Returning to The Catholic University of America as the speaker at its annual commencement on May 16, 2026, Msgr. James Patrick Shea encouraged CUA’s more than 1,500 graduates to draw on their Christian faith to help them persevere in life and not settle for mediocrity.
“Endurance vanquishes mediocrity,” said Msgr. Shea, who was a Basselin Scholar at Catholic University, receiving his bachelor’s degree in philosophy in 1997 and his licentiate there the next year.
Msgr. Shea, a noted Catholic speaker, has served as the president of the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota, since 2009, when at the age of 34, he became the youngest college or university president in the United States.
“Life with God is a constancy, a perseverance, an endurance, steadfastness, fidelity. Jesus said, ‘Remain in me. Remain in me, that you may bear fruit that will last,'” the priest said, adding, “If we endure, if we persevere, if we don’t give up, then we always win. This is an ironclad principle of the Christian life.”
Perseverance, Msgr. Shea said, “is a participation in the essence of God. God is faithful. God is constant. God is steadfast.”
The Catholic University of America – the national university of the Catholic Church in the United States – held its 137th annual commencement on the steps of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.
Commencement exercises began after all recipients of doctoral, master’s, and bachelor’s degrees processed to their seats in front of the basilica.
Cardinal Robert W. McElroy – who as the archbishop of Washington serves as Catholic University’s chancellor – delivered the invocation.
In his commencement address, Msgr. Shea noted who the Catholic University campus “holds for me some of my happiest memories,” and he joked about how as a CUA graduate, he was known for talking about the university.
“When I left here and went to Rome, my classmates at the Vatican’s North American College had a running joke that Jim Shea could not have a single conversation without mentioning The Catholic University of America,” he said. “In fact, there’s a rumor that at one point it was made into a drinking game!”
On a serious note, Msgr. Shea recounted a story from when he visited Dachau, the infamous Nazi concentration camp, with the University of Mary’s health sciences faculty, where they went so they could “see and smell what happens when medicine turns against the sanctity of life,” he said.
During that visit, his guide pulled him aside at the end of the tour. She was the translator for the last surviving Catholic priest interned at Dachau. The Nazis had imprisoned more than 3,000 clergy there, 90 percent of whom were Catholic priests.
The priest, who had died the year before at the age of 102, confessed something to the guide, telling her, “I was a mediocre priest, and it took Dachau to get the mediocrity out of my priesthood.”
Msgr. Shea said hearing what that priest had said “haunted me for a long time.”
“The question of mediocrity, of human mediocrity, haunts every single examined life,” the commencement speaker said.
Talent, Msgr. Shea said, is not a cure for mediocrity, nor is knowledge, wealth, or honor.
That cure can be found in “the essence of the character of all the saints and scholars of our tradition… It is stability, constancy, perseverance, endurance, steadfastness, fidelity.”
The priest told CUA’s graduates that “you already know this. You know this because how did you get here today? Do you know the main reason? Because you didn’t quit.”
Encouraging the graduates to persevere by remaining steadfast in their faith in Christ, Msgr. Shea said, “If we don’t give that up, if we stay with Him, we always win.”
Msgr. Shea received an honorary doctorate in theology from The Catholic University of America during the commencement. The priest, who spoke at the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress, the 2025 National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, and the SEEK Conference for Catholic young adults, was praised for his commitment to evangelization.
Three other individuals received honorary doctorates from Catholic University.
Lisa Brenninkmeyer received an honorary doctorate of theology. Brenninkmeyer, initially the founder of a women’s Bible study in her parish, is the founder of Walking with Purpose, one of the nation’s largest Catholic Bible studies for women and girls, evangelizing in 710 parishes in the United States, Europe, and Canada.
Dr. John Bruchalski, a physician, received an honorary doctorate of humane letters. Dr. Bruchalski is the founder of the Tepeyac OB/GYN center in northern Virginia, which provides affordable obstetrical and gynecological care. He also founded Divine Mercy Care, which subsidizes medical services at Tepeyac for patients in financial need.
Iqbal Zahidul Quadir, a distinguished fellow at Catholic University’s Busch School of Business, received an honorary doctorate of marketing and entrepreneurship. Growing up during Bangladesh’s bloody war of independence from Pakistan, he moved to the United States in 1976, earning an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania. Back in Bangladesh, Quadir established two telecommunications companies dedicated to improving rural telephone access. His companies now connect 84 million Bangladeshis via cellular and internet service.
At the end of the ceremony, Peter Kilpatrick, Catholic University’s president, addressed CUA’s class of 2026.
“Always pursue the truth: the truth about the human person, the truth about the world, and the truth about God – and always do everything with the greatest love that you can muster,” he said.
Kilpatrick encouraged the students to love God and love others, not only their friends, but also strangers, the poor, the migrant, those in prison, and even those who harm or persecute them.
“The more you learn to love everyone, to authentically care for your neighbor and for everyone with whom you come into contact, the happier, the more joyful you will be. This has been proven beyond any shadow of a doubt in the lives of countless saints in every era, and confirmed even by social scientists today,” Catholic University’s president said.
Michael Kish, a business and philosophy dual major, as well as Catholic University’s student body president, was among those graduating at the commencement. In an interview, Kish said he believes Catholic University is the best place to seek a Catholic education, which he defines as the “process of forming a human being to be best equipped to seek their highest end, which is the Lord God made flesh.”
“Unlike a secular university, we’re not bogged down by issues of contemporary politics, and unlike other Catholic universities, we are right in the middle of the world,” Kish said, adding, “It’s been the best four years of my life.”
