The
University of Notre Dame’s Institute for Church Life
will inaugurate its new Satellite Theological Education
Program (STEP) September 25 (Sat.) with the first of four
interactive videoconferences providing pastoral training
and theological education for ministers and laypeople in
four Catholic dioceses.
The
first of STEP’s video-conferences, or “Institute
Days,” will link some 300 people gathering at ten sites
in the dioceses of Reno, Nev.; Erie, Pa.; and Winona, Minn.
“This
creative use of distance learning technologies is one important
and effective way for our University to deploy its resources
in the service of the Church,” said Notre Dame’s
president Rev. Edward A. Malloy, C.S.C.
According
to Thomas Cummings, coordinator of STEP, each Institute
Day videoconference will include a gathering prayer, an
educational videotape presentation, and a live discussion
coordinated from the Notre Dame campus by a theologian or
pastoral expert. STEP is designed as a resource for dioceses
which are mostly rural and without Catholic seminaries,
colleges and universities. With the help of Notre Dame’s
Office of Institutional Technologies, the program will provide
these dioceses with educational services through videoconferencing
and, eventually, a home website and electronic courses offered
on the Internet.
The
first Institute Day’s theme will be “Discipleship
and Ministry,” and the discussion will be led by Jane
Regan of the Institute for Religious Education and Pastoral
Ministry at Boston College. Rev. Michael Driscoll, assistant
professor of theology at Notre Dame; Lawrence Cunningham,
professor of theology at Notre Dame; and theologian Brother
Loughlan Sofield,S.T., will lead subsequent Institute Day
discussions on the Eucharist, the integration of faith and
everyday life, and collaboration among priest, religious
and laypeople.
