Annual Zahm Lecture with Vincent D. Rougeau, J.D.

​​​​​Educating Minds and Hearts for a Pluralist Democracy: Catholic Higher Education in a Time of Turmoil

As the University of Portland marks 125 years of its Holy Cross mission, President Vincent Rougeau of the College of the Holy Cross asks how Catholic higher education can serve humanity in a moment of real democratic strain. Drawing on Catholic social teaching's account of human dignity, the common good, and justice he asserts that Catholic colleges and universities have a distinct opportunity–and obligation–to help a divided nation move forward together.

Vincent D. Rougeau is the 33rd president of the College of the Holy Cross, a role he has held since July 2021. A nationally respected expert in legal education and Catholic social thought, he previously served as dean of the Boston College Law School and the inaugural director of the Boston College Forum on Racial Justice in America. Before that, he was a tenured professor of law at Notre Dame Law School.

Rougeau has written extensively on law and religion, with a focus on Catholic Social Teaching and the relationships among religious identity, citizenship, and membership in multicultural democratic societies. He is the author of Christians in the American Empire: Faith and Citizenship in the New World Order (Oxford University Press, 2008).

He is past president of the Association of American Law Schools and currently serves on the Executive Committee of the Association of Jesuit Colleges & Universities, as well as the boards of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, GBH, Commonweal magazine, Newton-Wellesley Hospital, and the Boston Lyric Opera. Rougeau received his A.B. magna cum laude from Brown University and his J.D. from Harvard Law School.

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