Pope Leo XIV: CTU Master of Divinity
Cardinal Robert Prevost, OSA— now Pope Leo XIV—, earned his Master of Divinity degree from CTU in 1982 and was ordained the following year.
CTU’s Master of Divinity (M. Div.) program prepares students for full-time professional ministry in the Roman Catholic Church, including ordination to the priesthood. Students at CTU study theology and ministry that is both grounded in tradition and engaged with current contexts.
Born in Chicago in 1955 to a multicultural family of Hispanic, French, and Italian heritage, Pope Leo XIV joined the Augustinians in 1977 and began his theological formation at CTU shortly thereafter. His early ministry took him to northern Peru, where he served as a pastor, educator, and canon law expert. His leadership trajectory led him from the Augustinian Province of Chicago to his appointment as Prior General of the worldwide Augustinian Order.
In 2014, Pope Francis appointed him Bishop of Chiclayo, Peru, and in 2023, he was named Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and created Cardinal-Deacon of Santa Monica. President Barbara Reid, OP, joined Pope Leo at his installation as Cardinal.
Welcome to Catholic Theological Union. I am Sr. Barbara Reid, a Dominican Sister of Grand Rapids Michigan and it is my great pleasure to serve as CTU’s seventh President. CTU is one of the largest schools of theology and ministry in the U.S., forming students from more than forty countries to be effective leaders in the Church.
In 1968, on the heels of the Second Vatican Council, the three men’s religious communities who founded CTU—Franciscans, Passionists, and Servites—followed the Spirit’s lead to create a new model of seminary formation: in the midst of the city, near a major university, and in a neighborhood where there could be close ecumenical and interreligious engagement.
Today, the number of men’s communities who are the corporate owners of CTU has grown to twenty-three. Within two years of its founding, CTU expanded its mission to include women religious and lay women and men, who prepare together with men religious for collaborative ministries in the global church.
Our graduates can be found in more than sixty countries throughout the world in myriad ministries, as leaders in parishes and diocesan offices, teachers and administrators in schools, hospital chaplains, campus ministers, leaders in justice ministries, and in interreligious and ecumenical work, and much more.
The strength of our academic programs at both the Masters and Doctoral levels is upheld by our stellar faculty, who are not only extraordinary teachers, but also world-renowned scholars who publish extensively. In addition to academic formation, faculty and staff place equal emphasis on human, spiritual, and pastoral formation of our students
The Spark
Inspired by an address at Rockefeller Chapel of Cardinal Leo Josef Suenens, a leader of the Second Vatican Council, the Dean of the University of Chicago Divinity School urged that a Catholic school of theology be founded in Hyde Park
Opening The Doors
After a summer of political turbulence in Chicago, CTU launched a bold new collaborative initiative, beginning its classes in the educational center of Sinai Temple in September 1968.
Beginning A Catholic-Jewish Studies Program with Rabbi Hayim Perelmuter as charter faculty member joining Rev. John Pawlikowski, OSM as co-founders of the program. (1968)
Alacia Lakey, a graduate of Yale University, was the first lay woman student at CTU. She would be the first of a growing stream of lay women and religious to join CTU.
1978
CTU In The Holy Land Two of its outstanding biblical professors, Rev. Carroll Stuhmueller, C.P. and Rabbi Hayim Perelmuter, created a semester long program for CTU students in the Holy Land. 1981
Recognizing the growing importance of the Hispanic community in the United States Church, CTU launched a program in Hispanic studies, one of the first in the country.
1987
The Vatican Visits! At the direction of the newly elected Pope John Paul II, the Vatican initiated a visitation of all U.S. seminaries. With the support of Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, CTU won full approval of its structure and mission. 1988
The Augustus Tolton Program In collaboration with the Archdiocese of Chicago, CTU began a scholarship and formation program for African-American lay ministers serving in Chicago.
