Boston College formally inaugurated John T. Butler, S.J., as its 26th president on Friday 16 October, according to the university’s news office, which described the ceremony in the Conte Forum as the crowning event of a three-day celebration that began with academic symposia on 15 October. The Boston Globe and the student newspaper The Heights also reported the inauguration of Fr Butler as the 26th president.
Symbols of Office and a Familiar Face
Fr Butler received the presidential medallion, the academic mace and a copy of the university’s original charter. He took over the presidency on 31 July from William P. Leahy, S.J., who is now president emeritus, and the university says Fr Leahy’s own inauguration took place almost 30 years ago to the day. Fr Butler has worked at Boston College since 2002, most recently as Haub Vice President for University Mission and Ministry before becoming president-elect in 2025. “I’ve been at this university for one-third of my life,” he said, thanking the community that, in his words, formed him.
Cardinal Seán O’Malley gave welcoming remarks, and greetings came from the chair of the trustees, Travis Rhodes, students, staff and faculty, and academic figures including Harvard’s Nicholas Burns, Wellesley College President Paula Johnson and University of Massachusetts President Marty Meehan. Archbishop Richard Henning gave the benediction and celebrated the Inauguration Mass earlier that day.
An Address on Formative Education
In his remarks Fr Butler acknowledged pressures facing universities, naming rising costs, a shrinking college-age population, anxiety over artificial intelligence and disorder in collegiate athletics. Higher education has always had to adapt, he said, but should not be “reinvented”. He held up formative education, which combines intellectual, professional, personal and spiritual development, as the centrepiece of Jesuit, Catholic institutions, and described how it helped him as someone who struggled with dyslexia.
He called for the university to keep refining formative education and to integrate it more fully into the liberal arts curriculum, and said Boston College should acknowledge that it is an undergraduate university with select graduate programmes. He also urged American universities to see their shared strengths rather than only their rivalries. “We are in it together,” he said, according to the university.
Why It Matters
An inauguration is largely ceremony, but the address sets out priorities that students, faculty and donors can hold the new president to: sharpening formative education, focusing on undergraduates and staying firm on Jesuit identity while the sector deals with money, demographic and technology pressures. The aims described here come from Fr Butler’s own address as relayed by the university, so how they turn into policy will be the better test in the months ahead.
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