Faculty of Philosophy

The Faculty of Philosophy has pursued, in the recent years, the renewal of the Institutional Cycle, of the Specialization and of the Doctorate, following the innovative lines traced by the Second Vatican Council, by the Apostolic Constitution Sapientia Christiana, by the encyclical letter, Fides et ratio of John Paul II and, finally, from the document produced by the Congregation for Catholic Education (CEC), Decree of Reform of Ecclesiastical Studies in Philosophy of January 28, 2011, with application documents, subsequently merged into the Apostolic Constitution Veritatis Gaudium (January 29, 2018). 

The renewal kept in mind a dual purpose that the Faculty has gradually assumed over the years. This is about a “dual purpose” and not of “two purposes”, because they are two components of the same mission of our Faculty.

1. a) The first of these two components is constituted by the needs of students who undertake the study of philosophy with a view to an integral preparation with a theological background. It is necessary, especially today, the gradual initiation to a reflection that frees the space for transcendence, or for the conviction of the existence of God, as the first Principle and last End. A conviction that the human being can establish with his reason, in this by following the repeated Pauline indication, but also by following the suffered historical journey of humanity. This had, in fact, already been glimpsed by philosophers before Christ to the point of considering man “analogous to God”; St Paul also reminds the philosophers of the Athens Areopagus (Acts 17, 22 ff.).

1. b) The second of these two components is constituted by the need, common to all students, for a systematic, non-erratic comparison between humanistic-religious thought and tradition, and between thought and scientific tradition. The Faculty of Philosophy is characterized, in fact, by a consolidated metaphysical tradition of Aristotelian-Thomistic inspiration that recognizes the primacy of metaphysics and ontology, in the continuous dialogue with the mathematical and natural sciences, for the search for the foundation of logic, anthropology, ethics and religion. As underlined in the same University Statutes, the healthy pluralism of methods and schools is thus guaranteed, even within the limits of what is established in Articles 38 and 39 of the Apostolic Constitution Sapientia Christiana.

COURSE SCHEDULE FOR OBTAINING DOUBLE TITLE

Following a specific agreement, concluded on 30 October 2019, between PUL and the University of Perugia, it is active by the A.Y. 2020-2021 a two-year course for the attainment of the “double degree” of Licentiate in Philosophy, according to the university system of the Holy See, and of a Master’s Degree in Philosophy and Ethics of Relations (LM-78), according to the Italian university system and with all the legal effects created by the Master’s Degree in Philosophy obtained in an Italian University.

On the basis of specific tables of recognition of the respective itineraries, during the two-year period, the student enrolled at the PUL must obtain a minimum of 30 to a maximum of 45 ETCS / CFU at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Perugia. Similarly, the student enrolled at the University of Perugia must achieve the same number of ETCS / CFU at the PUL.