On Dec. 12, 2024, the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, I received the following notification from the University of Notre Dame:
“Dear Diego: It is our great pleasure to offer you admission to the seventh cohort of the Notre Dame Inspired Leadership Initiative for the 2025-26 academic year.”
When I read that first statement, I could see my friend Mary Ellen Woods smiling. Mary Ellen and I both graduated from Notre Dame in 1980. We both majored in government and shared several classes together. I was from Texas, she was from New York. We disagreed on many political, economic and social issues, but we respected and admired each other. We were good friends. Our mutual respect continued long after we left Notre Dame.
After Notre Dame, I returned home, graduated from the University of Texas Law School, and started trying cases. I got married in 1993; God blessed me and my bride with one son and two daughters. One of my clients hired me away from my firm. I stayed in that job for 30 years. I retired from that position in 2019 to become a labor arbitrator.
Mary Ellen went on to get a public policy graduate degree and lived in Chicago. Few loved Notre Dame like Mary Ellen did. She dedicated herself to serving the University on various advisory boards including a stint as president of the Notre Dame Club of Chicago. She worked tirelessly with the club’s scholarship foundation, helping and advising many students in the Chicago area. She even advised my daughter who attended and graduated from Notre Dame in 2015. Mary Ellen was a passionate advocate for education and Notre Dame.
We stayed close. We served as class officers. She would often call just to talk, debate a point of the day or talk about family. In 2021, she called to tell me she had been accepted as an ILI Fellow at Notre Dame. I was not familiar with the program, and when I asked about it, I remember her telling me, “Diego, you would love it.” She wrote a biweekly column for the Notre Dame student newspaper, The Observer, and that’s how I learned about the program and tracked her progress. Her descriptions of ILI enticed me. I thought to myself: I could do this; I could enjoy this; maybe I should do this.
But whenever the possibility popped into my head, reality overshadowed it. My wife needed me, and she also wanted to travel more; my daughter wanted me to help with our grandsons. Other family obligations demanded my attention. Balancing my family’s needs with my arbitration practice became a challenge. Tossing ILI into the mix would only complicate matters.
Between 2022 and 2024, Mary Ellen continued to encourage me. She spoke on my behalf to the Notre Dame ILI staff. While attending a conference in Chicago in September 2023, Mary Ellen and I met for dinner and spoke about the program. Over a meal of fine Italian food, ILI solidified as a real possibility. In early 2024, Mary Ellen called again. I told her I was seriously thinking about it. That was our last conversation. She passed away a few weeks later.
Mary Ellen’s passing hurt and forced me to reassess. I prayed for guidance.
While meditating on the fifth joyous mystery of the rosary, finding Jesus in the temple, I found the answer. When his parents asked why he was in the temple, Jesus told them he needed to be in his Father’s house. Only in his Father’s house could Jesus discern his Father’s will.
That’s when it hit me: I needed to come home.
Notre Dame’s former president, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, once said Our Lady’s home is Notre Dame. For those of us who love Notre Dame, Our Lady’s home is our home.
Upon starting the ILI program in 2021, Mary Ellen wrote she was excited to be returning to a place that she loved, where she could study, reflect, learn and grow. That was her way of saying she was glad to be home. So am I.
I look forward to learning from my professors, colleagues and students. My goal is not to live this academic year as Mary Ellen would; she already did that. My goal is to recharge, learn and enjoy home.
Thanks Mary Ellen.
Diego J. Peña
ILI Fellow
Aug. 24
