At St. Bernard’s, sanctity and union with God are at the heart of our academic formation.
We strive to pursue a kneeling theology that both contemplates the mysteries of our faith, while simultaneously inviting conversion of heart and mind to full communion with God.
Following our patron, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, and our one-time Chancellor, Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, our programs seek to develop an approach to theology and philosophy that not only inform our students, but transform them in light of the mystery of God in Jesus Christ.
St. Bernard’s chapel is just steps away from our classrooms, allowing for a fostering of devotion and spirituality in congruence with our students’ theological and philosophical formation. Likewise all full-time faculty have the mandatum, “an acknowledgment by Church authority that a Catholic professor of a theological discipline is teaching within the full communion of the Catholic Church" (Guidelines Concerning the Academic Mandatum).
Furthermore, the institutional commitment of an educational institution to its Catholic identity always includes a close and essential relationship with its diocesan bishop. St. Bernard’s has enjoyed this throughout its history, currently with the Bishop of Rochester as its Chancellor, and lately with the Bishops of Albany and Syracuse, New York, and Allentown, Pennsylvania. Their leadership, guidance, and collaboration are invaluable to St. Bernard’s and serve as living examples of the intention of Pope St. John Paul II’s apostolic exhortation, Ex Corde Ecclesiae (see §28).
