Senior Reflections: The Best Beginning

By Jack Gardner (CA’24)
Moscow, Pennsylvania

Growing up the second of 11 homeschooled children in a busy and crowded house, I never thought much about TAC. I just saw it as my parents’ alma mater. During my sophomore year of high school, my older brother, Dominic, visited the California campus. He fell in love with the classes and Discussion Method. I did not share his enthusiasm. 

I had no interest in drudging through dusty old tomes and reading Latin and studying things that had no bearing on “real life.” I applied instead for dual-enrollment classes of business at a local community college, fully expecting to go from high school to a business program. God, however, had other plans. 

My brother was, and still is, my best friend, and so soon I was on a plane to pay him and TAC a visit. Surprise, surprise, I fell in love, too. 

The classes were wildly different from what I had expected. The first one I attended was Junior Philosophy. The students were just beginning Book 8 of the Ethics and were engaged in an enthusiastic discussion about friendship. After a few minutes I was on the edge of my seat, fully absorbed in the conversation. At several moments I had to catch myself to keep from jumping into the discussion! 

That Ethics class stands out in my mind to this day, but every class I visited captured my interest and attention in a similar way. For the next three days, I sat in on all the classes I could, swept up in Freshman Theology and bewildered but fascinated by Senior Philosophy. And, just like they say in the brochures, the conversations continued after the classes. Everywhere I went, students welcomed me, asked me where I was from, why I was here, and what I thought of the College. They were so excited to hear my story and share theirs. 

“Once you have seen the account of sensation given by Aristotle in De Anima and struggled with the compelling and opposing account of Kant, you must take a side. It affects your outlook on the meaning of the world around you.”

Through these interactions, I made two important realizations. First, philosophy, theology, and everything else in the College’s program of Catholic liberal education were nothing at all like I had thought. The books were old, but they were far from boring and dusty. Rather, even in that brief visit, I glimpsed a peek at the way that liberal education influences every aspect of life by forming the hearts and minds of those who take it seriously. Second, the College was not only for people who “loved school,” it was for anyone who is interested in truly understanding God, the world, and the people in it. I may not have loved the boring and repetitive math and science of high school, but without even knowing it, I had always been looking for an education like TAC’s. 

Now, as a student, my experience at the College is much the same. Reflecting back on these four years, full of the countless memories, challenges, and amazing experiences that have shaped me in such a short time, I find it difficult to capture the deep and hopefully lasting impression that the College has made on me. 

Once you start to learn and appreciate the wisdom of the authors of the Great Books, whether they were right or wrong, you cannot go back to a life uninformed by their words. For example, once you have seen the account of sensation given by Aristotle in De Anima and struggled with the compelling and opposing account of Kant, you must take a side. It affects your outlook on the meaning of the world around you. 

Then there is the spiritual life of the College. With four Masses, Adoration, and the Rosary offered daily, students have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make Catholic worship a constant presence in their days. In all things, but especially in our scholastic pursuits, the constant reminder of the Ultimate Cause of all goodness, meaning, and truth helps direct our endeavors. 

My adult life is still just beginning, but I know that my time here has prepared me better, spiritually and mentally, than many more years of experience elsewhere could have. I am excited to go out in the world, get a job, and hopefully start a family, but I will always look back at my time here as the best beginning I could have ever made.