Academic Formation Workshops
Academic courses help those involved in lay ministry to acquire necessary knowledge and information for effective parish leadership.
Course: What is the Bible?
Course Description - This introductory course serves to acquaint students with the Church’s basic teaching on revelation, Scripture and Tradition. It will consider the Bible as the divine Word of God. The course will introduce students to the Church’s approach to Scripture, particularly as presented in Dei Verbum and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The class will also provide an introduction to the tools and methods the Church employs in the interpretation of Biblical texts.
Course: What is the Old Testament?
Course Description - This course introduces reading and interpreting the Old Testament in its own context and in the context of Christian faith. The course includes an introduction to the history of Israel and the Old Testament Canon considered in light of its historical, prophetic and literary significance. The course will also consider briefly some interpretative tools for Old Testament preaching.
Course: What is the New Testament?
Course Description - This course introduces reading and interpreting the New Testament as the primary document of the faith of the Church. The letters and Gospels will be studied to understand how the early Church used its cultural and literary resources to articulate its theological understandings of the mystery of Jesus.
Course: What are the Sacraments?
Course Description - This course presents an overview of sacramental theology as well as an historical introduction to the development of the liturgical and sacramental life of the Church. Attention is given to traditional and contemporary approaches to sacramental principles and practices.
Course: What is the Liturgy?
Course Description - This course will explores an understanding of the liturgical prayer of the Church, especially as it is presented in the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy of the Second Vatican Council. The course introduces the general principles of liturgical celebration, the primacy of the Sunday assembly, the liturgical year and the role of public prayer in the parish community. The course also seeks to stimulate the student’s personal formation in liturgical prayer.
Course: What is Morality?
Course Description - This course presents the context and basic principles of Catholic moral teaching, and examines their application in particular areas. The moral life of the Church is considered in light of the philosophical and theological foundations of ethics as well as the fundamental call of all Christians to conversion. The moral life is linked to the spirituality of individual Christian experience and the place of Scripture in moral reflection, character and virtue. Special attention is given to the sources of Church teaching, particularly in social justice, sexual and medical ethics, and communication.
Course: Who is God?
Course Description - This course focuses on the revelation of God as Trinity. Topics include an understanding of the existence of God, an appreciation of the Trinitarian, relational mystery of God, a consideration of the role of the incarnation in Christian life and the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church. Students will also relate the basic experience of God to the baptismal call to ministry and service as well as an anthropological consideration of the nature of the human person and human communities. The theme of Trinitarian communion as the ground of ecclesial communion and its implications for the life of the Church and world will be explored.
Course: Who is Jesus Christ?
Course Description - This course introduces the student to the fundamentals of the Church’s teaching about the person of Jesus Christ. The course focuses on the development of Christological doctrine through the writings of the Church Fathers and the early Councils of the Church. It also considers the person of Jesus in light of spirituality and liturgical life.
Course: What is the Church?
Course Description - This course presents a basic theology of the Church and its ministry. The course will focus on the biblical, magisterial and historical foundations of Church identity and leadership. Emphasis will be given to understanding the mission of the Church, particularly in light of the Catechism of the Catholic Church as evidenced at universal and local levels of Church life. The course will also focus on the role of the lay minister in the community of the Church.