Luminaria

 

Luminaria 2024 Event Photos

2023 Luminaria

Jennifer Arnold 

Distinguished Educator Award

Generosity, joy, and dedication are three words that describe this year’s Luminaria 2023 Educator Award – recipient, Jennifer Arnold. She is celebrating her 24th year of teaching kindergarten at St. Mary School in Paris, Kentucky and as the longest-serving educator on faculty she is both well-known and respected by St. Mary and the wider Paris community.

David Tramontin

Distinguished Alumnus Award

Dave Tramontin exemplifies the qualities that the Luminaria 2023 Alumnus Award seeks to recognize: service to others, leadership among peers, and dedication to the Catholic faith and education.

He has spent much of his adult life giving back to Catholic schools in a myriad of ways including volunteering as a basketball coach, serving on the Lexington Catholic High School board of directors, participating in and leading facilities-focused committees, and fundraising for immediate needs as well as long-term endowments.

2023 Dinner & Award Ceremony

Hilllenmeyer Memorial Endowment

 The Monsignor Herbert Hillenmeyer Memorial Endowment was established by the Hillenmeyer family to honor the legacy of their family icon and his commitment to Catholic education. 

Fr. Hillenmeyer served the Diocese of Covington as apriest for 73 years. Between 1915 and 1923, he was Secretary to the Bishop and Chancellor of the Diocese. He was named a Monsignor in 1936 and Vicar General of the Diocese in 1949. For 43 years, he was pastor of St. Thomas Parish in Ft. Thomas where he built the current impressive church building in 1938-39 and established St. Thomas High School in 1945. He remained pastor of St. Thomas Parish until his retirementin 1968. Msgr. Hillenmeyer, a trustee of Thomas More College, was instrumental in raising funds for the Crestview Hills campus construction project. In 1962, he was granted Thomas More’s first honorary degree and received the first Thomas More Medallion in 1971.

On his 70th jubilee as a priest in 1972, Fr. Hillenmeyer’s nieces and nephews honored him with their commitment to endow a lecture series at Thomas More College. The first Hillenmeyer Lecture was given in 1975, by Archbishop (later Cardinal) Bernardin of Cincinnati. The topic was “Catholic Higher Educationand Moral Values.” Fr. Hillenmeyer passed away shortly thereafter. Over the next four decades, the series attracted notable speakers on various topics including social justice, women and the Church, history, science, Catholic spiritual life, papal encyclicals, and ethics.

What began as a small fund grew over the years as a tax-exempt charitable Trust devoted to supporting the annual Lecture Series and numerous Catholic charitable and educational causes in both the Diocese of Covington and what became the Diocese of Lexington. In 2021, the Hillenmeyer family determined the best way to honor Fr. Hillenmeyer’s commitment to Catholic education was to terminate the Trust and distribute 100% of its assets to Catholic educational charities positioned for longevity, including CEOF.