PASOS Network at Dominican University
Advancing the Practice of Culturally Responsive Ministry in Higher Education
The PASOS Network is a national community of praxis that transforms higher education institutions to cultivate un protagonismo for the Church and society through culturally sustaining practices rooted in the faith traditions of Latine students and the communities from which they come. It fosters collegiality and creativity amongst Catholic institutions, especially those who are concerned with doing culturally responsive work through every practice that touches faith, justice and Catholic identity.
The PASOS Network emerges from the relationships, cultures, intellectual and theological frameworks of Latine and BIPOC young adults and those who have formed them. We constantly strive to root the ministry that we do at Dominican University, a Catholic, Hispanic-Serving Institution, in the community and cultural wealth of our Latine and BIPOC students. The PASOS Network emerges from this local reality and that of many other institutions like ours. We seek new ways of theologizing and ministering en conjunto. Our ministries support and form young adults as ecclesial agents, “the now of God.” To paraphrase St. Dominic, this kind of ‘soul care’ has an ultimate end of transforming Catholic higher education and the Church.
The five key elements of this model are:
- Pastoral. Enhancing culturally responsive ministry practices
- Acompanamiento. Rooting our ministries in theology of accompaniment
- Study. Fostering connections between study and prayer through scholarship
- Organizing. Strengthening collective power to create change for our institutions and the Church
- Synodality. Journeying together as one Church