FOCUS Brings Ministry to 153 Campuses
DENVER, Colo. – This fall, college students will develop relationships that impact their lives while on campus and for many years afterward.
Missionaries with the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS) invite them to participate in campus ministry events and deepen their faith by encountering Christ in the sacraments and in their daily lives. For many, these relationships guide decisions to live virtuously and seek eternal joy over the temporary pleasures sometimes associated with campus life.
Through God’s grace and the support of generous benefactors, nearly 700 missionaries are now serving on 153 college campuses, with 19 new campuses welcoming FOCUS teams, including Rice University, Texas Tech University, the University of Iowa and University of Louisville.
New Opportunities
With this year’s expansion, FOCUS teams will serve in 12 new dioceses in the U.S., including two in new states with the University of Utah and University of South Carolina. The new campuses will give FOCUS the opportunity to reach 400,000 new young people who attend these schools.
“We are delighted to welcome FOCUS to the Diocese of Salt Lake City,” said Bishop Oscar A. Solis. “It is a blessing to have faith-filled and dedicated missionaries to be our partners in the mission of evangelization.
“They will be a blessing to many students in the University of Utah and young adults at St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Newman Center, a source of inspiration as they witness their Catholic faith and share the Gospel of Christ with great conviction, enthusiasm and joy. We are grateful to God for this blessing and thankful to FOCUS.”
Father Lukasz Misko, O.P., the chaplain at the St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Newman Center, said, “It’s hard to believe FOCUS has been here only a month! Our missionaries are already friends with dozens of students at the Newman Center and on campus.
“Most importantly for me, they’ve found a beautiful, organic way to work with our leaders and the existing programs to add freshness and evangelical joy to them. I recommend FOCUS to any campus ministry that wants to go from good to great.”
The new campuses include 12 Division I campuses, for a total of 112 Division I campuses that FOCUS serves. It also includes one new Ivy League campus, University of Pennsylvania, increasing the total to four Ivy League campuses served by FOCUS (Harvard University, Columbia University and Brown University are the other three).
The expansion includes a new international campus, University of Passau in Passau, Germany. In addition, FOCUS will continue to serve on two campuses in Austria, one in Ireland and one in England.
For information on all 153 FOCUS campuses, go to focusoncampus.org.