News

On Sunday, Oct. 5 neighboring collegiate marching bands will join together for the first annual New England Collegiate Marching Band Festival. The festival is a new performance opportunity for collegiate marching bands to come together and perform their fall field productions without the added stressors that accompany a football game or high school competition. Gates will open at 11 a.m., and the festival will begin at 12 p.m. on Fitton Field. The event is free and open to the public.

Marching bands exist to entertain crowds both with their spirit and their musical talents. With that in mind, the festival hopes to focus on the overall experience each of the marching bands brings to their stadiums and arenas.

A local parade band will kick off the festival at 12 p.m. with the National Anthem, followed by 20 minute performances by each of the participating schools. Upon finishing their performance, band members will enter the stands to watch the remaining performances and cheer on their musical colleagues.

In addition, all profits raised from sale of concessions, 50/50 raffles, program books, t-shirts, and from donation bins will be split with each band that performs.

The 10 college bands slated to perform include the Boston College “Screaming Eagles” Marching Band, Boston University Marching Band, Bowie State Symphony of Soul Marching Band, Central Connecticut State University Blue Devil Marching Band, College of the Holy Cross “Goodtime” Marching Band, Marist College Red Fox Marching Band, Sacred Heart University Pioneer Marching Band, University of Connecticut Marching Band, University of Massachusetts Lowell River Hawks Marching Band, University of New Hampshire Wildcat Marching Band, and University of New Haven Chargers Marching Band.

The Working for Worcester project, the Worcester Student Government Association (WSGA), and the Holy Cross Running Club present the first annual School Year Kick-Off 5K Run on Saturday, Oct. 4 at 9 a.m., starting in Hogan Campus Center Courtyard. The event hopes to bring Worcester college students and the local community together in order to promote community wellness, celebrate the beginning of the 2014-15 school year, and raise money for Working for Worcester project.

Beginning at 9 a.m., the event features a pre-race registration/rally with live music, free breakfast for runners and spectators, and a brief presentation by city leaders and student organizers, followed by the start of the race at 10 a.m., taking a course through the Holy Cross campus.

Fee for runners is $15 ($10 for students with valid Worcester College ID). All proceeds from the event go to the Working for Worcester spring service day, which sends out thousands of volunteers to build new playgrounds, schoolyards, and parks in one giant day of community service.

Working for Worcester is excited to introduce its first sports and wellness community event to support our mission of enhancing sports and wellness opportunities for children and families across underdeveloped neighborhoods in Worcester.

The project is citywide partnership of student organizations, local businesses, academic institutions, city government, and community groups to build and renovate youth recreation spaces across the city. In its first two years, the project has mobilized more than 1,600 volunteers and raised and invested $175,000 in community spaces. The project founder Jeffrey Reppucci ’14 received the Key to the City in 2014 from the Worcester Mayor’s Office and it has been featured on the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams.

The WSGA aims to discover the interests of “the student” who exists across all college campuses in Worcester. With that understanding, the WSGA will aim to speak on behalf of those interests and increase student engagement to levels unprecedented. WSGA bridges the many Worcester colleges together and helps to host events intended to foster cooperation between schools.

The Holy Cross Running Club is a social-minded exercise group, open to runners of all speeds and abilities and based on the hilly slopes of Mt. Saint James. Dedicated to improving the fitness of its members in a fun, stress-free environment, the group strives to uphold the athletic and social ideals typical of the Holy Cross community at large.

Read more on the NBC Nightly News showcase of W4W

For more information on W4W, please visit: www.workingforworcester.com

For more information on the WSGA, please visit: www.worcestersga.org

For more information on the Holy Cross Running Club, please visit: https://www.facebook.com/groups/170285229828077/

Additional information on W4W can be directed to: info@workingforworcester.com

Former NBA player and author of “Basketball Junkie” Chris Herren will share his story of recovery on Tuesday, Oct. 7 at 7:30 p.m. in the Hart Center at the College of the Holy Cross.  The event is free and open to the public.

A former NBA player, Herren was a high school basketball legend from Fall River, Mass., who realized his lifelong dream of playing for the Boston Celtics only to lose it all to alcohol and drug addiction. Sober since August 1, 2008, he has refocused his life to put his sobriety and family above all else.

He shares his harrowing story of abuse and recovery in his memoir, “Basketball Junkie” (St. Martin’s Press, 2011),  as well as in numerous interviews throughout the ESPN documentary “Unguarded,” of which he is the subject. In June of 2009, he launched Hoop Dreams with Chris Herren, a basketball player development company that offers basketball training, camps, and clinics to top basketball prospects in New England.

Off the court, Herren continues to share his story with audiences in the hopes of reaching just one person and making a difference in his or her life. In inspiring presentations, he draws on his own history to convince audiences that it is never too late to follow your dreams and urges audience members to overcome their setbacks and start making the right choices. To support this vision, he founded The Herren Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing assistance to families affected by addiction. In 2012, The Herren Project launched a national anti-substance abuse campaign, Project Purple, to encourage people of all ages to stand up to substance abuse.

The 6’2” guard scored 2,073 career points while at Durfee High School and was a Boston Globe and Gatorade player of the year and was named to the McDonald’s All-American Team in 1994. Recruited by the top Division 1 programs in the country, Herren chose Boston College only to break his wrist during his first collegiate game. Sidelined by his injury, Herren failed several drug tests and left Boston College. Picked up by Fresno State and legendary coach Jerry Tarkanian, Herren went on to lead the WAC and nation in assists and steals, and was named to the all-WAC first team in 1996 and 1997.

