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Institute for Pastoral Initiatives News

Experiences of Faith shared worldwide

Former VLCFF student Dr. Warlito Borja shares his University of Dayton experience from his home in Belgium:

What did you learn from the Virtual Learning Community for Faith Formation?

My experience of being a student with VLCFF taught me to appreciate the faith from different perspectives. I began to appreciate the faith from the lens of believers coming from different cultural and faith backgrounds. The VLCFF experience exposed me to the different languages of people's faith.

How did you transition to facilitator (instructor) with VLCFF?

My journey from a student to a facilitator is like a Pentecost experience. When I started with Dayton as a student, I was already a doctor of theology. Like the disciples, during Pentecost, I already knew the Lord and I already had a personal and deep experience with Him, but, I still needed to receive the Holy Spirit to be able to proclaim the Lord to all the nations. So, now, as I facilitate, I use these different faith languages to guide and form other faith formators so that they too can experience that Pentecost.

Of course, as a facilitator, I keep on acquiring new faith languages as I journey with fellow faith formators towards appreciating our faith better and learning how to appropriately share it to other people as well.  

What inspires you the most about sharing your knowledge online? 

It brings me a lot of joy to know that, by facilitating courses through VLCFF, I am able to share my understanding and appreciation of the faith to people all over the world. It is also a blessing to be able to guide and form fellow faith formators. At the top of it all, my facilitating experience has also deepened my faith and has broadened my appreciation of it through the minds and hearts of my fellow faith formators whose experience and exercise of the faith is simply enriching and invigorating.   

Congratulations on your Deacon ordination. How did University of Dayton VLCFF play a part in this?

I see my ordination to the diaconate as a bridge between the laity and the clergy in the world of faith formation. Most of the time, there is this gap that hinders a good working relationship between an informed laity and the clergy. By being an ordained minister and at the same time a married theologian, I am able to be in both shoes.

The University of Dayton gave me that platform to bridge that gap. Unlike the platform I get within my academic community with conferences and symposia, the level of faith conversation I get from the Dayton online platform is on the level of lived faith, faith in practice. This makes it very enriching. 

To start your faith journey, simple create a profile and register for a course. The next cycle of year-round VLCFF classes will begin March 7.  See the list of courses and calendar.  

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