Marquette Announces the Creation of the "James Foley Scholarship"

[Mike_Marquette]

Working with the family and friends of James Foley, Arts '96, Marquette University has established the James Foley Scholarship in the J. William and Mary Diederich College of Communication.   

The goal of the scholarship is provide support to journalism students within the College of Communication. Please consider making a donation to honor and remember our fellow Marquette alum, Jim Foley. Jim loved hoops, and he especially loved Marquette. https://muconnect.marquette.edu/giving/foley-scholarship

Take a moment to read this letter Jim wrote to Marquette about his relationship with his alma mater and his views on faith.

Phone call home
A letter from James Foley, Arts ’96, to Marquette.

Marquette University has always been a friend to me. The kind who challenges you to do more and be better and ultimately shapes who you become.

With Marquette, I went on some volunteer trips to South Dakota and Mississippi and learned I was a sheltered kid and the world had real problems. I came to know young people who wanted to give their hearts for others. Later I volunteered in a Milwaukee junior high school up the street from the university and was inspired to become an inner-city teacher. But Marquette was perhaps never a bigger friend to me than when I was imprisoned as a journalist.

Myself and two colleagues had been captured and were being held in a military detention center in Tripoli. Each day brought increasing worry that our moms would begin to panic. My colleague, Clare, was supposed to call her mom on her birthday, which was the day after we were captured. I had still not fully admitted to myself that my mom knew what had happened. But I kept telling Clare my mom had a strong faith.

I prayed she’d know I was OK. I prayed I could communicate through some cosmic reach of the universe to her.

I began to pray the rosary. It was what my mother and grandmother would have prayed. 
I said 10 Hail Marys between each Our Father. It took a long time, almost an hour to count 100 Hail Marys off on my knuckles. And it helped to keep my mind focused.

Clare and I prayed together out loud. It felt energizing to speak our weaknesses and hopes together, as if in a conversation with God, rather than silently and alone.

Later we were taken to another prison where the regime kept hundreds of political prisoners. I was quickly welcomed by the other prisoners and treated well.

One night, 18 days into our captivity, some guards brought me out of the cell. In the hall I saw Manu, another colleague, for the first time in a week. We were haggard but overjoyed to see each other. Upstairs in the warden’s office, a distinguished man in a suit stood and said, “We felt you might want to call your families.”

I said a final prayer and dialed the number. My mom answered the phone. “Mom, Mom, it’s me, Jim.”

“Jimmy, where are you?”

“I’m still in Libya, Mom. I’m sorry about this. So sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Jim,” she pleaded. “Oh, Daddy just left. Oh … He so wants to talk to you. How are you, Jim?” I told her I was being fed, that I was getting the best bed and being treated like a guest.

“Are they making you say these things, Jim?”

“No, the Libyans are beautiful people,” I told her. “I’ve been praying for you to know that I’m OK,” I said. “Haven’t you felt my prayers?”

“Oh, Jimmy, so many people are praying for you. All your friends, Donnie, Michael Joyce, Dan Hanrahan, Suree, Tom Durkin, Sarah Fang have been calling. Your brother Michael loves you so much.” She started to cry. “The Turkish embassy is trying to see you and also Human Rights Watch. Did you see them?” I said I hadn’t.

“They’re having a prayer vigil for you at Marquette. Don’t you feel our prayers?” she asked.

“I do, Mom, I feel them,” and I thought about this for a second. Maybe it was others’ prayers strengthening me, keeping me afloat.

The official made a motion. I started to say goodbye. Mom started to cry. “Mom, I’m strong. I’m OK. I should be home by Katie’s graduation,” which was a month away.

“We love you, Jim!” she said. Then I hung up.

I replayed that call hundreds of times in my head — my mother’s voice, the names of my friends, her knowledge of our situation, her absolute belief in the power of prayer. She told me my friends had gathered to do anything they could to help. I knew I wasn’t alone.

My last night in Tripoli, I had my first Internet connection in 44 days and was able to listen to a speech Tom Durkin gave for me at the Marquette vigil. To a church full of friends, alums, priests, students and faculty, I watched the best speech a brother could give for another. It felt like a best man speech and a eulogy in one. It showed tremendous heart and was just a glimpse of the efforts and prayers people were pouring forth. If nothing else, prayer was the glue that enabled my freedom, an inner freedom first and later the miracle of being released during a war in which the regime had no real incentive to free us. It didn’t make sense, but faith did.

This article written by James Foley appeared in the fall 2011 issue of Marquette Magazine following his first capture earlier that year. Foley was killed in August 2014 following a second capture in 2012. Additional resources on Foley, including the university’s response and information about a James Foley Scholarship, is available online.

[GoldenWarrior11]

I never met James, but I can definitively say that he was a TRUE Marquette WARRIOR.  I am honored to say that I attended the same school as him. 

[royceda5 9]

Wow. Great article and it sounds like a great man. Proud to be an alum of the same university.

[Mike_Marquette]

A prayer vigil to remember Marquette alumnus James Foley and in support of the Foley family will be held Tuesday, Aug. 26, at 6 p.m. in the Church of the Gesu, 1145 W. Wisconsin Ave. (Note: This is a new location from previous reports.) All members of the Marquette and Milwaukee communities are welcome.

The university will provide free parking in the Wells Street Structure (located at 13th and Wells streets) for attendees.

Also, a donor is matching donations to the James Foley Scholarship at Marquette up to $1996 (Jim graduated from MU in 1996) that come in prior to the prayer vigil tomorrow. To donate go to go.mu.edu/remember-foley. Thank you.

[Sir Lawrence]

The scholarship fund made an appearance in the current issue of People Magazine, p. 33.