1992
CTU Honors Cardinal Joseph Bernardin As a true friend of CTU, the school awarded an honorary doctorate to Cardinal Bernardin on the 25th anniversary of the Second Vatican Council. In his remarks, the Cardinal asked CTU to continue to support the pastoral mission of the Council. 1992
The Oscar Romero Program Matching its innovative Augustus Tolton program, CTU, in collaboration with the Archdiocese of Chicago, initiated a scholarship and formation program for lay Hispanic ministers. 1995
The Bernardin Center As part of its first major capital campaign “Bold and Faithful,” CTU established the Cardinal Bernardin Center to promote his legacy and signature issues. The Cardinal himself, shortly before his death, wrote the charter for the Center.
1997
Rev. Ted Hesburgh At CTU! With the blessing and encouragement of the famed president of the University of Notre Dame, the popular sabbatical program he began moved from South Bend to CTU and Chicago. 1999
The Catholic-Muslim Studies Program Supported by the generosity of James and Catherine Denny, CTU inaugurated a unique program in Islamic studies to promote dialogue and mutual respect between Christians and Muslims. Dr. Scott Alexander was appointed its founding director. 1999
Peacebuilders Initiative With a major grant from the Lilly Endowment, CTU’s Bernardin Center created a program for high school students, introducing them to rich social justice teaching and practice of Catholicism. 2006
Making A Place For Faith With a major grant from the Lilly Endowment, CTU’s Bernardin Center created a program for high school students, introducing them to rich social justice teaching and practice of Catholicism. 2007
Finding Common Ground One of the programs closest to the heart of Cardinal Bernardin’s was the Catholic Common Ground initiative, designed to reduce polarity within the Catholic community. In 2007 this signature program found its home in CTU’s Bernardin Center.
2011
Center For Study Of Consecrated Life Building on its history of collaboration among religious communities, CTU inaugurated a Center devoted to the study and advancement of religious life. 2019
The First Woman President On January 1, 2021, Sr. Barbara Reid, OP, became the first woman president in the history of CTU, serving as the eighth president of Catholic Theological Union and the first woman religious to lead the school of theology and ministry
THE BOTTOM LINE: THIS FUTURE POPE RECEIVED A HIGHLY UNUSUAL (M.DIV) SEMINARY EDUCATION IN A VERY INNOVATIVE INSTITUTION FOUNDED BY MEN'S RELIGIOUS ORDER IN A VERY URBAN AND ECUMENICAL CONTEXT. THAT IS UNLIKE 99.999... PERCENT OF PRIESTS AND BISHOPS.
THIS IS A VERY MODERN POST VATICAN II PERSON FROM THE VERY BEGINNING OF HIS PRIESTLY AND RELIGOUS FORMATION.
CTU is a great resource. I wish I had the leisure to pursue a degree there. Perhaps in a few years.
ReplyDeleteRev. Ed Foley, whose homily texts graced the Pray Tell Blog for years (and perhaps still do, although I see he isn't listed as one of their contributors), was on the faculty of CTU.
I also consider it notable that his undergraduate degree is in mathematics. He had attended a minor seminary in high school, but apparently was on the same track as other lay college students for undergrad. I'd like to know more about what that signifies; I interpret it to mean that he wasn't certain, during those years, which direction (holy orders or lay person) his life would take. But that is just my supposition; if the story is different, I'd like to know it.
ReplyDeleteStudents that I met as an undergraduate during the Vatican Council who had been to a minor seminary often had problems of immaturity with women and their own sexual identity. I am very glad I never went to a minor seminary.
DeleteVillanova was co-ed by the time Leo got there. It could have been that Augustinians by that time were encouraging their candidates to complete college before entering novitiate. When I was a Jesuit novice (Jesuits have high schools but not minor seminaries) novices with some college were definitely more mature than those directly out of high school. I suspect Jesuits might have been going in the direction of encouraging their candidates to go to a Jesuit college or university and even encouraging them to get a degree to get a secular job. Already at Saint John's divinity students were allowed to major in something other than philosophy as long as they took a philosophy minor.
Finally, Leo may have been repelled by what he found in the minor seminary, then decided to avoid the Augustinian college seminary (if one still existed) and got a math degree to keep his options open. Knowing that he would go to CTU, he might not have worried about theology formation.
