Dear USD Community,

Welcome to the fall 2025 semester! Over the past month it has been a joy to welcome our new and returning students. Thank you to everyone involved in supporting our orientation and onboarding events and extending our Torero hospitality to our new students and families.

I hope you were able to find time for rejuvenation over the summer and that you’re coming back to campus refreshed and ready. After a busy spring semester, my wife Mary convinced me that I needed to do something to restore myself. So I booked a trip to Ireland doing what I love - hiking.

My seven days on the Kerry Camino and Dingle Peninsula were physically challenging, experiencing every season of weather. But more importantly, it was spiritually renewing and exactly what I needed. Everyone gets overwhelmed and exhausted at times, but it is through challenges and new experiences that push us outside our comfort zones where we grow and learn.

During my travels I read a book by theologian and Irish poet John O’Donohue, who writes: “Perhaps the art of harvesting the secret riches of our lives is best achieved when we place profound trust in the act of beginning. Risk might be our greatest ally. To live a truly creative life, we always need to cast a critical look at where we presently are, attempting always to discern where we have become stagnant and where new beginning might be ripening. There can be no growth if we do not remain open and vulnerable to what is new and different. I have never seen anyone take a risk for growth that was not rewarded a thousand times over.”

As we experience a new beginning with the start of the academic year, and all the excitement, anticipation and anxiety that comes with it, let’s take O’Donohue’s words to heart and open ourselves up “where new beginning might be ripening.” Especially in times of uncertainty and challenge, the many resources and benefits available at USD are here to fuel us academically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

And fortunately at our great university, we are not on this journey alone. In the Catholic faith we talk about the importance of “accompaniment,” or standing with someone on their life’s journey. That’s what makes USD so special - we are blessed with a wonderfully supportive community that will accompany you on the path forward.

One of our beautiful traditions is our annual Mass of the Holy Spirit, an opportunity to gather together and pray for the year ahead and peace in our world. This year’s mass will be celebrated on September 11 at 12:15pm in The Immaculata, and led by newly appointed San Diego Bishop Michael M. Pham, who began his seminary training at the St. Francis Seminary right here at USD.

Since his appointment, Bishop Pham has reminded us of the importance of coming together to not only serve each other, but to also show compassion and care to those most vulnerable. In his opening message to the Diocese, Bishop Pham notes: “The love of Christ means that we are all in it together. That is what love is about. How we treat one another is the reflection of our commitment to Christ’s love and justice for all people — for He came into the world to bear witness by His love, justice, and peace. This love unites us with our Savior and with one another.”

It’s only fitting - and deliberate - that our vision statement calls us to foster peace, work for justice and lead with love. Let us draw inspiration from the words of O’Donohue and leaders like Bishop Pham, as well as the Toreros here on campus and around the world who light the way forward to create a more inclusive, sustainable and hopeful world.

Here’s to a great year ahead and wishing you the very best in your classes and the many ways you experience this great community, together. Because USD begins with us.

Peace,

James T. Harris III, DEd
President