I earned my bachelor of science in mechanical engineering from Notre Dame in 2011. Since 2012, I have been employed by [an industry leader] in heavy industrial manufacturing management.
Even as a technical expert in an industrial setting, I still thumb through my notes on theodicy from Fr. Heintz's Foundations of Theology class when I am confronted by ugly truths of the human condition.
I skim through my notes on Rerum Novarum from my theology and human rights class when I get up in arms about the injustices of our modern economy.
The topics covered in theology are relevant, no matter one's religious background or professional path. Notre Dame's requirements for a broad liberal arts curriculum produce students who are more well-rounded and more humane in the workplace. This is a competitive advantage in my mind. Notre Dame alumni I have worked with are every bit as technically proficient as alumni of Georgia Tech, MIT, University of Michigan, Penn State, and Texas A&M. Notre Dame alumni are more effective in relating and building trust with their coworkers. I credit Notre Dame's core requirements for that difference.
I am not aware of many universities that have similar requirements. In truth, there are many great universities and great engineering programs across the country and across the world. Notre Dame's catholic identity and commitment to a broad liberal arts curriculum, including theology, are what make our institution unique among those great universities. I do hope you will continue to support what makes Notre Dame special.
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ReplyDelete"The question: What would Newman have to say to the Church of the 21st Century?
DeleteFather Komonchak:
It’s always risky, of course, to claim to know what a very intelligent and holy man would say, if you are yourself not as holy and as intelligent. Let me simply point to three things Newman stressed that seem particularly pertinent today.
From the days of his evangelical conversion at the age of fifteen to his death seventy-five years later, Newman insisted that one’s Christianity had to be realized, made real. This meant not simply that one had to make real to one’s self the sacred privileges Christ won for us, making him and them the light by which the world was revealed for what it is ; it meant also making one’s faith real through one’s obedience to its demands, by repentance, by regular prayer, by participation in the life of the Church, by fidelity in little things until the virtues become the spontaneous orientations of one’s own nature.
Secondly, Newman wished to see the cultivation of the intellect the major goal of Catholic education. This meant, the development of critical faculties, an ability to examine closely and fully the opinions of the day, and the overcoming of mere "viewiness." He wanted a well-educated laity, confident and competent as much in the knowledge of their faith as in specialized areas of knowledge. He pointed out how distorted a university education is that excludes or marginalizes theology.
http://ncronline.org/blogs/distinctly-catholic/q-father-komonchak
DeleteThirdly, Newman insisted upon the role of authority in the Church. To be a Christian is to be the heir of the faith once delivered to the saints, mediated from generation to generation by a Church guided by the successors of the Apostles. If this makes teachableness an integral part of Christian virtue, it is also true that Church authority rests on the people’s "admiration, trust, and love of Christ and his Church," and that these must ever be earned, and can be made much more difficult, by the way in which authority is exercised.
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