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Bernadette McGonigle

Graduate

Bernadette McGonigle
"'Theology provides tools....to dig deeper within to find the resilience to keep on keeping on, so as to understand with a deep sense of peace what Julian of Norwich meant that “all shall be well all manner of thing shall be well”.' "

Why study theology? This is a question which many of us are asked as we embark on a course with the Priory Institute.  Underlying the question is a bemused assumption that theology is somehow not relevant to ‘real’ life.  I am an Irish lawyer with a background in human rights and I am currently studying at the Angelicum Pontifical University in Rome having received a fellowship to undertake a course in Interreligious Studies. I completed the Ba (Hons)Degree in Theology with the Priory last year.

As I continue to study theology in Rome during the Covid 19 Crisis, in an apartment near the Pope’s Basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano during lockdown, the relevance of my studies has been more beneficial that most other things I have studied in my life as the age old questions come to the fore, uninterrupted by the usual distractions of entertainment etc.   These questions search for meaning in life and to try and make sense of how that life unfolds around us.  Theology provides tools for grappling with those questions and to dig deeper within to find the resilience to keep on keeping on, so as to understand with a deep sense of peace what Julian of Norwich meant that “all shall be well all manner of thing shall be well”.  The Covid 19 crisis in addition to being a health crisis is also an existential crisis.  We learn we are not in control of our lives and we need to dig deep within ourselves to reconnect to the source of our being.  People with faith have the resources to do so, if they will.  My Catholic faith, nourished by my years of study with the Dominicans, in Dublin and in Rome, has given me a toolbox to help me cope and to stay grounded in these times.  I encourage others to study theology as they tread their own path in faith, hope and charity.

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Bernadette McGonigle

Presentation of Academic Awards 2023

  Dec 13, 2023
On 9 December the Priory Institute was delighted to host the Presentation of Academic Awards Read more.

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