President’s Letter Archive:
Seeing Suffering Not as a Barrier but as a Passageway to God
The Thomas Fire and Montecito mudslides give us an opportunity to talk about how we respond to circumstances like these, which have devastated our community. How can we, as followers of God and disciples of Jesus Christ, be great... Read More
The Great Journey: A Quest to Find the Way of Life
One of my favorite writers, the great American novelist Walker Percy, talks about dreams and ambitions that get derailed by personal choices, and the long, slow road we must follow to recover. His books reflect themes such as longing... Read More
Learning to Welcome Adversity in Life
Our chapel program focused on the theme Gratitude and Grit last spring, and I spent some time thinking about what it takes to develop grit, or the capacity to overcome obstacles and setbacks in life. How does God use... Read More
Balancing Active Engagement with Prayer and Contemplation
By President Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D. I consider Gregory the Great (540-604) an intellectual and spiritual friend who helped me understand how to be a highly active person and also contemplative. During college, I became increasingly frustrated with my... Read More
Helping Students Develop Moral Vision
By President Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D. What gives a person moral vision? How does someone develop the capacity to look at a situation and suddenly see it differently? Reading two books by Muhammad Yunus, a recipient of the Nobel... Read More
A Charge to the Graduates of the Class of 2013
Delivered at Commencement May 4, 2013 By President Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D. Your class verse is from Proverbs 19:21, “Many are the plans in a human heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” Proverbs is one of... Read More
Corot: The Man Behind the Masterpiece
by Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D., President Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, the most important landscape painter in France in the late 19th century, inspired a new generation of French landscape artists. Although he never officially lived in Barbizon, a small town in... Read More
Living Well Means Dealing with Life’s Great Regrets
by Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D., President I grew up in a church my parents started in 1951 with two other lay couples. In that congregation, those who committed their life to Christ or confessed faith publicly were put under... Read More
Training Our Brains and Our Hearts to Overcome Envy
by Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D., President As humans, we face a tension between envy and contentment. We get preoccupied with comparing ourselves to others, which ruins how we celebrate and enjoy the gifts God has given us. One of my... Read More
How Faith and Prayer Benefit the Brain
by Gayle D. Beebe, Ph.D., President Evagrius, a great saint of the fourth century, aspired to honor God and give his life to great purposes. In the last issue, I talked about the eight deadly thoughts he identified that... Read More