FWIW, when I was at a Jesuit university (Loyola University Chicago) in the first half of the 1980s, among the individual colleges that the university comprised was an undergraduate seminary, but it was for diocesan priest candidates, not the Jesuits. I also met some Jesuit collegians (novices?) in my time in college, but I don't think they were enrolled in the seminary college. They may have been graduate students. The undergraduate seminary college (for the archdiocese) had its own campus, a few miles to the west of the campus that, in those days had the dorms for the lay women and men students - undoubtedly to shield the seminarians from temptation.
DeleteI don't really know how to gauge the significance of all this or understand what it portends for the Church worldwide.
ReplyDeleteI do think this Pope will have his hands full with American Catholics who disliked Francis.
Steve Bannon, a Catholic, says Leo is the worst possible choice for MAGA. I expect other MAGA Catholics like Newt Gingrich and Ted Cruz will also weigh in.
Another possible flashpoint is Leo's older brother, who posts noisy Trump nonsense on his FB page and says he disagrees with the pope "about a lot of things."
It's very clear that a significant number of MAGA Catholics want a crackdown on LGBT issues, which they see as the root of the clergy sex scandals, breakdown of traditional families, and "feminization" of society. Politics has become inextricably meshed with their fwith.
Maybe MAGA Catholics will begin to exit the Church for Evangelical congregations.
DeleteMore practically it looks likely that Leo will be around for at least a decade and that he will pursue policies like those of Francis. Conservative bishops and priests should see the handwriting on the wall and keep their disagreements to themselves. Leo was involved in the disciplining of Strickland.
He is likely to put a person like himself in as head of the dicastery that selects bishops. He will certainly be able to vet every appointment of an American bishop. The old guard of bishops might as well take early retirement. Not much hope of a course correction.
On the other hand, being committed to synodality, Leo will likely go easy on hot button internal issues like married priests and women deacons in the hope he can build consensus around peace, the environment, poverty, immigration, i.e. be the social teaching successor to Leo XIII.
Will local parishes free of strident conservative priests and members but having social teaching without any hope for women deacons and married priests be attractive to liberal Catholics? That remains to be seen.
I don't see the strident priests and members leaving for evangelical denominations. What has happened in the local parish--to risk generalizing from personal experience--is that very ultra-trad priests attract ultra-trad parishioners. Parishioners looking for a less trad priest move to other parishes. This kind of parish shopping has been going on a long time, but it seems meaner and more fraught now, with parishes positioning themselves with code words like "authentically Catholic."
DeleteLeo may hope he can keep everyone in the fold by finding that Golden Mean, but, as the Anglican Communion discovered many years ago, there is no pleasing some factions. Especially if Leo "packs the court," so to speak, with like-minded bishops.
Traditionalist Catholics thought Francis was actively antagonistic to them, especially in his efforts to restrict the Latin Mass after Benedict had loosened the rules. It's too soon to gauge what Leo's approach will be. Leo may be content to let them be.
DeleteYeah, like I said, I don't really understand all the nuances. In our area, it's less a matter of Latin Mass than insufficient adherence to rules like meatless Fridays, eating before Mass, incorrect rubrics, women wearing head coverings, allowing altar girls and female lectors, etc.
DeleteI do enjoy some of the local priest's more lurid FB posts like this one:
Angels Fight Demons for Us When We Pray
Demons are attracted to faithlessness, disorder, and the unclean. Warning of their ability to get to us when we are not disciplined, not paying attention, and not being vigilant in our watch against them, noted exorcist Fr. Chad Ripperger says, “Angels come wherever they are called, demons come wherever they are not resisted.” On this same subject of parallel distinctions between angels and demons, Fr. David Nix cautions, “When you say the name of Jesus in prayer, angels come to you and demons flee. When you misuse the name of Jesus, angels flee and demons come to you.”
