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^{(Adapted from the keynote address at the inauguration of Katia Passerini as president of Gonzaga University, September 2025; printed as follows in the December 2025 issue of Gonzaga Magazine)}

By Sister Raffaella Petrini, FSE President of the Pontifical Commission and the Governorate of Vatican City State

Your new President and I have a few important things in common. First, although we were both born in Italy, our lives developed further in the United States, where we built relationships and became rooted in family, religious community and professional environments. Second, we both studied at the LUISS University in Rome, imbued with such values as respect for the human person, professional competence and growth, accountability, and sustainability. Third, we both have strong connections with the Jesuit religious family. Fourth, Katia and I are the first women presidents in the history of the institutions we love and serve with gratitude and dedication. We both firmly believe that collaboration, teamwork, loyalty and transparency are the pillars of human-centered organizations which, inspired by Catholic Social Teaching, strive to pursue the common good.

Katia and I are friends. In fact, friendship is the main reason I am here today. My hope is that you will continue to cultivate friendships at Gonzaga University under the guidance of your new president and her remarkable staff. All of you gathered here are the leaders of today or tomorrow, called to give back what you generously received through your family and the people that God’s Providence placed in your path. Friendship tills the soil where the seed of dialogue among people and disciplines can grow.

Empowering Potential

Classical philosophy held that friendship played an important role in human existence, assuming that a person without friends cannot be truly happy, because no one can grow spiritually and morally alone. For Aristotle, friendship implied a sincere desire for the other person’s good and a mutual awareness of these feelings. Christian anthropology shares this conviction: Human beings depend on God and others to satisfy their basic needs, but they also need others to develop their skills and inner talents; they need others to empower their potential. They need education, mentorship, support and care.

Pope Francis reminded us that no one can face life in isolation: We need a community that helps us to look to the future. This August, Pope Leo XIV reiterated to the youth gathered in Rome that “human relationships are essential for each of us,” because “it is through relationships that we grow.”

Friendship is also a relationship among those called to spend time together as members of the same community. You are called to be part of the wider community of Gonzaga University. You are here to be and to become leaders who are ready to pursue the good of others, leaders who are willing to sow the seeds of unity.

Together, you can aspire to something greater. You can cultivate the desire to improve yourselves and society as a whole, and to make the world more human and more fraternal.

Opening Doors

True friendship is open to sacrifice. It breaks through the narrow boundaries of individualism and competition to pursue higher goals and become an expression of love and solidarity. Pope Leo specified that true friendship can be found in Jesus Christ, and that while “the path of dialogue, the path of friendship, may be challenging, it yields the precious fruit of peace.” In the Christian tradition, like Aristotle, St. Augustine too identifies a strong connection between friendship and happiness. Since happiness finds its ultimate source in God, however, friendship has a transcendent dimension. It is unbreakable, because not even death can separate true friends.

The friendships cultivated at Gonzaga profoundly impact your individual journey and your life in community. In his encyclical “Fratelli Tutti” (2020), Pope Francis discussed the importance of social friendship, emphasizing that “our love for others, for who they are, moves us to seek the best for their lives.” Social friendship is rooted in the “acknowledgment of the worth of every human person, always and everywhere.” Only by cultivating this way of relating to one another can we foster fraternity, the structural framework of peace.

Leading with Hope

Catholic Universities are meant to offer a space for encounter and to promote a culture of hospitality in the spirit of this Jubilee Year of Hope. In this space of encounter, we are exposed to the mystery of otherness. Here, you can truly learn how to be receptive, how to make yourselves more vulnerable to others, how to take risks, and how to stay open to the unknown. These are all dimensions of friendship.

One of the main purposes of higher education – and especially of your Jesuit education at Gonzaga under Katia’s guidance – is to build community. This community is not tailored only to satisfy individual needs but also to define common goals. Higher education becomes an essential means of integration; it accomplishes its primary task when it can form people who are ready to journey together as friends. It shapes leaders who can bring people together and care for them – servant leaders who wish to promote the well-being of those entrusted to them.

Education that nurtures true friendship becomes a peace-making force that can help heal fractures, protect the vulnerable, and bridge cultural and generational gaps.

I truly believe that fostering dialogue among all who are involved in the Mission of this University will inspire you to pursue greater life goals that require courage, honesty and integrity. May the spirit of true friendship that you cultivate here guide your freedom, direct your will, strengthen your hope, and help build a better future together