Course Details

RS 506 Overview

What is the Church, and what is its mission? How have ecclesiastical structures evolved over time, and what do they have to do with the people who make up the ecclesial Body of Christ? While the Second Vatican Council serves as a theological foundational for Catholics and a significant point of reference for a number of other Christian denominations, ours is a time with little trust in “institutions.” This course will examine the pastoral implications we can draw from exploring ecclesiological topics like: the early church’s missionary identity; the centralization of authority in the medieval West; the church as local/universal/global in the modern, post-Reformation period; the contemporary recovery of the priesthood of all the faithful; and the urgent need for ecumenical and interfaith dialogue.