A Message from the President

Before it was a place name, providence was a theological term denoting God’s loving plan to bring each created being into fulfillment. Thus the name Providence College does not merely reflect the location of the school, but rather its deepest mission: to provide an environment where each person created in the image and likeness of God comes to understand his or her identity and role in God’s plan for us.

As you pursue your graduate studies at Providence College, we encourage you to make the best possible decisions for fulfilling your role within God’s plan. As a Catholic college rooted in the 800-year-old Dominican tradition, we spur you to ask tough questions, weigh competing arguments, and integrate diverse perspectives. In short, we challenge you to constantly seek the truth.

Whether you pursue your graduate degree in preparation for a new professional challenge or to enhance your current career, I welcome you—in the intellectual tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas—to embrace faith and reason as compatible and complementary elements in the lively debate that is Catholic and Dominican higher education.

It is my sincere hope that your graduate studies at Providence College—together with the gift of God’s grace—will enable and inspire you to be a prophetic agent of social change, transforming both yourself and society through the contemplation of truth.

I invite you to join us and experience your providence.

Rev. Brian J. Shanley, O.P., Ph.D.
President

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