Demons are real, and they are here. But God has not abandoned us to fight them on our own. Rather, He has given us His host of angels to fight with and for us. One incredible contemporary example of angels battling demons in defense of faithful Christians is when Boko Haram, a terrorist organization, was about to execute seventy-two Nigerian Christians by firing squad—and angels intervened. The terrorists had their rifles cocked and were preparing to take aim at the persecuted Christians, but suddenly they threw their weapons down and started violently grabbing at their own heads, screaming and shouting that they were covered with snakes. Some of them ran away, but others dropped dead where they stood.
One of the dying terrorists dropped his gun, and a Christian captive reached down to grab it, hoping to shoot at the fleeing Boko Haram militants and help the Christians escape, but the youngest child put her hand on his arm to stop him. “You don’t need to do that,” she said. “Can you not see the men in white fighting for us?”
All seventy-two captives survived and escaped.
What was happening in this instance? Demons were at work in the actions of the terrorist, ready to kill these Christians, even the little children, because of their faith. But just as the demons were present, so too, because of the faith and prayers of these Christians, were the angels present.
Fr. Ripperger warns of the constant dichotomy, the constant warring, between angelic and demonic forces: “Just as we have guardian angels assigned to us . . . Satan may likewise assign a demon, often to an entire family. Lesser demons are sent to tempt and open the door to higher demonic realms.” God gives us our guardian angels for many reasons, chief among them to ward off demons. Sometimes we visualize moral decision-making as a debate between a bad angel whispering in one ear and a good angel speaking wisely in the other, and there is a certain truth to this: according to St. Thomas Aquinas, one of the roles of the guardian angels is to fight off demons. St. John Bosco also speaks to this conflict and advises us to be bold in asking our angels for help: “When tempted, invoke your Angel. He is more eager to help you than you are to be helped!. . . Ignore the devil and do not be afraid of him: he trembles and flees at your Guardian Angel’s sight.” And as stated in the Baltimore Catechism, “Our guardian angels pray for us, protect and guide us, and offer our prayers, good works and desires to God.”
(A reflection from "Prayer As a Weapon" by Jesse Romeo)
I wondered about the minor seminary thing because I didn't think they were doing that any more. Or maybe it was like a couple of high schools in Omaha run by religious orders (Jesuits and Benedictines) that used to be seminary track, but now are just boys' prep schools.
DeleteI don't know if Leo will pick a fight with the Latin Mass crowd. I don't really think Francis accomplished anything by doing that. Seems like they could just treat like one of the uniate Eastern Rite churches such as the Ukrainian Catholics or the Syro Malabar in India.
About the lurid angels and demons stuff, I would be careful about anything Father David Nix is involved with.
DeleteHard for me to believe that anybody over age 12 goes for that sort of thing, but parishioners eat it up. Waiting for him to regurgitate one of Rod Dreher's stories about the guy who's had his wife exercised umpteen times. That's starting to look like spousal abuse to me.
DeleteI think if I were that wife I'd be exorcising myself out of the marriage.
DeleteI’ve tried to find anything that supports this mass demons leaving Bono Haram terrorists fable and found only one from some sort of evangelical group. I can’t believe your priest is spreading this drivel. Boko Haram is vicious and unbelievably cruel and has murdered hundreds, maybe thousands of Christians - but only one story( from a very suspect source) about this? Involving 72 Christians. Usually they kill a few at a time, sometimes a couple of dozen at once, so a planned execution of 72 would definitely have been a big story. This priest should be reported to his bishop unless the bishop is as bad as he is.
DeleteReported for what? He's packing them in up there.
DeleteOn another topic.
ReplyDeleteI ask your prayers for Betty. Her daughter just committed suicide. She was in her fifties with many health problems, many of them due to the genetic pattern that she shares with Betty. She recently got a diagnosis of breast cancer. We think it had likely spread far beyond. She had cancer when she was in high school. And over the course of her life had often threatened suicide. With developments in recent months, we thought this was likely.
Your prayers for me. Since I have never had children, this is not something that I can easily understand or help. We have next door neighbors who lost their daughter suddenly to a rare disease about two decades ago. They have never really gotten over it. But the mother came over and spent some time with Betty.
I am so sorry to hear that, Jack! Yes of course I'll pray for Betty. And also for you. You are doing a work of mercy by being there for Betty.
