With complete confidence and faith in Almighty God the Holy Trinity, Giver of all good and perfect gifts, St. Sophia Ukrainian Orthodox Theological Seminary will begin its fourty-sixth academic year in autumn 2020. The seminary, in addition to being a training ground for future clergy, serves as the center of the spiritual and intellectual life of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church here and abroad - a model of our Orthodox Christian faith.
St. Sophia Seminary is a self-renewing community, a network of interpersonal relations reflecting thefundamental unity of faith and love that comes only from the Holy Spirit and links the seminary to the larger communities of Church and world. As a particular community of persons, a community of faith, an apostolic community, and an academic community, St. Sophia Seminary offers a specific challenge to men and women of good will who wish to serve Christ and His people at a more conscious and intimate level.
The primary, though not exclusive, goal of this seminary is to help form and train true Orthodox pastors, teachers, and leaders of the people of God who follow the example set by our Lord God and Saviour, Jesus Christ, in His own earthly ministry. Through a program of professional education, spiritual growth, vocational awakening, the following objectives are set before the student:
- A deepening of one's own personal Orthodox Christian experience and commitment to more profound service in the Lord's vineyard;
- A vivid awareness of the contemporary world in which God works with and through people of faith;
- A growing understanding of the Orthodox faith through critical theological reflection and liturgical praise;
- An awareness of the nature of Orthodox Christian priesthood and diaconate and cultivation of the vocation of those men called to these holy orders;
- An integration of one's theological understanding and worldview with one's own life in Christ;
- An appreciation of the Ukrainian Orthodox ethos and polity and our Church's salvific mission in the modern world.
