Students in St. Bonaventure University’s prestigious Oxford program were part of a small but historic moment last week when student Alyssa Perkins delivered the opening blessing at the weekly banquet at Trinity College in an indigenous American language.

Perkins, an Inclusive Childhood and Early Childhood Education major from Salamanca, delivered the blessing in the Seneca language. She is a first descendant of the Seneca Nation.

At Trinity, the blessings offered before and after each meal are called graces.

“For the first time in 470 years of this university’s existence, the grace has been delivered in Seneca,” Mike Jones-Kelley, Oxford program director, said in remarks after the grace. “It might well be the first time the Trinity that grace has been given in any indigenous American language.”

Jones-Kelley has been a faculty member in the Jandoli School of Communication since 2008.

Tradition at Trinity College demands that the opening and closing graces be delivered in Latin. Although the Bonnies are very respectful of Oxford traditions, they chose this time to substitute their own affinity for the Seneca Nation and to acknowledge the ancestral Seneca lands on which the university resides.

In February, the university formally unveiled a Land Acknowledgment statement as part of continuing efforts to enhance its relationship with its neighbors in the Seneca Nation.

Among the special guests at the banquet were university President Dr. Jeff Gingerich and First Lady Betsy Gingerich.

St. Bonaventure’s Francis E. Kelley Oxford Program, unique among colleges and universities in Western New York and surrounding areas, allows St. Bonaventure students to take some of their required classes at Oxford.

About the University: The nation’s first Franciscan university, St. Bonaventure is a community committed to transforming the lives of its students inside and outside the classroom, inspiring in them a commitment to academic excellence and lifelong civic engagement. Out of 167 regional universities in the North, St. Bonaventure was ranked #6 for value and #14 for innovation by U.S. News and World Report (2024).