This nonprofit corporation, organized exclusively for educational purposes, is devoted to the mission of Catherine of Siena Virtual College.

The mission of Catherine of Siena Virtual College is to provide gender-justice education for the purpose of promoting gender equality and empowering women to exercise their agency and leadership in society and religion.

We reach out to:

2. Women seeking self-empowerment and those training for leadership roles in society and religion with an emphasis upon the empowerment of women;

 

3. Men wishing to learn more about gender equity in society and religion and who want to equip themselves to better serve the collective and individual aspirations and needs of women within their church, society and the world.

USA Trustees

Janet Kalven

Janet is a feminist educator, author and activist with a long term commitment to the empowerment of women. Born in Chicago in 1913, her life spans most of the twentieth century.

She began her work as an educator in 1937 at the University of Chicago as a teaching assistant in the Great Books Program. In 1942, she joined the Grail, an international women's movement, rooted in Christian faith and committed to the transformation of the world into a global community of justice and peace. In 1944, she became a co-founder of Grailville Education and Conference Center in Loveland, Ohio, where she developed a series of residential programs, including the Grailville Year's School, Semester at Grailville for college women and Seminary Quarter at Grailville for women in graduate theological study. These alternative programs offered women a lively experiential education that enabled them to integrate a feminist spirituality with concerns for social justice, ecology and the arts, while earning college credits. As a member of the Grail Women Task Force, she continues to organize short-term institutes on feminist theology and spirituality.

In addition to her work at Grailville, from 1972 to 1986 she served as Associate Director of the Self-Directed Learning Program at the University of Dayton. She is co-author and co-editor of a number of books including: Your Daughters Shall Prophesy: Feminist Alternatives in Theological Education; Women's Spirit Bonding; and With Both Eyes Open: Seeing Beyond Gender. Her most recent book, published in 1999 by State University of New York Press, is Women Breaking Boundaries, A Grail Journey, 1940-1995, an insider's story of a group of women who have pioneered on many fronts from feminist theology to overseas service to sustainable life styles on threatened planet earth.

Sharon Caldwell

Sharon Calwell has served as a grant writer and fundraiser most of her professional life for a variety of organizations in the Greater Chicago area. She is the former former Director of Government Grants, YMCA/YWCA, Chicago and brings with her many important contacts in the Chicago area. Her long history of experience in this area and dedication to the cause of women's empowerment makes her an invaluable contributor to the work of Catherine of Siena Virtual College.

Dr. Joseph Martos

Joseph Martos is a retired professor of philosophy and theology who lives in Louisville, Kentucky. Born and raised in New York City, he attended Catholic grade school and high school before entering a seminary to study for the priesthood. Sent in 1964 to the North American College in Rome by the Diocese of Brooklyn, he attended the Gregorian University at a time when the Second Vatican Council was in session, giving him a solid grounding in both traditional and contemporary theology.

He returned to the United States without being ordained and continued his studies at Boston College, where he concentrated on the ideas of the Canadian Jesuit, Bernard Lonergan. Receiving a scholarship to DePaul University in Chicago, he completed his doctoral studies in classical and contemporary philosophy before writing his dissertation on Lonergan's proof for the existence of God.

Dr. Martos worked as a parish religious education director and high school religion teacher before receiving his first academic appointment at Briar Cliff University in Sioux City, Iowa. Asked to teach a course on the sacraments, he could not find a good textbook to use, so he wrote Doors to the Sacred: A Historical Introduction to Sacraments in the Catholic Church. First published in 1981, the book has been updated every ten years to take account of continuing developments in sacramental theology and practice.

After leaving Briar Cliff, he taught briefly at Xavier University in Cincinnati before moving in 1985 to DeSales University in Allentown, Pennsylvania, to chair the school's theology department. Invited in 1992 to Spalding University in Louisville, he was director of the Russell Institute of Religion and Ministry until the university discontinued all of its humanities programs in 2003. Since then he has continued to teach graduate theology courses during the summer while spending much of his time in business pursuits. He latest book is The Sacraments: An Interdisciplinary and Interactive Study.

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