Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., president of the University of Notre Dame, will add new names to the Wall of Honor in Notre Dame’s Main Building and preside at Mass in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart Tuesday (Oct. 13) in celebration of Founder’s Day.
Founder’s Day, the feast of St. Edward the Confessor, patron saint of Notre Dame’s founder, Rev. Edward Sorin, C.S.C., has been annually celebrated on campus since 1868 in honor of Father Sorin and all of the men and women whose lives and work have made the University what it is today.
At an induction ceremony at 11 a.m. on the first floor of the Main Building, Father Jenkins will bless two new plaques for the Wall of Honor, one honoring Notre Dame theologian and teacher Rev. John S. Dunne, C.S.C., and another honoring the first generation of African-American students at Notre Dame.
Established in 1999 to memorialize men and women “whose contributions to Notre Dame have been lasting, pervasive and profound,” the Wall of Honor will now include Father Dunne, one of the University’s beloved teachers, who died two years ago. A widely revered teacher and mentor for more than half a century, he also wrote some 20 influential works on theology and the spiritual life. A second plaque will include three names representing the University’s first generation of African-American students: 1947 alumnus Frazier Thompson, the first African-American student to enroll at Notre Dame; 1956 alumna Goldie Lee Ivory, the first African-American woman to earn a Notre Dame degree; and 1958 alumnus Aubrey Lewis, the first African-American graduate to be elected a Notre Dame trustee.
The induction ceremony will be followed by a reception in the Main Building Rotunda at which Notre Dame’s Voices of Faith gospel choir will perform.
Father Jenkins will preside at a Mass for Founder’s Day at 5:15 p.m. in Notre Dame’s Basilica of the Sacred Heart. Rev. Michael Connors, C.S.C., director of the John S. Marten Program in Homiletics and Liturgics and senior faculty chaplain, will preach, and sacred music will be provided by the University Folk Choir.