The Juggler
typifies the core value of community,
symbolizing each person's unique and distinctive contribution to Notre Dame.
If anyone withholds participation from the group effort, a piece of the total picture of school life is missing; when everyone participates, the picture is complete.
We need to juggle the many aspects of life at Notre Dame, and maintain a proper balance between activities in and out of the classroom.
This is the Juggler's fascinating tale, taken from the medieval French legend and re-told by Anatole France (1844-1924):
Before he became a monk, Barnabas was a juggler by profession, poor and simple in person, but clever and skillful in juggling.
As his days slipped by in the quiet of the monastery, he was saddened by the thought that, unlike the other monks, he had no fine talent to offer to the Virgin Mary. He could not compose hymns or illuminate manuscripts; he could not sing beautifully or play an instrument.
Nothing - nothing could he do to show his love of the Mother of God.
One night, while thinking of his poverty of talent, he reflected on his happy days of juggling. Suddenly he knew what he would offer to Mary.
Quietly he hastened to the Chapel, and there, before the statue of Our Lady, he performed his spectacular feats of juggling.
At last, exhausted but happy, he paused. Then it was that the Virgin Mary, pleased with his loved-filled offering, was seen to descend from her beautiful shrine and with a tender hand dry the wet brow of her weary Juggler.
So, too, the community of Notre Dame today offers to Our Lady its talents and efforts, hoping that she will find these talents as acceptable as was the offering of her first Juggler.
And that is why we call ourselves
the Jugglers of Notre Dame.