College Breaks Ground for St. Cecilia Concert and Lecture Hall

On Friday afternoon, incense filled the air, holy water softened the ground, and four spades pierced the soil at the site of Thomas Aquinas College’s forthcoming lecture and concert building, St. Cecilia Hall.

Set to open its doors in 2017, St. Cecilia Hall will be the fourteenth building constructed since the College acquired its campus in the 1970s. Situated on the southwest corner of the academic quadrangle, adjacent to St. Gladys Hall and Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel, St. Cecilia Hall will host the biweekly events that make up the St. Vincent DePaul Lecture and Concert Series. The building is made possible through an $8.5 million grant from the Fritz B. Burns Foundation of Los Angeles.

Seeking St. Cecilia’s Intercession

Prior to the groundbreaking ceremony, the College offered a Votive Mass in honor of St. Cecilia, the 4th century virgin, martyr, and patroness of music for whom the building is named.

In his homily, Chaplain Rev. Cornelius M. Buckley, S.J., noted the fortuitous location of St. Cecilia Hall, which will neighbor St. Gladys Hall (a classroom building), as well as Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel. “We have the art complementing the science, the philosophy, and the theology,” he remarked, “and the science, the philosophy, and the theology complementing the art. And at the head of it all is this chapel, where God Himself is present in a very special way. So we see here, then, a concrete example the ideals of the founding fathers of Thomas Aquinas College.”

Among those in attendance were three representatives of the Fritz B. Burns Foundation — President Rex Rawlinson and Trustees Maureen Rawlinson and Cheryl Robinson — as well as members of the College’s Board of Governors, faculty, and President’s Council. Also present were two members of Gladys and Fritz Burns’ family, their daughter Frances Morehart and granddaughter-in-law Missy Mueller.

The four-decade long development of the College’s campus, Fr. Buckley explained, is testament to the generosity of such benefactors. “It is because of the calling of people who want to serve the Lord and their response to that calling that we are able to have this campus and this new building,” he said. “We ask the Lord to bless them in a singular way and enable them to see the great contribution that they have made and are making to the formation of the students of Thomas Aquinas College.”

Blessing and Breaking Ground

Immediately after the Mass, Fr. Buckley, joined by his three fellow chaplains and several student acolytes, led the congregation in a procession to the future site of St. Cecilia Hall. There, President McLean observed that the building, “will be a beautiful and acoustically appropriate venue for our St. Vincent de Paul Lecture and Concert series, with space enough to welcome members of our wider community.” He additionally thanked the trustees of the Fritz B. Burns Foundation, “who share with us a firm commitment to genuine, Catholic liberal education, and have been our partners for decades now in helping our students receive a sound intellectual, moral, and spiritual foundation.”

The College’s head chaplain, Rev. Paul Raftery, O.P., attended by a student acolyte, then proceeded to bless the grounds of the new building with incense and holy water. “Bless, O Lord, the site for St. Cecilia Hall,” he prayed. “Through the gift of Your eternal wisdom, grant that the undertaking that we begin today, for Your glory and our own well-being, progress day by day to a successful completion through Christ Our Lord.”

With the land thus prepared, Dr. McLean, Mr. and Mrs. Rawlinson, and Mrs. Robinson then ceremoniously turned over the first four shovelfuls of dirt, thereby launching the construction of St. Cecilia Hall. The crowd of students, tutors, and others who had gathered to witness the occasion cheered exuberantly, before moving “just a few feet to the east,” as Dr. McLean put it, to the Fritz B. and Gladys C. Burns Plaza for the dedication of the College’s new statue of St. Gladys.