YMM-Systematic Moral Theology

This course will explore basic questions of Christian morality. Particular emphasis will be placed on the human person, freedom and knowledge and conscience formation. The role of natural law, Sacred Scripture and the Magisterium will be addressed.

Independent Study

This course offers an introduction to the basic principles and topics in Bioethics. The subjects covered will be selected from the following: suffering; Catholic identity in health care; issues at the beginning of life; genetics; transplantation; experimentation; distribution of health care; issues at the end of life.

This course will examine the dynamic and transformative relationship between the human person and God in Christ through the Holy Spirit. The Trinitarian origins and goal of spirituality will be emphasized as well as the concepts of grace uncreated and created, the gifts of the Spirit, freedom, sin, conversion, growth in holiness, prayer, and prayer practices.

Central to issues in contemporary justice are specific problems and cases that required the application of Catholic social justice teaching. To explore the application of social justice principles to issues common to the laity in the 21st century, this course will explore and analyze cases, applying social justice teaching to their resolution, and investigate the complexities of solutions in the modern world.

The Church's social doctrine finds its essential foundation in Biblical Revelation and in the Tradition of the Church. This course will study key document history of the social teachings of the Church from the early church fathers through the present day Holy Father, Pope Francis.

This course bases the ethics of sex and marriage on a Christian understanding of the human person, discusses marriage as institution and as sacrament, and deals with issues such as marriage permanence, marital fidelity, contraception, the virtue of chastity, homosexuality, and vowed celibacy from a moral and pastoral point of view.

This course provides a study of the development of Catholic social ethics in response to changing social conditions and theories. Particular attention will be paid to the application of Christian Justice to the social problems of our day. The examination of magisterial documents and individual obligations with regard to justice will be explored. Prerequsite: Fundamental Moral Theology.

This course offers an introduction to the relationship between theological anthropology and maorality within Roman Catholic theology. The course will also consider contemporary secular understandings of the human person and their ramifications upon current morality in the United States of America. The course's emphasis will be upon pastoral application and ministry.

Our study of Desert Spirituality or, more precisely, the various aspects of the Fathers and Mothers of the desert has several distinct but interrelated objectives. The first is to familiarize oursleves with writings about and by the desert Fathers and Mothers. In doing this, we will also familiarize ourselves with the historic and cultural context in which they lived. More importantly, we will attempt to single out and understand some of the essential foci of the living of the Gospel (i.e., spirituality) that emerged through the principal personages of the desert. Finally and most importantly, we will seek to go beyond the historical and arrive at an appreciation of how the essence of desert sprituality can guide our own following of Christ in the contemporary world.