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Over the past weekend the alumni of Thomas Aquinas College came out in force to support their alma mater for the Third Annual Alumni Days of Giving — boosting their giving by 19.1 percent from the previous year and helping to raise $111,941 in just two days.

On Tuesday, in between Don Rags sessions, students at Thomas Aquinas College, California, made their way to St. Augustine Hall for the semi-annual campus blood drive. United Blood Service set up a makeshift clinic in one of the classrooms, and donors dropped by throughout the day.

Each fall, during the mid-semester break for Don Rags, the students of Thomas Aquinas College host an Open-Mic Night to showcase their musical talents. On Wednesday night, the event took place on both campuses. In New England (above) the concert was held in Gould Hall, and in California (below), St. Joseph Commons.

Last weekend Meany Gymnasium hosted the championship games in this year’s intramural basketball tournament on the New England campus.

In the men’s tournament, the team captained by Ignatius Ifenuk (’22) bested the one led by Tony Burkhard (’23) 2-1 in the best-of-three-game series. In the women’s championship, sophomore Margaret Short’s team swept classmate Fiona Mohun’s squad in two straight games.

Writing in First Things, George Weigel — biographer of Pope Saint John Paul II and a distinguished senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center — laments the current state of architecture, while praising a building which, he says, represents a hopeful countertrend. That building? Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel on the California campus of Thomas Aquinas College:

For the first time last Friday night, the students of Thomas Aquinas College, New England, participated in the Lenten practice of praying the Stations of the Cross in Our Mother of Perpetual Help Chapel. Their devotion was made possible thanks to the installation of 14 hand-painted stations — scenes depicting the passion and death of Christ — that now line the Chapel walls. Like their counterparts on the California campus, the New England stations have a noble history and reflect the role of Providence in the life of Thomas Aquinas College.

Amid rising concerns about the spread of a novel coronavirus, COVID-19, and its possible effects, Thomas Aquinas College has notified both California and New England students — as well as their parents — about the status of the disease, the situation on their respective campuses, and the steps the College is taking to reduce the threat of contamination.

“Based on the witness of several TAC graduates, and a strong belief in the vision of the College’s founders, we sent our oldest son, John (’18), to Thomas Aquinas College, sight unseen,” says John J. Guinee, the newest member of the College’s Board of Governors. “Soon, three more of our 10 children — Caroline (’20), Joseph (’21), and Michael (’23) — followed.

Below are photos from this afternoon’s Ash Wednesday Mass, attended by sudents, tutors, and their families in Our Mother of Perpetual Help Chapel on the New England campus …

… and photos from the midday Mass in Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel in California: