The Comillas Pontifical University closes the 2022-2023 academic year with graduation of students from various academic careers. Four Augustinian Recollects get their degrees: Bachelor of Theology, Julio César Hernández Ramírez; baccalaureate in theology: Tiago Ribeiro de Araújo, Bernal Francisco Guerrero Sandí and Ednando Ribeiro Lima.
On June 3, 2023, at the academic event organized by the Pontifical University de Comillas, among many other students, four religious from the House of Formation Saint Augustine of Las Rozas: Julio César Hernández Ramírez, Tiago Ribeiro de Araújo, Bernal Francisco Guerrero Sandí and Ednando Ribeiro Lima obtained the graduation at the end of several years of study and academic work. All the simple professed attended the event together with fray Juan Manuel Ramírez, prior of the house of Formation Saint Augustine, and the teacher of professed Fray Luis Diego Ramírez.
The graduation was attended by the students of the last courses of Theology, of Canon Law, Philosophy, Physical Activity and Sports Sciences, Primary Education, Criminology, Social Work, Early Childhood Education, Politics and Economics, Psychology, International Relations, International Communication, Social Work, Translation and interpretation. The graduation took place at the Canto Blanco Campus, Madrid, in a large fixed tent that accommodated all the those who attended the event.
The graduation began with the solemn entrance of the academic authorities of the University: the magnificent rector, the Jesuit Enrique Sanz Giménez-Rico, accompanied of doctoral professors representing the different faculties present at the act of Graduation, among them Mr. Pedro Fernández Castelao, professor of Anthropology Theology, and Mrs. María Jesús Fernández Cordero, professor of Church History modern. Before the Rector Magnificent opened the session, the anthem of the Universidad Pontificia Comillas performed by musicians from the Choral School of Madrid. The Rector Magnificent immediately opened the session. The event was led by the Magnificent Rector and Federico de Montalvo Jääskeläinen, Vice Rector of institutional relations and general secretary of the University.
After the opening of the act, Mrs. Elena Dionisio Ruiz, graduated in Theology, delivered the speech on behalf of all the students present. Don Julio Zarco Rodríguez, president of the Humans Foundation, chosen godfather of the group of graduates, he also delivered his speech, evoking the COVID-19 pandemic, the humanization to which we are all called to exercise within the society in which we are inserted, so that each person is not just another number, but each one have their place as a human being within society.
Immediately the scholarships were presented to the students who came to be awarded and imposed by the professors present as they were summoned. There were a total of 60 students who received the scholarship, including the four Augustinian Recollects. During the ceremony, musicians from the Madrid Choral School performed the song Lean on me by Michael Bolton.
The imposition of scholarships ended with a request and a wish from don Federico de Montalvo Jääskeläinen: “the request: be human, be good; and the desire: have good luck, be good and get lucky (be good and be lucky)”, alluding to the Daft Punk song “Get lucky”, which played right away.
Once the song was finished, a video was presented about what the academic year had been like and what the university wanted. The Rector Magnificent then took the floor to exhort students to experience values regardless of what we are or where we are, “values that speak of God and of human beings”.
With the singing of Gaudeamus igitur, the university hymn par excellence, the act and Enrique Sanz Giménez-Rico adjourned the session, leaving the tent accompanied by the academic committee together with the godfather of the graduation and the recent students graduates to the sound of “Oh happy day”, by Edwin Hawkins Singers.
The act closed with a Spanish wine in which all the attendees participated, offered in the gardens of the university campus.