Herren was drafted in the 2nd round (4th pick, 33rd overall) of the 1999 NBA Draft by the Denver Nuggets. He played one year with the Nuggets seeing action in 45 games prior to being traded to the Boston Celtics in 2000. As a Celtic Herren had a career-high 18 points against Dallas, only to suffer a season-ending injury. After being released from the Celtics, he played basketball overseas in five countries, Italy, Poland, Turkey, China, and Iran.

The event is sponsored by numerous departments on campus including athletics, the president office, student affairs, student development services, and the Student Government Association.

Vern Bengtson, faculty research associate with the Edward R. Roybal Institute on Aging at the University of Southern California, will give a lecture titled “Millennials, Parents and Grandparents: Are families still passing on the faith?” at the College of the Holy Cross on Thursday, Oct. 2, 2014 at 7:30 p.m. in the Rehm Library. The lecture, presented by the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture, is free and open to the public.

In the largest-ever study of religion and family across generations, Bengtson and his colleagues followed more than 350 families for nearly four decades to find out how religion is, or is not, passed down from one generation to the next. His findings were published in the 2013 book, “Families and Faith: Generations and the Transmissions of Religion” (Oxford University Press).

“From the media as well as from religious leaders, we frequently hear messages that families are in a precarious position and that young adults are increasingly leaving the faith of their parents. Is this true?” Bengtson asks. “The results [of the study] suggest that the ‘faith generation gap’ is a myth, and that most churches are woefully blind to the opportunities and challenges of intergenerational ministry.”

Bengtson is the former AARP/University Chair in Gerontology at USC, past president of the Gerontological Society of America and a MERIT awardee from the National Institutes of Health. He has published 17 books and 260 research papers on gerontology, theories of aging, sociology of aging and family sociology.

The lecture at Holy Cross is his only East Coast appearance.

Bengtson’s talk is the first of two Deitchman Family Lectures on Religion and Modernity this month exploring the theme of “Keeping, Changing and Choosing Religious Faith.” On Thursday, Oct. 23, at 7:30 p.m., Wake Forest sociologist David Yamane will give a lecture titled “Why do people become Catholic?” Yamane contends that while the focus is generally on Americans leaving the faith, there are a significant number of adults converting to Catholicism.

To learn more about these events and to find lectures online, visit www.holycross.edu/mcfarlandcenter.

About the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture:

Established in 2001 and housed in Smith Hall, the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture provides resources for faculty and course development, sponsors conferences and college-wide teaching events, hosts visiting fellows, and coordinates a number of campus lecture series. Rooted in the College’s commitment to invite conversation about basic human questions, the McFarland Center welcomes persons of all faiths and seeks to foster dialogue that acknowledges and respects differences, providing a forum for intellectual exchange that is interreligious, interdisciplinary, intercultural, and international in scope.  The McFarland Center also brings members of the Holy Cross community into conversation with the Greater Worcester community, the academic community, and the wider world to examine the role of faith and inquiry in higher education and in the larger culture.

Renowned religious leader, Rabbi Eric Yoffie will return to his native Worcester to present a lecture on American Judaism at the College of the Holy Cross on Monday, Oct. 6 at 7:30 p.m. in the Rehm Library. His lecture, titled “Understanding American Jews: demographically complicated, religiously diverse, stronger than ever, and still at risk,” is free and open to the public.

As a worldwide influential writer and lecturer, Rabbi Yoffie speaks to both religious and general audiences on Israel and the Middle East, interfaith relations, social justice, religious and political leadership, American religious life and American Jewish life. He is president emeritus of the Union for Reform Judaism, representing 1.5 million Reform Jews in the United States and Canada, after completing a 16-year term as president. Currently, he writes regularly for The Huffington Post, The Jerusalem Post and Haaretz, and is often quoted in the general and Jewish press.

Rabbi Yoffie has been a pioneer in interfaith relations and launched movement-wide dialogue programs with both Christians and Muslims. He was the first Jew to address the Church-wide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, the first rabbi to address the students and faculty of the Rev. Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University, and the first major Jewish leader to speak at the convention of the Islamic Society of North America.

Rabbi Yoffie was raised in Worcester, where his family belonged to Temple Emanuel Sinai. He is a graduate of Brandeis University and was ordained at Hebrew Union College in New York in 1974.

The lecture is sponsored by the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture at Holy Cross, as well as the Worcester Jewish Community Center, the Jewish Federation of Central Massachusetts, and Temple Emanuel Sinai.

Learn more and watch lectures online at www.holycross.edu/mcfarlandcenter.

About the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture:

Established in 2001 and housed in Smith Hall, the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture provides resources for faculty and course development, sponsors conferences and college-wide teaching events, hosts visiting fellows, and coordinates a number of campus lecture series. Rooted in the College’s commitment to invite conversation about basic human questions, the Center welcomes persons of all faiths and seeks to foster dialogue that acknowledges and respects differences, providing a forum for intellectual exchange that is interreligious, interdisciplinary, intercultural, and international in scope.  The Center also brings members of the Holy Cross community into conversation with the Greater Worcester community, the academic community, and the wider world.