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Americans
have elevated speed and brevity to an art form. We want our food to
be fast and our telecommunications to be instantaneous. Even the word
"millisecond," no one's surprise, is part of our language. La Salle University's coat of arms possesses a simple elegance. The shield is appropriately divided into quarters by a cross, as befits a university in the Catholic tradition. The first quarter displays a star which comes from the insignia of the De La Salle Christian Brothers, who founded La Salle College in 1863 together with Bishop (later Archbishop) James f. Wood of Philadelphia. The Founder of the Christian Brothers, St. John Baptist de La Salle, exhorted his followers to be people of Faith. The Spirit of Faith, symbolized by a star, is one of the principal hallmarks of the Brothers. In his meditation for the feast of the epiphany (traditionally, twelve days after Christmas), St. John Baptist de La Salle found powerful symbolism in the star of Bethlehem in which the magi had put so much faith and trust as they searched for the infant Jesus. The star, then identifies La Salle University as rooted in the educational tradition and mission of the Christian Brothers. Incidentally, a star is also part of the coat of arms of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. St. John Baptist de La Salle himself was born into a family of comfortable wealth in France in 1651. As biographies of him began to be developed in the nineteenth century, many of the authors mistakenly connected De La Salle with noble families of the same name. All of the noble families surnamed De La Salle utilized coats of arms, which portrayed three broken chevrons. La Salle University's shield retains a single broken chevron to remind the viewer of its namesake. De La Salle, canonized in 1900, was proclaimed as the patron saint of all teachers in 1950 by Pope Pius XII. With this background in mind, William F. J. Ryan, an authority on heraldry who was based in New York City, was commissioned to redesign the coat of arms of La Salle College (now University). His work, adopted in 1965, reveals a cross, a star, and a chevron. The helmet above the shield recalls that knights of old were prompt in their defense of the Church and of Christian morality. The University's motto, "Virtus Scientia," is translated "Virtue and Knowledge." La Salle University's blue and gold colors can very conceivable by traced to the coat of arms of various noble De La Salle families. For example, Armand Ravelet, a prominent nineteenth century biographer of St. John Baptist de La Salle, specifically describes the gold chevrons on a blue background. The earliest known reference to "blue and gold" at La Salle appears in a description of its 1895 Commencement ceremony at Philadelphia's Grand Opera House, where blue and gold bunting hung from the boxes, in the center [sic] of which appeared shields of the same hues bearing the letters "L.S.C." From the balcony lights hung trailing plants, while above floated pennants in the college colors. Our La Salle University symbols live on to inform and to inspire all of today's Explorers that they are an important part of something much larger than themselves. Brother Joseph
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