St. Patrick’s Seminary & University in Menlo Park, CA announces the addition of well-known and experienced Catholic apologist Mr. Patrick Madrid to the faculty in Fall 2018. Seminarians will learn from Mr. Madrid’s many years of experience as an apologist, author, and professor of theology and apologetics. Mr. Madrid shares: “I’m excited and looking forward to teaching Saint Patrick’s seminarians the art of apologetics because priests have to deal with countless faith-related questions, doubts, and challenges that negatively impact lay people.”
As appropriate for an institution in the heart of the Silicon Valley, STPSU will take advantage of the resources of technology for this partnership: while seminarians will meet together in the classroom at the Seminary, Mr. Madrid will join the class via video conferencing technology. This synchronous learning will allow a high level of interaction among the seminarians and with Mr. Madrid.
In this course, Mr. Madrid will guide seminarians through some of the prevalent challenges to our Catholic faith and coach them to respond appropriately. Such formation is essential to our future priests who are charged with evangelizing the world. As Mr. Madrid notes: “Knowing how to engage effectively in apologetics—especially nowadays, as secularism, atheism, and scientism are becoming increasingly popular worldviews—is a necessary component in modern priestly formation.”
Academic Dean Dr. Karen C. Chan explains that this course in Apologetics comes toward the end of the seminarian’s theological formation, after he has received a solid theological foundation: “In order to explain, defend, and pass on the faith to others, our future priests need more than short sound bites. They need not only to understand the contemporary critiques and their roots but also to respond by embodying the wisdom and beauty of the Church. This can be done most truly when seminarians drink deeply from the Catholic tradition.”