The Universidade Católica Portuguesa (UCP) honoured Archbishop Manuel Clemente, Patriarch Emeritus and Chancellor of the university for 10 years, at a ceremony held on 23 January in Lisbon, the day after he celebrated the 25th anniversary of his episcopal ordination.
The former Chancellor, who was also a teacher and student at UCP, began by emphasising his 50-year connection with the university, recalling: “my academic vocation ended up being linked to my pastoral vocation, which took precedence over everything else.”
For the current Patriarch of Lisbon, Mgr Rui Valério, Mgr Manuel Clemente has a “profound ecclesial sense” and is “a bridge builder who promotes the opening up of the Faith with Culture, of the Church with society”. He concluded by stating that “Mgr Manuel Clemente continues to look at things, facts, people and events with the gaze of Christ”.
The President of UCP, Isabel Capeloa Gil, thanked “the close leadership, the unwavering defence and the trust that Bishop Manuel Clemente has placed in our institution”.
“In these 10 years at Católica, his temporal purpose has made history. The long expectation that the university was, is now a platform of Hope for the future. And part of this future is the legacy of the Patriarch Emeritus with his universalist and indeed timeless vision of infinite dialogue between knowledge, people and geographies”, said the Rector.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, the President of the Republic, closed the event describing Manuel Clemente as “one of the greatest Catholic thinkers on contemporary Portugal” and a “thinker about Portugal, about our identity, about our vicissitudes and, at the same time, a historian of the Church in Portugal”.
The tribute session also included speeches by José Manuel Pereira de Almeida, Vice-Rector of UCP, José Lobo Moutinho, Director of the Faculty of Law, Teresa Andresen, Landscape Architect, João Clemente, Director of the Youth Service of the Lisbon Patriarchate and the unveiling of the portrait of Manuel Clemente by Master António Macedo.
