For more than forty years, Catholic Theological Union (CTU) at Chicago has been educating and preparing men and women to serve God’s people throughout the world. Founded in 1968 in the spirit and vision of the Second Vatican Council, CTU has grown to be the largest Roman Catholic graduate school of theology and ministry in the United States.
Since its inception, CTU has been blessed with a rich diversity reflecting the global church itself: a student body representing forty-six countries worldwide; religious order seminarians and lay women and men; students of varying ages and backgrounds. Its distinguished Catholic faculty also includes scholars from the Protestant, Jewish, and Muslim traditions. And over the years CTU’s programs have expanded to address the intercultural needs of the Church in an increasingly global society.
CTU alums now number 3,500, serving the Church across the United States and in sixty-five countries worldwide. They work in parishes, homeless shelters, prisons, hospitals, schools, colleges and universities, gang ministry, hospices, social service organizations, and myriad other ministry settings.
CTU is also the home of the Bernardin Center of Theology and Ministry, where the ideas and spirituality of Cardinal Joseph Bernardin flourish through scholarships, seminars, lectures, and a full array of programs which focus on Cardinal Bernardin’s signature issues, including reconciliation and peacemaking, the consistent ethic of life, youth and young adults, and interreligious dialogue.
Our Mission
The mission of Catholic Theological Union is to prepare effective leaders for the Church, ready to witness to Christ’s good news of justice, love, and peace.
OUR VISION
In concert with our sponsoring religious communities, our founding mission is the academic and pastoral preparation of religious order candidates for the ordained priesthood and support for the formation and continuing education efforts of these religious communities.
Moreover, as a Roman Catholic graduate school of theology and ministry, we are dedicated to offering quality theological education and ongoing formation for laity, religious, and clergy who are preparing for or who are already engaged in ministry in the United States and around the world.
As an inter-cultural community of faith and learning, we seek to bring the richness of the Roman Catholic tradition, teaching, and practice to our students, to the broader Church, and to the public. We accomplish this through our graduate degree programs, our faculty, our programs for youth and young adults, and a variety of other educational opportunities and resources.
In communion with the Church, we are committed to ecumenism as well as interreligious dialogue, particularly with the Jewish and Muslim communities, and we welcome students from those communities who are seeking to study in a Catholic context.
We strive to accomplish this mission in a community environment composed of religious, clergy, and lay women and men who mirror the local and global Catholic Church in all its vibrant diversity.