DeleteThere have been three suicides among my cousins' children. This will be a very hard time for both of you. I pray God to send you understanding comforters, grant you forbearance with each other, and bring you as much acceptance as can be found in a tragedy like this. I think the Church takes a less condemnatory view of suicide than it used to, and I pray for the kindest possible spiritual comfort.
DeleteJack, I am so sorry, for Betty's sake, her family's sake and your's. I will remember all of you, and Betty's daughter, in my prayer this evening.
DeleteVery sad to hear this. I have two cousins, one on both sides of my family, who lost their sons this way. My prayers are with Betty and you.
DeleteAbout 6 weeks ago my great- nephew was found dead , I believe at my nephews home ( his parents). He was my eldest sister’s grandson. The family has been silent about the cause of death. No memorial service. We were requested to not mention it on social media. He was using drugs, so it might have been an overdose. Or it might have been suicide. My niece was murdered and now her cousin’s son has also died under tragic circumstances.I sometimes think that while losing a child is usually the worst personal loss someone ever experiences, I also think that losing the child ( no matter how old) to suicide is worse because parents of suicides that I have known believe that they should have been able to see the danger and stop it. They often blame themselves which compounds the grief. Prayers for Betty and Jack.
DeleteRoss Douthat linked to this (conservative-Catholic) analysis of Pope Leo based on what is known of him through public statements, his Twitter account, and his performance as head of a Vatican dicastery.
ReplyDeletehttps://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2025/05/leo-xiv-man-priest-and-bishop-who-is-he.html?campaign_id=280&emc=edit_rd_20250513&instance_id=154463&nl=ross-douthat®i_id=87407961&segment_id=197880&user_id=7bba122dbc8acf5289c69a5c9f2867a2
My summary of that analysis is: Leo comes across as aligned with the church's traditional moral teaching; and aligned with Pope Francis on the church's social teaching. All in all, he seems moderately conservative (which probably makes him a centrist among the curia).
At least as portrayed in this analysis, he doesn't seem likely to be a reformer, although he seems open to the development of the church's teaching.
Most of the public comments so far from people who know him, praise him less for his innovative ideas than for his personal qualities like kindness, respect toward others, and his being more of a listener than a talker. How those qualities will translate into the papacy is yet to be seen, I think.
He is known not only for his kindness, respect, being a listener but also as one who runs a good meeting. That is why he likes synodality. He is also a hard worker who gets things done. So all the bureaucratic wheels may work better.
DeleteBut he is very intelligent so we are going to get a teaching Pope but not a philosophical one like JP2 or a theologian like B16 or a prophet and preacher like Francis.
I think he will be more like Augustine but an Augustine that synthesizes Catholic Social Teaching from Leo XIII down through Paul VI, JP2, B16, and Francis intending to expand and update this in light of our present digital revolution
"Pope Leo XIII addressed the social question in the context of the first great industrial revolution,” Leo XIV explained. “In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice and labor.”
That is a good decade of work, especially if he spends a lot of it in dialog with cardinals and bishops around the world.
Unless they are on the far right or far left, most people seem pretty happy to have the new pope. I think it is good that the conclave didn't drag on for too long of a time, it shows that they can reach a consensus when they need to. We are in kind of a honeymoon period; I'd be glad to see it last for awhile.
DeleteKatherine, interesting point on consensus among cardinals. A period with more unity and less drama is good for any enterprise!
DeleteI think Americans are always trying to "read" popes as if they were movie stars. Every utterance, every garment, every gesture, every friend, every familial relation, every domicile, every meal is parsed as if all these things would help us "know what he's really like" and thus predict the future direction of the Church and Universe.
Power and responsibility change people. I pray he is up to the challenge of preserving the Church and helping Catholics apply its teachings to the horrors of today and those horrors yet to come.
PS, Leo's brother Lou says he's going to tone down his social media posts. Hopefully other MAGA Catholics will follow his good example.
DeleteI take it as encouraging that the pope has MAGA family members and they're trying to give one another some grace. We've all had to walk that line to an extent.
Delete