Date: May 10, 2024 Time: 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM Chapel of Our Lady of Grace

This year's Baccalaureate Mass celebrating the University's graduating class will be held in our campus chapel.  

History of This Catholic Tradition

The precise origins of this tradition are lost to history. However, it is believed the Baccalaureate Service originated at Oxford University in 1432 when each bachelor was required to deliver a sermon in Latin as part of their academic exercise. Since the earliest universities in this country were founded primarily to educate ministers, the British practice of the Baccalaureate Service was continued. Not surprisingly, Roman Catholic secondary schools and higher education institutions placed the Baccalaureate within the context of the Mass.

Briar Cliff's Baccalaureate Mass

During our Baccalaureate Mass, we ask for God’s blessing upon the graduates, as the community sends them forth with all they have learned from this sacred hill. Our students have completed an immense amount of work, and have encountered and triumphed over countless academic, social, financial, and other challenges. They have made lifelong friends, met future spouses, grown in their faith, and have come to a deeper understanding of who they are and what their calling in life is. This Mass is an opportunity for faculty and staff, friends, family, and all of whom have given their very best in helping to guide them along their journeys, to come together and celebrate the graduates and all they have accomplished.

Participations Instructions

• All graduate and alumni are invited to write names of deceased relatives in the Book of Life in the Campus Ministry Office (on the first floor of Heelan Hall) to be remembered during the liturgy. 
• At 6:30 PM, we ask all graduates intending to participate to arrive in their gown (no caps) and report discreetly to the atrium so we can prepare to process in as mass begins.