"As for the Institute for Church Life, it is meant to link the resources of the University to the lives of churchgoers and church leaders at various levels (that is, at the level of the bishop, of parish clergy, of religious and lay leadership). The ICL is like a function machine in a math textbook: you put the University in and it comes out in user-friendly forms for non-academic church leadership. ICL supports the worship life of the Church through the Notre Dame Center for Liturgy, the teaching mission of the Church through the newly formed Center for Catechetical Initiatives and the Notre Dame Vocation Initiative, the service mission of the Church through the Center for Social Concerns and other initiatives, and the contemplative character of the church through scholarships for students and others to foster retreat work for various groups.
The Institute is currently the beneficiary of major grants from the Lilly Endowment, one under the rubric of Sustaining Pastoral Excellence, and another under the rubric of identifying and nurturing best practices in parish life. The University's theological distance learning program, STEP, is a project of the Institute for Church Life. The outreach represented by these projects is not incidental, but essential to the mission of a Catholic University as defined by the encyclical Ex Corde Ecclesiae and as practiced by Fr. Ted Hesburgh, the founder of the Institute for Church Life. Our most recent project was an international conference, in partnership with the USCCB, called "In Solidarity with Africa ," meant to uplift the bishops' call to solidarity with the African Church on the part of the Church in the U.S. , including Church affiliated universities.
A Catholic University 's mission is to witness to the values of the Gospel in the way appropriate for universities to do so, in the medium of academic excellence. The Institute's outreach function takes the academic excellence and prestige of the University and turns it into a witness bearing leadership role in the life of the Church at large."
Dr. John C. Cavadini, Ph.D.
Associate Professor and Chair,
Department of Theology
Director,
Institute for Church Life