Students, faculty, staff and community members alike are invited to take part in a recognition Friday, Jan. 24, of the life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.

For almost a quarter century, Bill Kriege has been a part of the spiritual journey for countless Rockhurst University students.

The J.E. and L.E. Mabee Foundation has given Rockhurst University a $900,000 challenge grant to fund the construction of a new campus chapel.

LaTisha Davis may have a business card that says Rockhurst University Director of Multicultural Belonging and Engagement, but her role can be simplified to one thing for students: She’s here to be your person if you need one.

Everyone needs a support system and to feel like they’re included, and before she was the University’s first director of the office, Davis was a first-generation student from a marginalized background trying to fit in at Wichita State University.

Rockhurst University will honor Alvin Brooks, longtime Kansas City leader in social justice and civil rights, with the establishment of the Alvin Brooks Center for Faith-Justice on campus. The center will house many of the university’s faith-justice related efforts, including a chapel, mission and ministry programs, and diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Work has begun to raise funds for the center and to identify a location and construction and design partners.

The next time you pass through Van Ackeren Hall, look up.

On the ceiling of what was formerly a mostly white entry way is a burst of blues and greens in the form of a new mural celebrating different faith traditions and the connections between them.

The new campus art is the result of a Faithfully Forward grant from the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, awarded to institutions in the hopes of celebrating religious diversity on the campuses of Catholic colleges.

“Why me, oh Lord?”

It’s a question Alvin Brooks said he has asked himself at different points throughout his life — in trying times and in moments of triumph. And it was one, he said, that he found himself asking again on Friday as Rockhurst University broke ground on a faith-justice center named in his honor. It was only recently that Brooks said he got an answer to the question, coming down the escalator after receiving the 2022 Henry W. Bloch Human Relations Award with his close friend, U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II.