St. Augustine College of South Africa’s core mission is to empower communities through enriching our students’ abilities to enact social change. Within the college, the Department of Theology emphasizes the exploration of the mystery revealed through the Trinity, thereby exploring humanity’s relationship to the divine, the divine’s relationship to the cosmos, and how this mystery compels humanity to enact social and ecological change. As such, our department is ecumenically Catholic with a focus on Catholic Social Teaching and, more broadly, Christianity’s impetus towards social justice. We welcome all faith traditions and Christian denominations in pursuit of self- and community empowerment, and our courses embrace the ethos of unity in diversity from both a faith-based and cultural perspective.
Our student body is a plurality of different faith traditions and cultures, which is why we call ourselves ecumenically Catholic: though our foundation is the Catholic theological tradition, it expands to embrace various theological perspectives. This furthers our burgeoning decolonial and liberation theological impetus towards social transformation while also enriching the Catholic theological tradition which guides our department.
As a postgraduate student at St. Augustine College, you will receive a holistic theological education through our broad curriculum but will also have the opportunity to focus on your own interests through your research project, which is required for all degrees. This facilitates knowledge of an array of theological traditions and emphasizes the interrelated nature of each aspect of theology, from spirituality to systematic theology.
Furthermore, we have an interdisciplinary mindset in that our courses integrate rationalities across academia and cultures. Thus, as a graduate of St. Augustine College, you will recognize that theology is not an island, that it must dialogue with other academic disciplines and rationalities to better empower the life of faith of persons and communities. This furthers St. Augustine College’s mission toward enhancing and enabling social justice.