Pope: Church needs university dedicated to educating missionaries

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- While expert scholarship and good stewardship mean the pontifical universities in Rome should be working together, Pope Francis said it is essential that the Pontifical Urbanian University does not lose its centuries-long focus on preparing missionaries from and to the varied cultures of the world.

In fact, he said Aug. 30, it is important that the university's "missionary and intercultural specificity be seen even more clearly in the quality of the formation that it offers, so that its graduates can be creative in mediating the Christian message vis-à-vis other cultures and religions."

"How greatly we need priests, consecrated persons and lay people filled with missionary zeal for evangelizing cultures and thus inculturating the Gospel! These two things always go together: the evangelization of culture and the inculturation of the Gospel," Pope Francis told members of the section of the Dicastery for Evangelization responsible for the university and for what are traditionally known as the church's mission territories.

The members -- cardinals, bishops and men and women religious from every continent -- were holding a special plenary session at the Vatican Aug. 29-30 to focus specifically on the university, which grew out of the Urban College, founded in 1627 to train missionaries.

According to the latest information published by the conference of rectors of the pontifical universities in Rome, the Urbanian had 1,357 students from 102 nations enrolled for the 2021-22 academic year. According to Fides, the dicastery's news agency, most of the students are receiving scholarships from the Dicastery for Evangelization.

Fides reported Aug. 29 that a reorganization of staff was already underway. At the beginning of the 2023-24 academic year, it said, the university had 62 "full" and 113 "adjunct" or "visiting" professors. After an evaluation of the courses offered and the number of students enrolled in each class, Fides said that for the 2024-25 academic year there will be 47 "full" and 40 "adjunct" or "visiting" lecturers.

After three Jesuit-run institutions of higher learning in Rome -- the Pontifical Gregorian University, the Pontifical Biblical Institute and the Pontifical Oriental Institute -- formally became one university at the pope's request in May, he said some people thought the Urbanian was about to be "blended" into another university, but that is not true.

"The inspiration and needs that led to the foundation of the university remain as timely as ever," the pope said, but "this heritage needs to find contemporary expression in efforts to respond to the challenges presently facing the church and our world."

"We do not live in a Christian society," he said, "but we are called to live as Christians in today's pluralistic society -- as Christians and open to others."