Online Courses

CAST 3021-WB (WMST 3513-WB) Modern Women of Faith
The course focuses on the question of what it means to be women of faith, by considering the example of several Catholic women who have lived exemplary, faith-filled lives in a way that has challenged conventional expectations of women on the part of society. In view of their examples, students are encouraged to identify and consider the characteristics of an authentic, faith-filled, Catholic feminism. 3 credits

CAST 3023-WB (PHYS 3103-WB) The Popes and Science
This course is designed to introduce students to Papal teaching on the relations between Christian Faith and natural science and also to serve as a foundation for further study of faith and reason. The course aims to explore the impact of the Popes on the development of modern science. 3 credits

CAST 3025-WB (HSTD 6834-WB) The New Jersey Catholic Experience
This course is designed to provide the student with a detailed knowledge of how the Catholic Church developed within the context of New Jersey and American history over the past three centuries. The story of a distinctive Catholic experience has many dimensions which will be described not only through major milestones and eras, but through a growing socio-religious perspective which includes the laity, religious leaders, and key individuals who contributed to the legacy of their faith statewide. 3 credits

CAST 3004 Catholic Theology of Science
The history of science is often told as a chronological account of practical and theoretical developments from antiquity to modern times. Because of the modern assumption that science and religion have no relation, the theological influences of religions in various cultures are often ignored, or they are interpreted according to the historian’s biases, which is difficult to avoid. The worldview instilled by theologies, however, influenced how people of different cultures fundamentally understood the universe, so the fuller consideration of the history of science is the consideration of the theological history of science. In this course, the students will read a variety of writings with differing opinions and original sources. Cultures/periods will be treated in this order: Egypt, China, India, Babylonia, Greece, Arabia, Biblical cultures, early Christianity, European Middle Ages, and the Scientific Revolution. 3 credits

CAST 3024 The Literature of Catholic Conversion
This course is designed to help students to understand and to explore the experience of voluntary conversion in the Catholic tradition. Beginning with conversion even before Christianity with the story of Moses, moving through the New Testament and St. Augustine to later converts like John Henry Cardinal Newman and Dorothy Day, the course examines the nature of conversion, what led to it in each case, and the impact on the life of the converted and his or her society. 3 credits

CAST 3003 Creation and Science
This course seeks to deepen a student’s understanding of the relationship between the Catholic theology of creation and contemporary empirical science. Topics to be covered include the birth of science; the historical-philosophical environment of this birth; the interventions of recent Popes on the issue; the specificity of the cosmos as shown by current science; the unity of the cosmos and its beauty; the importance of philosophical realism; the doctrine of creation ex nihilo et cum tempore; the theory of the Big Bang; and the theory of evolution. Primary sources will be emphasized. 3 credits

CAST 3016 Global Christianity
This course explores the distinctive characteristics of non - western forms of Christianity in the Middle East and Egypt, Africa, the Caucasus, Central Asia, India, China and Latin America and the recent spread of western forms of Christianity into non-western cultures from an inter- disciplinary, historical and theological perspective. 3 credits

CAST 3026 (CORE 3763) The Human Person in Faith and
Fashion: A Catholic Perspective
The course looks at the age-old question, what it means to be a human person. The course explores this question by analyzing three views: [1] the human person in the image of God in the Catholic Intellectual Tradition, [2] the human person in the image of self, as defined by other schools of thought, and [3] the human person in the image of fashion (person as portrayed by the fashion media). We will look at fashion images as a visual language and evaluate what it communicates about men and women. The course will also explore the impact of the three views or personhood on culture at-large. 3 credit