The Church believes that God’s revelation comes to us through Sacred Scripture and Tradition. These
sources of truth offer us a dialogue between faith and reason, the fifth trait of our University.
The Catholic Church maintains a rich legacy of dialogue between human reason and faith in God’s
revelation that comes to us through Scripture, Tradition and the teachings of the Church’s magisterium.
Catholicism professes that what we believe in faith and what we discover by reason are not only
compatible but also mutually beneficial. God is the source of both faith and reason, and there is no
contradiction in God. Both faith and reason lead us to the one Truth who is God.
“As a Catholic university, we are motivated by the example of Jesus Christ, whose interaction in a human community reveals a deep respect for different and diverse people, especially those whose needs are the greatest.”
This spirit of dialogue extends to a dialogue between faith and culture. Since no single culture may
be identified with the “Kingdom of God,” we are committed to dialogue with diverse cultures and to
examine what society values in the light of God’s revelation. We acknowledge all expressions of beauty,
truth, and goodness as manifestations of God in our world. At the same time we accept the challenge
to speak to our society the truths it may not wish to hear, truths which will foster the authentic good
of both society and individuals.
In many universities, various disciplines engage in dialogue for their mutual enhancement. This is
also true at a Catholic university, where faith is considered an essential component of this dialogue.
Pope John Paul II has said that Catholic universities are “called to explore courageously the riches of
Revelation and of nature so that the united endeavor of intelligence and faith will enable people to
come to the full measure of their humanity created in the image and likeness of God, renewed even
more marvelously, after sin, in Christ, and called to shine forth in the light of the Spirit” (Ex corde
Ecclesiae, #5).
Gannon is challenged to be a community whose members discover truth by ardent development of faith and by rigorous exercise of reason. In the dialogue between faith and reason, important questions are considered:
- How is what I/we learn connected to God?
- How does any area of human knowledge contribute to issues of faith and human meaning?
- What does the Gospel say to our culture, our social groups, our methodology, and our
definitions of beauty, truth, and goodness?
- What questions do scientific research and advancement in human knowledge raise that need
to be addressed in the light of faith?
In the end, the purpose of a Catholic university is to freely search for, discover and communicate truth,
while knowing the Source of Truth.