2026 Baccalaureate Commencement Speaker and Honorary Degree Recipients

Dear Seton Hall Community,

I am very pleased to announce the keynote speaker and honorary degree recipient for this year’s Baccalaureate Commencement.

Giving the keynote address will be bestselling author Arthur C. Brooks, Ph.D., who recently published The Meaning of Your Life: Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness. Professor Brooks is a leader in the movement to increase personal happiness and fulfillment.

Since 2019, he has served as the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Nonprofit and Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School, and at the Harvard Business School as a Professor of Management Practice and Faculty Fellow. Prior to that, he served as the 11th president of the American Enterprise Institute.

His other books include Build the Life You Want (2023) with Oprah Winfrey; From Strength to Strength (2022); and Love Your Enemies (2019).

Professor Brooks converted to Catholicism after experiencing a profound encounter with the Blessed Virgin Mary at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico. He incorporates his religious practice — which includes daily Mass and praying the Rosary — into his approach to human flourishing.

He will be joined on the dais by Seton Hall’s 2026 honorary degree recipient, Diane M. Foley, president and founder of the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation.

A retired family nurse practitioner, her oldest son, conflict journalist James Wright Foley, was killed by ISIS in 2014 for being an American reporter and a Christian.

After his murder, she was inspired by Jim’s moral courage and the Holy Spirit to establish the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation, which advocates for U.S. nationals taken captive abroad and works to safeguard journalists.

Ms. Foley has raised awareness of international hostage-taking and wrongful detention through the award-winning documentary Jim: The James Foley Story and essays in The New York Times, The Washington Post and USA Today. In addition, she participated in the National Counterterrorism Center’s hostage review, which overhauled America’s hostage policy.

In 2024, she co-authored the book American Mother with Irish American author Colum McCann and is active in her parish of St. Katherine Drexel in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire.

Seton Hall’s graduating class and their families are indeed fortunate to have such luminaries to grace their Commencement. I look forward to the wisdom and insight that will mark the ceremony on Monday, May 18.

Sincerely,

Erik Lillquist, J.D.
Interim Provost and Executive Vice President

Categories: Education