Franciscan Center for Social Concern

The Franciscan Center for Social Concern seeks to encourage in all members of the University community a yearning for justice and peace, a greater respect for life, and a deeper reverence for creation.

The journey begins with serving others, but also includes reflecting on that experience in the light of faith, integrating it with our studies, and becoming agents for positive change.

We trust that such a journey will change lives, transform our campus, and create a better world.

The center’s aim is fourfold:

1. Promote Direct Service: To be more directly and personally involved with members of the local community who are in need or who suffer from some form of injustice, and to join in regional efforts to address social and environmental concerns;
2. Education: To help foster a consciousness that focuses on the human and spiritual needs of all people, that evokes compassion for those in need, and that instills in people a greater sense of responsibility and an urgency to right wrongs;
3. Advocacy: To help bring about structural changes that lead to a more just society and church, to stand with those struggling to reclaim their dignity or rights, and to take public stands on matters of justice and peace. It is a journey that begins at St. Bonaventure with an examination of our own local circumstances and striving to thoughtfully reach out to those in need.
4. Social Entrepreneurship: To play the role of change agents in the social sector by:
   1. adopting a mission to create and sustain social value;
   2. recognizing and relentlessly pursuing new opportunities and learning;
   3. engaging in a process of continuous innovation, adaptation and learning;
   4. acting boldly without being limited by resources currently in hand;
   5. exhibiting heightened accountability to the constituencies served and for the outcomes created