Saint Vincent College is about new beginnings for you students.

On our campus Saturday we had our first football game in 45 years! It was a breathtakingly gorgeous day and thousands packed Chuck Noll field and the surrounding hillsides to watch our team play their hearts out (ok, we didn't win, but for a first year team we had some exceptional moments so come out Saturday at 1 pm and watch these young men play again). Our cheerleaders, newly-invigorated pep band, and dance team provided excellent entertainment during the game, as did the bands that performed on the field later that night.

College is like that - it is ever-green, ever-changing, always interesting, and plenty dangerous. Your four years here constitute a rite of passage into full adulthood. You meet new friends on campus and often find yourself letting go of many of your high school ones. Boyfriends or girlfriends from back home can get replaced with new ones you meet here (by the way, you may not realize this, but because so many Saint Vincent students end up marrying one another, you may be seated next to your future husband or wife!).

One of the hardest adjustments you will make as a college student is the transition from dependence to independence - no one here is reminding you to study, go to Mass or church on Sunday, or even get out of bed to make classes. It is up to you.

Many students struggle with that and experience their freedom as a license to play, party, and put off studying. One of the saddest times every December is the notification period when students and their parents find out about dismissals. Bad choices have consequences. There is a saying that it is easy to get in trouble and hard to get out of it.

But good choices have consequences, too. Last year's highlight for me was not having the President of the United States on our campus. For me, the commencement highlight was seeing the proud faces of the young men and women who had achieved much - not because Mom or Dad was here to prod them but because they chose to do it. Graduates of the Class of 2007 are now in law school, med school, other graduate programs, or are in business or teaching in the classroom, or otherwise fully engaged in life.

What you learn at Saint Vincent is that the sweetness of life isn't success - if it were there wouldn't be so many so-called successful people who are miserable. The sweetness comes from giving life your best, your all, and loving until it hurts.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta taught me that lesson. Tomorrow will be her ten-year death anniversary. And even though it has been so long since her death, last week Mother Teresa was on the cover of Time magazine. Why? It seems that her life spent working with lepers in the slums of Calcutta continues to inspire and fascinate, and the more we know about her life, the more she intrigues us.Did you know that she often groped in the dark for God, just like us? Did you know that she loved ice cream? Did you know that she laughed and cried, and that on the day she died, right at the moment of her death, there was a massive electrical storm and power failure in Calcutta that prevented emergency medical equipment from possibly saving her life?

Did you know Mother Teresa liked the Steelers? Ok, I made that one up.

But if you find the Nobel Peace Prize winner of any interest, you will have the opportunity to learn more about her from the people who knew her best.

Saint Vincent College will honor her one month from tomorrow with a weekend program on campus that you won't want to miss. It will be a time of story-telling, not theology. Who will be on campus? Mother Teresa's niece from Italy, her successor from Calcutta, the man whose best-selling book was on the cover of Time magazine, and all those closest to Mother Teresa during her lifetime.

While many people will be coming to Latrobe from all over the world, we have reserved a limited number of seats so that students like you can attend. Fr. Vincent and Katie in Campus Ministry are working with Julie Gulling in my office to accommodate as many students as possible, so please sign up.

Usually you have to read a biography to learn about a giant of history. At this Conference, you will get to hear from people who traveled the world with Mother Teresa and spent countless hours with her. Even if you don't have faith or consider yourself devout, you will find the humanity of Mother Teresa worth studying.

Mother Teresa said at the end of her life the following: God does not call me to be successful; God calls me to be faithful.

As this new beginning in your life unfolds at Saint Vincent, may you allow these words of Mother Teresa to take root in your heart, mind and soul.