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By Gary M. Bouchard      Illustrations by Jim Roldan

The age of Aquarius had dawned and set by 1973. The controversial, undeclared war that had caused campuses to erupt was spiraling to a violent and inconclusive end. The summer of love had succumbed to winters of discontent. The dream of unifying civil rights had given way to an angry and divisive Black Power. The man in the moon had become the man on the moon, but several golf balls in space later made even this new frontier seem oddly anti-climactic. An overweight and over-costumed Elvis was crooning in Honolulu, while a nation drowned in Watergate. And human greatness? Well, that of course was Muhammad Ali.

Amidst this cultural malaise of disappointed hopes, a Benedictine abbot stood before the faculty at this small liberal arts college and challenged them to join in what would be a courageous swim against a cynical tide. "All men require that a vision be held before them," he told them, "an ideal toward which they may strive. Our students, in fact, all of us, need such a vision today as never before in our history." It was "both the dignity and the duty of teachers," he said, to furnish such a vision.

And just how did he propose they do this? A philosopher and recent dean, Abbot Joseph Gerry was wise enough not to tell a college faculty how, but he was certain to make sure they understood what: "The humanities are not merely our greatest gift to our students' minds, but the world's best hope," he told them. "It is in the humanities that the roots of ignorance and envy, and thus the causes of war, are destroyed." And once more: "When men and women find nothing within themselves but emptiness they turn to trivial and narcotic amusements. The humanities are an answer to man's questioning and searching, in his leisure."

The Beginnings
Abbot Joseph did not invent the Humanities Program at Saint Anselm College that afternoon. In fact, he made no specific programmatic recommendations at all. He did, though, furnish a vision for the humanities as the foundation of learning, and he challenged the Saint Anselm faculty to implement that vision by examining the significance, effectiveness and inter-relatedness of the core courses taught at Saint Anselm.

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