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Vision Statement
Mission Statement
New Man
New Humanity
Integral Education

PREAMBLE TO KOLBE MISSION

According to Pope John Paul II:

In revealing the mystery of the Trinity, Christ, "fully reveals man to himself and brings to light his most high calling" (Redemptor Hominis [8]).

Pope Benedict XVI also recognized this supreme and essential truth regarding the Trinitarian dimension of human existence. He reminded future builders of a new social order that the mystery of man made to the image of the Holy Trinity occupies a preeminent position as the necessary preamble to any program aimed at successful political, economic and social renewal (Vatican City, Apr 14, 2008).

"Certainly, joint action on a political, economic and juridical level is needed but, even before that, it is necessary to reflect together on a moral and spiritual level. What is ever more vital is to promote a 'new humanism'", a humanism rooted in the mystery of the Holy Trinity.

Pope Francis has likewise highlighted the universal nature of this primordial truth:

"The Trinity has left its mark on all creation."

Consequently, the reigning pontiff exhorts Christian men and women, especially those involved in social renewal to

"Read reality in a Trinitarian key" (Laudato Si, para 239).

Francis points out that every human being is "imprinted" with a "trinitarian dynamism" that "God imprinted in them when they were created."

"Everything", he says is "interconnected" and

"This invites us to develop a spirituality of that global solidarity which flows from the mystery of the Trinity ((Laudato Si, para 240)"

Cognizant of the fact that the mystery of Holy Trinity is the primordial fact written into all of creation, including that of the human body and spiritual soul, further cognizant of the corollary fact that successful social-political-economic development (global solidarity) depends upon successful individual human development,

THE KOLBE FOUNDATION was incorporated in 1997 as a 501 (c)(3) non-profit foundation committed to social, economic, and political renewal of the temporal order through developing, facilitating and providing integral education, education devoted to the pursuit and acquisition of "speculative wisdom" enhanced by "practical" social action faitful to the Trinitarian dimensions of both man and society.

VISION: Integral Education for a New Man and a New Humanity

MISSION: The Kolbe Foundation exists to promote political, economic and social renewal of the temporal order through educational programs that contribute to integral human and social development.

Because the Trinitarian image is a species specific potency written into the depths of the human soul, it is the fundamental dimension of human existence; it therefore informs all the educational and social works of The Kolbe Foundation.

In the Spirit of St. Maximilian Kolbe, and guided by the virtue of justice and the precept of charity, The Kolbe Foundation is committed to educating and forming high school students, college students and adult men and women for successful work in the social apostolate thereby contributing to authentic economic, political and social renewal, renewal devoted to the "common good", the good of all men and women, both as individuals and in community, so that there may be peace on earth, an "Era of Peace" as promised by the Virgin Mary at Fatima.

Unless the LORD build the house, they labor in vain who build" (Psalm 127:1).

HOUSE OF STUDIES

The Kolbe House of Studies is a response to the call of the Church to establish Centers of Higher Education to prepare spiritually mature and professionally competent men and women for the work of temporal renewal of the social order. In essence, the House of Studies exists to educate and form men and women for the work of economic, political, cultural and Christian social renewal of West Texas and to contribute to the broader renewal of the United States by fulfilling the following objectives:

Mission OBJECTIVES:

1. Cultivating a love of learning and an ever deepening knowledge and understanding of the truth of Catholic Faith and Life.

2. Inspiring mastery of the Church’s social magisterium and of contemporary national and international politics in the context of naturally acquired and divinely revealed truths impacting the legal, political, economic and social-cultural structures and forms of society.

3. Providing higher education in the liberal arts and humanities that promotes development of the intellectual skills of thinking and communicating that will enable graduates to meaningfully contribute to the work of social renewal.

4. Developing and implementing a well ordered curriculum and pedagogy cognizant of the unique educational and pastoral dimensions of the contemporary world and oriented to truths grasped by faith and reason with special reference to their expression in Kolbe’s Greatest Books of Christian Civilization.

5. Teaching participants to contribute as generous citizens to the Church and Society just as Jesus served to foster the life, unity, and solidarity of humanity.

NEW MAN

By new man, we mean each individual person formed to the image of God and cognizant of this dignity. A new man is one who is in communion with others because he is first in communion with God and himself. He is fully aware of his vast human potential and has respect for the freedom to develop this potential in a lifelong pursuit of happiness.

A new man is a loving person who has knowledge and understanding of his human nature. This knowledge begins with his anatomical structure and physiological processes. He masters and enjoys the experience of his emotional life and understands the relationship it has to his mental and spiritual life. He is aware of his powers for memory, imagination, rational thought and the volition of his will. He understands the interiorization of culture and socio-cultural development as well as the need for political participation as fundamental parts of personal human development.

Above all, a new man is cognizant of the mystery of the Trinitarian image and likeness he bears in body and soul, which constitute the ontological root and basis of all that he chooses to do and become. Chief among these choices is the internal actualization of his own human potential for divinization as a member of the Body of Christ and the congruent external development of the social/cultural structures and norms that promote his own authentic human development and that of others with whom he must participate to achieve his actualization and that of the greater social body of which he is an integral part.

In short, a new man is an integral being composed of physical, emotional, moral, intellectual, spiritual, volitional, socio-cultural, political and aesthetic potentials each requiring proper nourishment and proper symbiotic balance as a synergistic whole appreciative of, and properly equipped for, his freedom to pursue happiness.

NEW HUMANITY

A new man cannot be developed in isolation from fellow human beings. The two, new man and new humanity, are inconceivable as separate entities. The Trinitarian mystery of human nature requires that the individual and communal aspects of human being be considered and developed together as an ontological fact, the fundamental datum, of human existence. Thus, a new humanity connotes all that is personally internal considered in nexus with all that is external, that is the political, economic and social structures as well as the cultural values, ideas, and beliefs that, together with the former, are summed up in the word "civilization".

A new humanity is a diverse, albeit flawed, global community united in justice, love, knowledge, understanding and wisdom thereby providing, as best as possible, the political and economic means necessary for authentic human development.

INTEGRAL EDUCATION

Integral education endeavors to understand and contribute to the unfolding of human potential and authentic human development including its intellectual, moral, physical, cultural, social, aesthetic, and spiritual dimensions.

Integral education also implies the use of an integral methodology that synthesizes faith and reason resulting in a broad ordering and integral cooperation among the disciplines to achieve the synergistic benefits of a unified curriculum distinct from partial benefits when the disciplines are separated and research conducted piecemeal.

Our approach to educational questions about the cosmos, about nature, about God and about human nature proceed from the integral cooperation of empirical science, philosophical reason, and revealed theological principles of faith.