Sustaining Academic Excellence; Achieving Ecological Welfare1

Equally worrying is the ecological question which accompanies the problem of consumerism and which is closely connected to it. In his desire to have and to enjoy rather than to be and to grow, man consumes the resources of the earth and his own life in an excessive and disordered way. At the root of the senseless destruction of the natural environment lies an anthropological error, which unfortunately is widespread in our day. Man, who discovers his capacity to transform and in a certain sense create the world through his own work, forgets that this is always based on God's prior and original gift of the things that are. Man thinks that he can make arbitrary use of the earth, subjecting it without restraint to his will, as though it did not have its own requisites and a prior God-given purpose, which man can indeed develop but must not betray. Instead of carrying out his role as a co-operator with God in the work of creation, man sets himself up in place of God and thus ends up provoking a rebellion on the part of nature, which is more tyrannized than governed by him. ---Ioannes Paulus PP. II, Centesimus Annus
2

The divinely inspired words of the Blessed Pope John Paul II, serving as our epigraph, stir us because of its timelessness and startle us because of its timeliness. Nowadays, we are witness to humanitys unhindered hubris. As our knowledge unlocks the secrets of the cosmos as well as the quantum world, anthropocentrism3 riots in our homo sapient hearts and minds and we tend to forget that we are just one of the infinite species living in this infinite universe created by an infinite Creator. Anthropocentrism drives humanity into a raging contradiction: on the one hand, rationality in the form of erudition and scholarship, and on the other hand, irrationality in the form of extensive and senseless destruction of the natural environment leading inevitably to extinction. Thus, human knowledge unguided by the Gods infinite wisdom is restlessand could only find peace at the bosom of its Creator4. Father Saturnino Urios University (FSUU) since its founding in 1901 as a layempowered, Filipino, Catholic, non-profit, non-stock, diocesan educational institution, has steadfastly sustained academic excellence while actively engaging in developmental work and other community-based advocacies. In fact, both FSUUs academic and social justice endeavors are well-recognized not only locally and nationally, but also internationally5. Our institutions advocacy to protect and preserve the Taguibo Watershed affirms the Urians Christian particularity6. The establishment of the Save Taguibo Watershed Network (STWN), with FSUU serving as its consolidating core, thrust every Urian into the forefront of ecological advocacy in the region7. Here in Caraga ---the poorest region in the country yet touted as a mineral and timber capital--- our stand against extractive industries that destroy the environment must be unshakeable. By addressing pressing environmental concerns, FSUU effectively executes its dual duty of sustaining academic excellence and achieving ecological welfare. Verily, this school year 2013 2014 will serve as the coming of age of our Urian commitment to be co-operators with God in the work of creation.

End Notes:
1

This is Father Saturnino Urios Universitys (FSUU) institutional theme for School Year 2012-2013 per Memorandum No. 001, SY 2012-2013 issued by Rev. Fr. John Christian U. Young, University President.
2

Centesimus Annus (which is Latin for "hundredth year") was an encyclical written by Pope John Paul II in 1991, on the hundredth anniversary of Rerum Novarum. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centesimus_Annus.
3

Anthropocentrism describes an analysis from the perspective that human beings are the central, only or most significant animal species, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective. The term can be used interchangeably with humanocentrism, while the first concept can also be referred to as human supremacy. Anthropocentrism is a major concept in the field of environmental ethics and environmental philosophy, where it is often considered to be the root cause of problems created by human interaction with the environment, however; it is profoundly embedded in our culture and conscious acts. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropocentrism.
4

This is with clear reference to the famous passage from St. Augustine's Confessions in which Saint Augustine states "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you."
5

The Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) and the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) ranked FSUU as number 14 among the Top 20 Colleges and Universities in the country in 2005. And just very recently, in 2011, the Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) ranking of Asian universities recognized FSUU as among the top 200+ universities in Asia.
6

See Bibo Ergo Sum: Theo-Social Reflections of the Taguibo Watershed Advocacy by Fr. Randy J.C. Odchigue, in Hapg : A Journal of Interdisciplinary Theological Research, St. Vincent School of theology and Adamson University, at 71-90, Volume 7, No. 1 (2010).
7

In fact, FSUU recently spearheaded the establishment of the Caraga Convergence of Conscience for Environmental Concerns or CARAGA CONCERNS last May 15, 2012.