Posted on 06/15/2004 12:55:11 PM PDT by George Gip
SAN DIEGO, CA (PRWEB) June 16, 2004 – The founders of New Catholic University are asking for your prayers. The North San Diego County-based university, scheduled to accept its first students in Fall 2005 pending state approval, has announced the creation of an advisory board that will petition the Holy Spirit for the university’s success.
The Board of the Faithful is composed of faithful Catholics throughout the world who are praying that the university remains true to the “uncompromisingly Catholic” character envisioned by its founders. Members also pray that the founders and the currently all-volunteer staff will be able to locate benefactors who share their commitment. The board is one of four key advisory boards, including an academic advisory board, spiritual guidance board and board of trustees.
“The Board of the Faithful is the most important of them all,” university president Derry Connolly said. “If what we’re building is not based on an act of faith, we might as well give up now.”
While the university posted information about the Board of the Faithful on its website, it never actively recruited members. But today, members hail from every continent and their numbers are growing. Connolly expects such dramatic growth in the future that he is already looking for a volunteer to oversee the board and its activities.
All current board members are Catholic, but non-Catholics are welcome to join, Connolly said. Several non-Catholics have already included the university in their daily prayers, citing shared values.
For Connolly, the formation of a Board of the Faithful was a no-brainer. A firm believer in the power of prayer, Connolly remembers failing his high school math and science classes before turning to St. Joseph of Cupertino, the patron saint of students taking exams, for help. Today, he holds a doctorate from the California Institute of Technology.
“Looking back on my life, prayer has always played a pivotal role at key turning points,” Connolly said. “The idea of New Catholic University itself was born from prayer. If it’s to succeed, it’ll be for that reason.”
Thoughts of building New Catholic University first took shape in Connolly’s mind during a visit to Franciscan University’s Steubenville campus, as he knelt before the Blessed Sacrament in the university chapel. For three years, his focus turned to other things and plans for a new university were put on the back burner, but another visit to Franciscan University brought it all back. Upon returning to San Diego, Connolly shared his idea with four friends and New Catholic University was born.
As New Catholic University prepares for its inaugural gala on Sept. 25, the prayers of many members of the Board of the Faithful remain focused on the university’s attempts to lay the groundwork for its opening. The black-tie optional gala, which will include dinner and entertainment, will be held at the Hyatt Regency La Jolla at Aventine. Connolly hopes to attract at least 500 supporters to the gala, a figure that will bring the university one step closer to winning the hearts and minds of committed Southern California Catholics and a goal that gives the Board of the Faithful a lot to pray about.
“If this university is to be realized, it’ll be the Holy Spirit’s ‘nudging’ of potential volunteers and benefactors that brings it about,” Connolly said. “Human effort can’t do it alone.”
New Catholic University will offer degree programs in technology, mass media communications, and business. With all academic disciplines, the university hopes to foster an entrepreneurial spirit, encourage leadership and innovation, and to provide each student with a solid moral framework, firmly grounded in Catholic ethics.
For more information on New Catholic University or its inaugural gala, visit the university’s website at www.newcatholicuniversity.com. To reserve a table or purchase individual tickets for the gala, call (858) 672-9080.
###
Contact Information:
Denis Grasska, Media Relations Director
Derry Connolly, President
New Catholic University http://www.newcatholicuniversity.com
Looks promising. Maybe more so than Ave Maria, which seems to be a little off track lately.
What?! Ave Maria off track? What have they been doing?
Oh...just that awful design they have for the chapel.
There may be other problems too:
http://www.cruxnews.com/avemaria/dossier.html
The good news is that New Catholic University sounds like a solid institution. I see that it's going to have a film program, too. It sure would be great if we could get more principled Christians in Hollywood.
Welcome to Free Republic!
“The idea of New Catholic University itself was born from prayer. If it’s to succeed, it’ll be for that reason.”
Please keep this university's succes in your prayers! God only knows how desperately we need a university, like Ave Maria, that holds to its catholic tradition.
Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list
A new Catholic university in formation in San Diego: Molding future innovators, leaders and entrepreneurs in Business, Technology and Media.
SAN DIEGO: The Board of Trustees announced the formation of a new residential Roman Catholic university in San Diego to offer degrees in business, technology and communication media. "The university aims to grow a new generation of business, technology and media innovators and leaders, infused with Catholic spiritual, social and moral teachings," said Dr. Derry Connolly, President and Chair of the Board of Trustees. The university anticipates opening to a single freshman class in the fall of 2005.
