School Motto

The motto of Cathedral High School is “Vigor in Arduis.”  This Latin Phrase is taken from the coat of arms of William Cardinal O’Connell, Archbishop of Boston from 1907 to 1944.  It was Cardinal O’Connell who called for the establishment of Cathedral High School in 1926. 

There are a number of variations on the translation of “Vigor in Arduis.”  Energy amid hardship, perseverance and strength in the face of difficulty, challenges, or adversity are but two interpretations of its meaning.  In either case the message is clear.  In choosing this motto, Cathedral hopes to inspire its students to persevere, not only through the day-to-day academic and personal challenges of high school but also through the greater challenges that life will present.

Cardinal O’Connell could not have envisioned back in 1907 the significance his motto would come to have for the present day students of Cathedral High School.  Throughout its rich history Cathedral High School has served the immigrant and minority students of Boston’s diverse neighborhoods.  Since the mid-1970’s, Cathedral High School has become increasingly attractive to Boston’s minority population as a place where their children can receive a rigorous college preparatory education in the Catholic tradition.

Vigor in Arduis: A History of Boston’s African-American Catholic Community, 1788-1988, by William C. Leonard of Boston College, is a dissertation chronicling the black Catholic experience in Boston from the late-eighteenth century until 1988.  This history has been one of deriving strength from their struggle, thus the title of Leonard’s work.  How appropriate, therefore, that Cathedral High School, with its long history of educating the poor and marginalized, should adopt “Vigor in Arduis” as its school motto.