The Religious Studies Department identifies religion as a constitutive feature of human experience whose study fosters the intellectual, moral, and spiritual development of our students. Therefore, the Department invites students to a critical and appreciative engagement with the myriad expressions of religion. Further, the Department is committed to educate students to work for the integrity of creation, justice, and the reduction of violence in our world.

The Department of Religious Studies strives to:

1. engage students in a critical synthesis of faith and reason as an integral part of a liberal arts education in the Catholic intellectual tradition;
2. develop a sense of religion as a multi-cultural phenomenon while fostering the skills necessary for understanding and relating to the religious diversity of the 21st Century with tolerance and appreciation;
3. introduce students to the broad spectrum of approaches which comprise the academic study of religion: spirituality, ethics, history, sacred literature, and theology

The Department of Religious studies is the academic discipline which explicitly serves the fundamental identity of Iona College in light of its mission as an institution in the tradition of the Christian Brothers and American Catholic higher education.

Rev. 4.20.07; 3.9.10; 10.4.10

Revision adopted 10.18.12 in response to new College Mission Statement 5.2.12.

(Revised, Februrary 2013)