UNDA marks the 20th anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s key document for Catholic universities
The four resident theologians at the University of Notre Dame Australia’s Sydney campus made a profession of faith and swore an oath of fidelity to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church on 20 May.
Mercy Sister Moira Debono of the Alma, Michigan congregation, Canadian Dr John Lamont who completed Philosophy of Religion at Oxford University, Scripture scholar Peter Holmes and Paul Morrissey, who coordinates the Master of Arts Theological Studies (MATS) at UNDA, made the declarations during a Mass that Cardinal George Pell celebrated at St Benedict Church, Broadway.
The Mass was held to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Constitution on Catholic Universities, Ex Corde Ecclesiae (“from the heart of the Church”), which urged all theologians at Catholic universities to take such a pledge.
Ex Corde Ecclesiae, issued in 1990, aimed to define and refine the Catholicism of Catholic institutions of higher education, and taught that “the education of students is to combine academic and professional development with formation in moral and
ing of the Church”.
The 20 May event – believed to be the first of its kind at an Australian Catholic university – coincided with 2010 being the inaugural year of the Sydney campus’ Bachelor of Theology course, with 20 students.
It also started a Bachelor of Philosophy last year with 15 students.
Every new member of the Theology Department will take the oath from now on.
UNDA Sydney’s Executive Dean of Philosophy and Theology Prof Hayden Ramsey told The Record that the declaration by the four theologians was significant, “so that the Catholic community can have great confidence that they’re being taught the Faith of the Church in a scholarly way”.
“It is a great signal witness especially for the young theological students,” Prof Ramsey said. Sr Debono told The Record that many students approached the theologians after the Mass telling them how “powerful” and “striking” the experience was for them, to see their lecturers make such a bold statement.
“I always find its good to know people know where you’re coming from,” said Sister Debono, a sacramental theologian who taught at the Catholic University of Portland in Oregon, which is associated with Notre Dame University in Indiana, from which students often do exchange programmes with UNDA’s Fremantle and Sydney campuses.
“The Church has given us this opportunity to address exactly what we recite in the Creed, and say ‘that’s what our teaching is based on’.”
The declaration was the brainchild of the four theologians also as a sign of solidarity with the students and the Church, and reflected the fact that the theology department in Sydney is growing.
“In one sense, for me, it emphasises the Catholic identity of the school,” she said. The MATS programme that Mr Morrissey coordinates, which started in 2008, is one of the University of Notre Dame’s most successful degrees, and is highly popular among Religious Education Coordinators and deputy principals, as the university increases accessibility by doing all teaching in school holidays and allowing it to begin at any time.
The occasion was also a Votive Mass in honour of Our Lady Seat of Wisdom, the patron of the university, using a setting produced for the occasion by prominent Catholic composer and former seminarian Richard Connolly.
Mr Connolly described it as a “labour of love” for the university.
“My single overriding hope for this Mass is that its range, singability and treatment of the text may enable the university … to join in singing to the Lord with one voice,” he wrote in a foreward.
“In a special way, theologians must give their witness first, and the courage and clarity they show is inspiring for everyone else,” Prof Ramsey said.