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It was an evening of looking back at Thomas Aquinas College’s earliest days and forward to a promising future Saturday, when nearly 200 alumni met for the annual Alumni Association Dinner on the Santa Paula campus.

The guest of honor for the occasion was Rev. Cornelius M. Buckley, S.J., a chaplain who has served the College with great fidelity, wisdom, and cheer for the last 11 years. “This event gives me the opportunity to say something I probably wouldn’t say otherwise, and that is how delightful I am to be here,” Fr. Buckley quipped, noting that when he arrived at the College in 2004, he expected to stay for only two years. “I am still here,” he continued. “I’ve had a very, very happy life, but these last few years have been really, as I like to say, the maraschino cherry on top of the very generous sherbet I have.”

Then, drawing upon the recent marriage vote in Ireland and ominous signs for the future of religious freedom in the United States, Fr. Buckley gave a thoughtful talk about the responsibilities of Thomas Aquinas College graduates, drawing upon the Second Vatican Council’s call for an engaged and active laity. “This institution was founded by laymen who realized at the time the terrible situation in which our country existed,” said Fr. Buckley. “And this institution is the living proof that the laity took the words of Vatican II to heart and used them, at least in this situation, to concretize what was the ideal of the Council fathers.”

The Alumni Association additionally used the evening to honor two classes, the Class of 2005, which was celebrating its 10th reunion, and the College’s first graduates, the Class of 1975, who were celebrating their 40th. “It’s hard to imagine, but they came to a school that didn’t exist,” said Peter L. DeLuca, one of the College’s founders and its vice president for finance and administration, of the Class of 1975. “There were buildings there,” he added, “but there were no Sophomores, no Juniors, no Seniors, no upperclassmen.” Yet despite the long odds, the Class persevered, and its graduation, he said, quoting the College's late founding president, Dr. Ronald P. McArthur, marked “a major milestone in the history of the College,” and provided “a true sense of accomplishment to all who have made sacrifices that this institution might come into being.”