Discovering Vincent

After reading all about DePaul University’s Vincentian Heritage Tour on this blog, you may wonder why the university invests time and resources into these trips.

On one hand, there is a concern over what will become of the university’s Catholic and Vincentian identity now that there are fewer than 270 Vincentians remaining in the United States today and that all Vincentian priests and brothers are expected to be gone in 20 to 25 years.

In a way, the fact that there are fewer Vincentian priests with each passing year “is relatively unimportant,” says the Rev. Edward Udovic, C.M., senior executive for university mission. The “C.M.” that appears after his name stands for the “Congregation of the Mission.” In Latin, it is “congregationis missionis,” and the literal translation of that is “a gathering of people for the sake of the mission,” notes Udovic. “So from that perspective, every single person at DePaul University is a Vincentian, because we’re all gathered here for the sake of the mission at DePaul University.”

The way we live up to that as faculty and staff, Udovic says, is to make the mission “real and effective in the lives of all those 23,000 students who walked through the front doors this morning and make sure we do everything that we can do in terms of accessibility, affordability and attainment” of education.

The Vincentian Heritage Tours give every participant insight into the life, work and beliefs of St. Vincent de Paul. “It gives them insight into the values that no other means can do,” says Udovic. This particular trip was for faculty and staff, but tours also are offered to different groups, including students and the university’s board of trustees.

As a historian, Udovic appreciates the value, for example, of reading about events such as the Battle of Gettysburg, “but all of that takes on an incredibly different feeling when you actually are at the battlefield. Ultimately, that’s what these trips are about.”