The forward-thinking university will recruit faculty who are industry experienced innovators, leaders and entrepreneurs; require all students to take part in a significant team-based business planning exercise; have an in-house business incubator; establish the St. Catherine of Siena Center for Women in Leadership to encourage women to pursue careers in innovation and leadership; and maintain a traditional emphasis on fundamental Catholic spirituality.
The student's senior thesis will be a two-year team-based and faculty-guided business planning exercise bringing together students from business, technology, and media to dream up, plan and implement new business concepts. The business plan will be developed with the goal of actually opening a business based on the thesis. "We expect fifty percent of our students to form businesses based on their senior thesis upon graduation," Connolly said.
Senior faculty will have had fifteen to twenty years of "real world" experience in leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship, and will have formed their own companies. Faculty will play a key role in the launch and the on-going leadership of student start-up companies. An on-campus incubator will provide seniors a place to start their business and remain for up to two years.
The new university seeks to integrate faith, values and business to produce ethical innovators and leaders. The emphasis on fundamental Catholic spirituality will encourage the students to get to know Jesus Christ, and the obligations of Catholic social and moral teachings on the workplace and marketplace. "Businesses that treat their workforce with the dignity demanded by Catholic teachings can have a significant competitive advantage. The university proudly proclaims its conformity to Ex Corde Ecclesiae and fidelity to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church. The formation of the university has received the approval of Bishop Robert Brom, bishop of the Roman Catholic diocese of San Diego," Connolly said.
Complete details at www.NewCatholicUniversity.com
Media Contact:
Jeremy Durant
Vice President for Institutional Development and Dean of Student Admissions
858-672-9080
Here's another Catholic college with a lot of promise:
http://www.christthekingcollege.com
I was very hopeful at first, but my hopefulness has turned to wariness and even disappointment due to a variety of developments and some of what I've seen first hand (I own property and live nearby).
I had feared from the beginning that they were going to reject tradition when I heard rumors that the Latin rite would not be allowed at all. I then had hoped that if focus on tradition were not in the cards, at least focus on orthodoxy was. Well that's doesn't seem to be case either.
I attended the first mass (which took place in a huge tomato field with the Vatican choir singing) and it was far from orthodox. The priest's homily was devoted to the big-bang theory.
The Dominos guy seems to be a charismatic "new Catholic" type with his own ideas about things and our bishop has about as much respect for tradition as most others in the US, which is none.
I hope I'm wrong, but I'm not expecting them to be much help at all.
Still, I'm guessing that at least some people feel that they've been sold a bill of goods.
It's a shame, because done right, it would be a wonderful thing.
Can a college or university be genuinely "Catholic" when it is treated as the personal corporate property and plaything of one man?
New Catholic University is definitely in my prayers. Since I'm from the San Diego area, I'll also check into either volunteering with them or attending that fundraising gala in September. Anybody else on this board from SD?
Conservative Christians have got to help this thing get off the ground!!!
Some people are trying to tell Tom Monaghan how to spend his money - that he can't move the university to Florida because they were counting on it remaininig in Michigan.
Its petty whining by ingrates. No one was ever promised that Ave Maria would always be in Michigan.
Whomever wants to stay in Michigan can find the benefactors to fund it and stay. Otherwise they need find employment lesehwere or join in the move to Florida.
Yes - freeper 'Sandyeggo'.
There is a board of directors who approve all decisions.
They are all very solid Catholics with national reputations.
The borad apparently has decided that without the money of Tom Monagahn they cannot make a go of it.
The board's prudential judgment is to move to Florida rather than close down due to lack of funds.
Tom Monaghan is not charismatic and is very orthodox. He has odd architectural taste. But artistic likes and dislikes do not make one more or less Catholic. What type of art or architecture to employ is a prudential decision. For example, he is not promoting use of a female crucifix - which would be heretical by its existence. But a glass chapel that is not traditional is not proof of a lack of orthodoxy - espcially in a man who has orthodox bona fides like Tom does.
Here's another article which has relevance to the current discussion on Catholic education:
http://www.christorchaos.com/oldies.html
Don't worry... just a few people are tiffed that Ave Maria isn't behaving like the SSPX sedavacantists.
Putting your keyboard before your brain once again?
People who worship in Society chapels are not "sedavacantists" and neither are the members of the clergy. You're the first person I've heard make this claim.
Additionally you're positing a strawman when you try to frame the concerns for Ave Maria as coming from a few "tiffed" (sic) within the SSPX. Concerns are many and varied among many Catholics of all stripes. From AMU taking government funds, to the horrid architecture, to the upfront rejection of the indult. In fact, Orthodox Catholics on the board of directors and donators have raised these same concerns and others.
You're either ignorant or are trying to cause trouble with your inflammatory false statement.
I live in San Diego as well and I'm keeping a very close eye on this college too.
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