Austria Summer Experience

Taught by psychologist Matthew Breuninger and philosopher Brandon Dahm

• The virtue tradition says that growing in virtue is like learning a skill. In this class, we learn a skill together: how to make a good loaf of sourdough bread. We mix, shape, and bake many loaves as we practice the art of breadmaking. As we bake, the professors teach and lead discussions on the philosophy, psychology, and theology of virtue formation. The class also visits a local bakery one morning and helps make pizza from their dough for all of the students one evening.
• Read more about the bread class in this article from Franciscan Magazine.

Simon Kyne

This hands-on summer course introduces students and aspiring entrepreneurs to a Christ-centered approach to innovation, business, and leadership. Participants will learn how to identify market opportunities, develop a business model, create go-to-market strategies, manage operations and finances, and build a strong brand while developing a business plan for a new coffee roasting venture at the Gaming campus.

Inspired by the motto Verso l’Alto! (“To the heights”) and the example of St. Pier Giorgio Frassati, the course connects practical entrepreneurship with purpose-driven leadership, collaboration, vocation, and service to God and the common good. Bring your ideas, vocation and entrepreneurial spirit to Austria!

Taught by Matthew Sanders, founder of Magisterium AI,

With guests philosopher, Javier Carreño, and AI ethics expert Fr. Michael Baggot

Artificial intelligence will be “10 times bigger than the Industrial Revolution, and maybe 10 times faster,” says Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind. This course, taught by Magisterium AI founder Matthew Harvey Sanders, will help students understand that change and what it asks of Catholics.

Through practical exercises and discussion, including demonstrations of Magisterium AI and other leading systems, students will develop a clearer understanding of how AI works, how it will reshape work and daily life over the next two, five, and ten years, and why everyone needs to grasp those changes now.

That foundation will ground our larger questions: What makes Catholic AI different from secular AI, and why is it necessary, and increasingly so? How should AI change the way we learn, work, and create as Catholics?

With faculty conversation partner Javier Carreño, we will draw on philosophy, theology, and the Catholic liberal-arts tradition to consider how these technologies can serve genuine human flourishing. During the final week of the course, Fr. Michael Baggot will join to add his expertise about the ethics of AI.

Fr. Matthew Russick, TOR, and Fr. Patrick Whittle, TOR

Spend three weeks in Austria living and learning the stories and practices of Franciscan spirituality with two Franciscan friars. This course will teach you through immersion in prayer and fraternal commitments, including daily morning and evening prayer of the Liturgy of the Hours, daily Mass, adoration, and regular fellowship and discussion.

The course will introduce the students to the penitential tradition at the foundation of the Franciscan Third Order through reflection on the life and writings of St. Francis of Assis and the saints and blessed of the Third Order. The course offers the opportunity to adopt a rhythm of life that encourages appreciation of this tradition and encourages transformation by beginning again.

Logan Gage

The Catholic Tradition teaches that all things reflect the beauty of God. But what does it mean that God is beautiful, and what does it mean to be beautiful by participation in God?

This course explores these questions and both theoretical and practical answers to them. In addition to reading about what beauty is, students will encounter beauty in the 14th century monastery, in the foothills of the Alps, at adoration, in the experience of poetry, literature, philosophy, and theology, in a museum in Vienna, and in the friendships they form.

Beauty wounds and brings about conversion, and the community of the class will walk the path of the way of beauty – the via pulchritudinis – back to knowledge, awareness, and union with God. This class is the first on-ground course offered for our Masters in Catholic Studies, but it will also be cross listed as an undergraduate course.

Claire Newton and Marisa Lilje

Join Claire Mary Newton and Marisa Lilje, both lifelong artists, as they wander into the Austrian countryside to capture the astounding beauty that is God’s creation. Every day we will tackle artistic themes of light, form, value, color, composition as we also delve into what holds each of us back.

What preconceptions do we bring to the easel? How do we shed those so we can fully engage with the majesty of this world in the light of day? Structured lessons, lively discussion and lots of outdoor time with paints in hand define these three weeks learning about ourselves, our palettes, and our stunning surroundings.