Navigare is a School of Catholic Leadership when, after high school or college graduation, young men spend a year in Europe becoming Catholic leaders and men fully alive. As a gap year right after high school or after college, this International Program offers an opportunity to encounter European Catholic culture, devote time to prayer and adoration, and master a second language.
The great question of the year is: What will make my life beautiful and great? The answer will come little by little as we follow in the Master’s footprints while journeying together in friendship, exploring the beauty of European Catholic culture and following in the Master’s footprints. We hope to be “surprised by an encounter with Christ”; to experience that “there is nothing more beautiful than to know Him and to speak to others of our friendship with Him” (Benedict XVI); and to learn that only when we encounter Jesus Christ, do we become fully alive: our life receives “a new horizon and a decisive direction”. St. John Paul II gave this as his personal witness: “Looking back and remembering those years of my life, I can assure you that it is worthwhile dedicating oneself to the cause of Christ and, out of love for him, devoting oneself to serving humanity. It is worthwhile to give one's life for the Gospel and for one's brothers and sisters!” During this year, the students live with the community of the Disciples, verify their vocation, become bilingual in Spanish and English, and learn the virtues of leadership. In Latin, Navigare means “to sail” out into deep waters on an adventure with Christ. |
“Having thus been set over the administration and management of the grain trade,
Pompey sent out his agents and friends in various directions, while he himself sailed
to Sicily, Sardinia and Africa, and collected grain. When he was about to set sail with
it, there was a violent storm at sea, and the ship-captains hesitated to put out; but he
led the way on board and ordered them to weigh anchor, crying with a loud voice:
“Navigare necesse est; vivere necesse non est”: To sail is necessary; to live is not. By
this exercise of zeal and courage attended by good fortune, he filled the sea with
ships and the markets with grain, so that the excess of what he had provided
sufficed also for foreign peoples, and there was an abundant overflow, as from a
spring, for all.”
(Plutarch, The Parallel Lives: The Life of Pompei, 50)