In Fall 2020, over 175 students participated in a wide array of Social Concerns Seminars despite the travel restrictions caused by the coronavirus. Instead of the usual experience of encounter through week-long fall break immersions, students took their learning and worked together to develop initiatives aimed at engaging the campus community in critical issues related to justice and the Catholic Social Tradition. These are some of those projects.
Act Justly: Racial Justice in America
In the Act Justly seminar, students read deeply from writers across the span of American history, engaged in community reflection and analysis, and developed an initiative which invites engagement from our Notre Dame community. Projects focused on lifting up the call to racial justice, specifically within our campus community.
Community Health and the Common Good
In Community Health and the Common Good, students examined healthcare, and the social determinants of health, through the lens of CST and designed projects to highlight ways we might together advocate for human and community flourishing.
Energy Climate and Social Change
Caring for Creation is a fundamental commitment of CST and these projects deal with a variety of ways climate change and environmental injustice create obstacles to our common call to care for the Earth. They call each of us to examine our shared responsibility to envision new ways of being in the world.
Gospel of Life
Throughout this seminar, students read and reflected on a consistent ethic of life and became familiar with various life issues (end of life, bioethics, creation care, a full concept of being pro-life, etc.) through readings, lectures, and by meeting people who work on life-related issues.