines how we relate to each other. Now, you may have caught a glimpse of this logic in the unspoken assumptions of certain behaviorist and cognitive behavioral therapies. The greatest threat to human dignity today may not be found in the overt denials of human freedom, but in the more gradual tyranny, which treats the human person as a sort of product that can be shaped and manipulated by a variety of technological and chemical based therapies. Christian therapists, counselors, and clinical psychologists stand as sentinels today for a mental health care profession that is rapidly coming to a crossroads.

12:25At stake is nothing less than the dignity and integrity of the human person. And much will depend upon the witness of Catholic mental health care professionals. As I was preparing what I would say today, I came across something that Freud had asked a colleague in 1918. He questioned why it was that psychoanalysis had not been created by a religious believer, but instead had to be founded by an atheist. For decades, scholars have pondered Freud's question, and I certainly would not presume to offer an answer today. But I would suggest to you that we are now in the springtime of a Catholic moment in psychology. The degree to which this moment will be realized will depend upon the courage of DMU, its graduates, colleagues, and friends to be fully, faithfully, and distinctively Catholic.

13:41We are quite aware of what a psychotherapy looks like when God has been pushed out of the question. What we don't know is what a Christ centered psychology would look like. John Paul the second told us that suffering is present in the world in order to release love, works of love, to our neighbors. What the world needs desperately needs is a new psychology infused with the love of Christ, and you can give that to the world. So the question today is, will you do it? Some of you may remember John Paul the second often used the phrase, duke in autumn, to encourage us to put out into the deep in the new millennium. So what could be more deep than the mystery of the human psyche? When Karol Wojtyla was elected pope, he was told, magister adest, et vocate.

15:02The teacher is here and is calling you. These words are the traditional formula by which a cardinal is asked whether he will accept his election as pope. Today, you, our graduates, will say farewell to many of your teachers. But there is another teacher present here today, one who is now calling you and who is waiting for your reply. And much of the joy that we feel, your friends, family, and faculty, today arises from our shared confidence of how the class of 2026 will answer his call. Thank you again very much.