DETROIT — Sacred Heart Major Seminary is continuing its outreach to the public through its massive open online courses with its “Encountering Christ” course, starting March 2.
The free online course is designed for the lay faithful of the Archdiocese of Detroit and those seeking to “Unleash the Gospel.”
The six-week course runs during Lent until April 12 and draws upon the principles of the Archdiocese of Detroit’s Parish Day of Renewal, which took place Nov. 15-16, said Dr. John Gresham, director of Distance Education and Online Learning at Sacred Heart.
“We are linking this course to the Parish Day of Renewal the archdiocese hosted,” Dr. Gresham said. “The last Parish Day of Renewal had ‘Encounter’ as the theme. So we picked up on that theme, and this online course is a way for those who attended that Parish Day of Renewal to move forward from that day.”
The course is comprised of six different modules, each taught by a Sacred Heart faculty member, delving into what it means to encounter Christ and have that encounter shape one’s life.
The modules will discuss encountering Christ in the Scriptures, the sacraments, the Examen prayer, in suffering, in the poor and insights from Pope Francis.
“Lent is a time to grow in our encounter with Christ, and this course focuses on that encounter through content in these different courses,” Dr. Gresham said. “We encounter Christ in the Scriptures, so we have a module on that. We have one module where we discuss encountering Him in the sacraments and one for through the poor. We encounter Jesus in the details of every day, so one of the modules focuses on the Examine prayer, which is a tool for us to find Jesus in our daily lives.”
“Encounter” is a word thrown around a lot in Catholic circles – the Archdiocese of Detroit’s model of evangelization is based on three stages: Encounter, Grow and Witness – and Dr. Gresham said the course will explain why such an encounter is crucial to Christian life.
“The encounter is rooted in a relationship with Christ,” Dr. Gresham said. “It is the foundation for everything else. Following Christ is not just following a bunch of rules, it is living in a personal relationship with Him. Another term would be exchange. We share ourselves with Christ, and He shares Himself with us.”
Sacred Heart introduced its first MOOC course, “ The Beauty of Belief,” last Lent and offered two more during the summer and Advent seasons. Dr. Gresham said each course has seen an average of 1,500 participants, and just like the prior courses, “Encountering Christ,” is free and requires no additional resources.
The course consists of weekly videos along with some interactive learning exercises and online discussion boards where students can share their observations.
“Students will come away with a better recognition of Christ’s presence in the Scriptures, the Sacrament and everyday life, and they will be better able to recognize His presence and respond to His presence.
“The whole idea of these free, online courses was to be our response to Archbishop (Allen H.) Vigneron’s letter, Unleash the Gospel, and we felt the need to go beyond our four-credit classes in order to reach a broader audience,” Dr. Gresham said of the MOOC courses. “This allows us to share the richness we have in terms of our faculty, their knowledge and teaching skills. We’re using our online technology to share our knowledge with the broader community, to form others to be missionary disciples.”
