News Detail

Heartfelt Congratulations to the Class of 2024

5/20/2024

The 76th Brophy Commencement was held on May 18 in Robson Gymnasium to a resounding crowd of family, friends, Brophy faculty and administrators, and 300-plus graduates of the Brophy Class of 2024. Their achievements have contributed meaningfully to the legacy of Brophy College Preparatory. Their class motto, “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity,” was evident throughout the ceremony and lives on as they embark on this new chapter in their lives as Brophy alumni. In the prologue of the Brophy Commencement program, Andrew Rau '02, assistant principal for Ministry, wrote:

Four years ago, it was hard to make friends. The Class of 2024 was the first and only class to begin their Brophy career remotely via their computers rather than on campus. The sorts of side conversations and random encounters between classes or during lunch that so often spark friendships simply were not able to happen in the opening weeks of the fall of 2020. But as our school navigated these challenges and got back to in-person learning, a small miracle happened: The Class of 2024 befriended each other quickly, and deeply. And in the years since – during a time when much discussion has been given to pandemic-related deficits in social connection – this group of Brophy students has demonstrated not a deficit but an abundance of connection, compassion and love for one another.

The motto of the Class of 2024 – “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity” – comes from a section of the Book of Proverbs that focuses on living wisely in the midst of life’s uncertainties and shifting fortunes. There can be no more fitting embodiment of this class’ spirit than these words traditionally ascribed to King Solomon. While their friendships formed early, their love came out most when times got tough. The adversities they faced – both together as a community and each in his own personal life – transformed these childlike friends into something more: They became brothers. Through triumphs and tragedies, they came together, supported one another, and developed a sense of mutual support that gave a feeling of family to their day-to-day Brophy experience.

It is this brotherhood between them that we celebrate today because, more than any academic lessons they might have learned, it is the sense of connection and belonging they have found here, with each other, that will give them the firm foundation they will need to move steadily forward into their promising futures. These young men will be no strangers to adversity when they meet it again in college, in their careers, and wherever else life may take them. And they will know how to face it because they did it here first, at Brophy, with their brothers of the Class of 2024.

May God bless them as they go forth into the world to love and serve others as they have loved and served one another.