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Building Campaign
We are building a new state-of-the-art academic center and theological library and we need your support. To learn more or to make a donation to our building campaign please contact us by email
or by phone at (202) 529-5300 ext. 120
Fr. Joseph Fox, O.P., Vice President for Advancement
487 Michigan Ave. NE; Washington DC 20017
or visit the Dominican Foundation. To make a contribution online please visit our campaign page here.
New Leadership and Laying of a New Cornerstone at the Pontifical Faculty
"What is this Day?"
Washington, DC–Saturday, September 8th, 2007 the Dominican Friars installed new leaders at the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception. It is one of the seven pontifical faculties of theology in the United States. The installation was also the occasion for the solemn laying of the cornerstone of the new, $18M, academic center currently under construction. The academic center will house the Dominicans’ theological library, as well as the administrative offices and classrooms of the pontifical faculty.
Father Dominic Izzo, O.P., provincial superior of the Dominicans in Washington stated, “We are proud to be installing Dominican Fathers Steven Boguslawski, Gabriel O’Donnell and Joseph Fox as the new leaders of our pontifical faculty. The Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception has an outstanding tradition of academic quality and education. We look forward to continuing and developing its well-deserved reputation by new academic programs and strategic partnerships with other ecclesiastical institutions.”
The ceremony of laying the cornerstone to the new addition was presided by Archbishop Pietro Sambi, the Vatican Ambassador to the United States. The Mass and installation were celebrated by the Most Reverend Donald W. Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington in the chapel of the Dominican House of Studies. A private reception and dinner followed at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center.
 At the laying of the cornerstone, Father D. Dominic Izzo, Prior Provincial of St. Joseph Province posed the question to the great crowd gathered to celebrate, “What is this day?” His address concluded with these uplifting and challenging words:
As you know, the cornerstone is what gives alignment to a building. Each stone aligned with Christ and so each stone aligned with each other. With Christ as the cornerstone this building must be in a certain way – aligned to manifest the values of the Kingdom of God and aligned so that we may “not be ashamed of the gospel for it is the power for salvation for all who believe.” The Dominican Contemplative Preacher also sees something else that all those [Dominicans in our history] just mentioned saw and lived: Accountability – our accountability to be aligned with Christ and to live a worthy of the vocation we have received. Accountability is not an historical concept limited to one time and in one place. Rather, it is the energy that moves our conversion so we can always see the true meaning of the events in our life with God. And so, today is not about a building, or concerns about how it will be completed, how it will be paid for, how it will be maintained into the future. 
Today we celebrate our accountability to the mission of the Order of Preachers in service to the Church made visible in this Academic Center and Dominican Theological Library. Today we recall the need to “pour new wine into new wineskins (this building), taking from the storehouse the old and the new” as we re-align ourselves (deepening of conversion) with the one true cornerstone, Jesus Christ. Alignment with Christ and openness to the call to something new in our mission is much more crucial to our life. The purpose of this building is to enrich continually our Dominican and Thomistic tradition by: engaging the culture of our time; strengthening the faith of the faithful through understanding their faith; and forming preachers and lay ministers for service to the Church (study-preaching-hearing-belief [cf. Romans 10]).  This is a place where those who teach and study permit what they teach and study to shape their character and virtue so that their behavior does not refute their preaching the Gospel (cf. LCO 100, III). Psalm 118 – is the psalm from which we hear, “the stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone (Ps 118:22)” is the one that the evangelists (Matt 21:42; MK 12:10; Lk 20:17, Acts 4:11), Peter (1 Peter 2:7) and others (cf., Eph 2:20) use to refer to Christ. It also the psalm that, just a few verses later, answers the question we ask now and those photographed on the program asked 100 years ago. What is this day? The answer? “It is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it (Ps 118: 24).”
For Construction Updates, look here May 17, 2007 Ground Breaking
Groundbreaking Ceremony for the New Academic Center & Theological Library at the Dominican House of Studies
 The ground blessing for the new Academic Center and Theological Library took place on October 5, 2006.
Construction Updates
Construction began in the Spring of 2007. The foundation has been dug and concrete is beginning to pour! We anticipate that construction will conclude in the summer of 2008.
More construction updates here
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