Gopher Catholic and St. Lawrence Catholic Church and Newman Center hosted their second annual Spring Wine Social at Our Lady of Grace in Edina on April 5. A fundraiser for the Newman Center serving the Twin Cities campus of the University of Minnesota, the social raised nearly $56,000 in donations, totaling over $163,000 when including ticket sales and sponsorships. The money will help support the mission of discipleship at the Newman Center.
People in suits and dresses packed the school’s renovated gymnasium to hear from speakers Father Mike Schmitz, the director of youth and young adult ministry for the Diocese of Duluth, and Father Jake Anderson, the pastor of St. Lawrence and director of the Newman Center. Samuel Galvin and Maddie Mautino gave student testimonies.
Bishop Kevin Kenney offered an opening prayer, saying the gift universities can give is accepting young adults as they are and journeying with them to build their faith, to “continue to affirm them in who they are.”
“If you’ve been there (St. Lawrence Newman Center), it’s not the easiest place to get to,” Father Anderson told attendees. “Nobody just accidentally finds themselves there. It’s kind of like a little Nazareth. We’re only two blocks from (the Minneapolis) campus, but it’s almost easy to walk by, not knowing that Jesus Christ is truly present there.”
With over 50,000 students at the University of Minnesota, Father Anderson said the Newman Center is meant to be a warm, welcoming Nazareth for everyone, and a place of mission.
“There is nothing more powerful than seeing young people at this most decisive period in their life, coming away to the power of mission, the power of their identity in Christ,” Father Anderson said. “We are not created just to tread water through life. And in the words of St. John Henry Newman, God has created this for some definite purpose. It’s so beautiful to see hearts being formed and hearts being set on fire for that purpose-driven life in the power of Jesus.”
By the end of a student’s four years at the University of Minnesota, Father Anderson said he and staff at the St. Lawrence Newman Center want him or her to walk out the door living in the power of the Gospel, reflected in three ways: “A sacramental life, a virtuous life, and a spirit filled prayer life.”
“People kind of walk sagging like they don’t know their true baptismal identity,” Father Anderson said. “It’s so powerful to see students coming alive to the Gospel and community and actually, even physiologically, standing upright and saying, ‘I know who I am.’”
Father Anderson said what “God is doing in St. Lawrence” is a movement of the Holy Spirit by working together all the charisms into a singular mission.
In his talk, Father Schmitz stressed the importance of the Catholic Church reaching the hearts and souls of youth, and how the mission of St. Lawrence to challenge young Catholics aligns with God’s mission. He pointed to Gopher Catholic signs around the gym with the tagline “Be seen. Be challenged. Belong.” Gopher Catholic is a Catholic community at the university’s Minneapolis campus.
Current perspectives on Jesus’ love for humanity conflict with the reality of suffering, Father Schmitz explained. To people of antiquity, suffering came first, so Jesus’ salvation on the cross brought his love to people by enduring suffering with humanity. But in current times, Father Schmitz said, people have come to know “Jesus loves you” first, which is seemingly contradicted by suffering.
This, Father Schmitz said, creates tension in the relationships between people and God, in that some people will ask, “Why are you letting me suffer?”
“God doesn’t just want you to be happy,” Father Schmitz said. “He wants you to look like his son.”
Mautino, in her testimony, shared that during a time of great loneliness while at the University of Minnesota, she felt abandoned by God because she was suffering, and she wondered why a loving God would allow her to suffer.
“I was mad at God,” Mautino said. “I did not understand why I felt so abandoned in my struggles, so I turned my back on him, and I sought validation and happiness from people and things that only caused me harm. … I felt like I had to go to parties to be someone I was not, to fit in. In a room full of people, I felt alone, and I often felt like no one cared if I was around or not. These friendships were built on gossip and judgment, but in the heart of my loneliness, God shined a light.”
When walking through her dorm, she noticed a door was open. She went inside the room and saw the face of Jesus on the wall in the form of a painting. Her newfound friend, a young girl living in the same dorm whose room had the painting of Jesus, showed her that practicing religion was possible at a major university. Together, they went to Mass at the Newman Center.
Mautino, a class of 2026 student at the university, explained that she felt in that moment like the prodigal son.
“I was living a lost life filled with sin, but in my return to Mass, I had received a very clear message from the Lord that he wants to celebrate my return,” Mautino said. “He wants to claim me as his daughter. I just had to let him.”
After a few struggles along the way, Mautino said her faith blossomed at the Newman Center. She joined a women’s group that met every Thursday night. She joined a St. Paul’s Outreach household, which is a program for intentional living through community and daily prayer, and said she was shown “the depths of sisterhood” and “unconditional love.”
That support and love helped her navigate a difficult relationship with a boyfriend who didn’t value her faith, Mautino said.
Father Schmitz explained during his talk that people in the current culture tend to value faith for other people, but not on a personal level. Individually, he said, people tend to believe faith isn’t for them.
Father Schmitz’s main encouragement through the night was that St. Lawrence Newman Center, and other churches, seek to train parishioners to be ready to become martyrs, not in some distant land but here, in this country, by living the faith fervently. He commended St. Lawrence for not coddling its parishioners, but instead, as the signs said, challenging them.
The second student testimony began later in the night when Galvin, after taking the stage, jokingly gave a piece of advice to the audience: “When Joe Geiger (the director of development for Gopher Catholic) asks you to give a speech after Father Mike Schmitz, say no. Just say no.”
Galvin, a graduate with the University of Minnesota’s class of 2023, said he found his faith before he came to college, and after arriving at the university, he knew he wanted to continue pursuing his faith.
“I probably came in with a lot of pride as well because I thought, ‘I’ve got this figured out. I’m a good Catholic guy and my main motivation was (that) I wanted to get married,” Galvin said. “My dream was I’m going to go to the student center, and I’ll make some good friends. … I will meet a beautiful Catholic girl, and I’ll get married. To no surprise, that did not happen. I got to the University of Minnesota and frankly, I was immersed not in a relationship, but rather a beautiful community.”
Galvin’s friendships and the community he found at St. Lawrence pushed him to go deeper into his faith, primarily through small groups, he said. When he came to college, he had a mindset that he was going to find his own mission, rather than God’s mission for him.
“I found that what I was doing was telling the Lord what I wanted him to do,” Galvin said. “I wasn’t looking for the Lord’s mission. I was looking for my own mission. Those first two years that I spent at St. Lawrence (were) a really beautiful time. I started to spend more time in my relationship with Jesus and listen to what he had for me. And for me, that culminated in moments at the end of my sophomore year.”
While in prayer during his sophomore year, Galvin sacrificed his vocation to the Lord.
“I said, ‘Lord, I give my vocation to you,’” Galvin said. “‘You know what I want; I’ve made it abundantly clear. I accept whatever you desire for me.’ … And the Lord works in beautiful ways because two weeks later, I went back to school and I met my wife. I met her at a St. Lawrence event. I’m really indebted to St. Lawrence (Newman Center) for my vocation … for introducing me to my wife.”
Father Kevin Finnegan, the pastor of Our Lady of Grace, welcomed everyone to the school’s gymnasium. He said, “When we built this (gym), part of our intention was to allow for things like this, for our greater community. You’re bearing the fruit of many people who have worked hard.”
