Throughout the course, students will delve into various religious traditions, examining their beliefs, sacred writings, practices, sacred spaces, and authority. By placing each tradition in dialogue with Catholic Christianity, students will gain insights into the role of Catholicism within the broader context of world religions, especially from an Ignatian perspective that emphasizes finding God in all things.

(Full Year) In this class, sophomores will encounter the living Word of God within the Old Testament through a historical-critical approach.  In addition to reading/analyzing the Hebrew/Greek texts, students will explore the cultures, traditions, and histories that serve as a foundation for those forty-six sacred books. Important areas of focus will include God's creation, relationship with Israel, social justice, and the repeated phenomenon of “unlikely choice” that characterizes God’s covenant relationship with the human community.  This second half of the course explores the New Testament to discover how God comes to meet his people in and through Jesus Christ.  Students will encounter the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith in an examination of the twenty-seven books of the Christian scriptures.  Important areas of focus will include Christology, the Kingdom of God, Soteriology, and the early Christian Church's emergence.  Students will examine how Jesus calls us into right relationship through his gospel ministry and mission. 

 

(One Semester) This senior-year course engages service learning and encourages students to experience and articulate what it means to be committed to doing justice. Students explore structural injustice, develop tools for critical causal analysis, and craft solutions in dialogue with the Catholic Church’s faith-justice tradition. Among the specific areas addressed are hunger, homelessness, structural/social sin, immigration, labor, race and gender bias. Through local volunteer service assignments students deepen their understanding of social action and advocacy rooted in Christian Scripture and tradition. This course affords students an opportunity to better understand and integrate Gonzaga’s motto, becoming a “Man for Others.” *Social Justice in Action (description in the course listed below) integrates weekly service over the course of a semester with social justice curriculum. This application only course offers an opportunity to experience the Gonzaga neighborhood through field trips, guest speakers, and research. The course intentionally links spirituality, academic study, and action to foster the Ignatian virtues.