Arab Catholic U

INDEPENDENT CATHOLIC NEWS, Aug. 11 — Mar Elias, the first Catholic Arab university in Israel, is set to open this fall in Ibillin, near Nazareth in Galilee.

In addition to Christians, the university will primarily serve students from the country's Muslim and Druses communities.

The new university, named in honor of the prophet Elias, recently obtained recognition from Israel's Ministry of Education and is a subsidiary of the University of Indianapolis.

Catholic Lite

SPTIMES.COM, Aug. 1 — In a comparison between Florida's three existing Catholic colleges and the plans that have been laid out for the more traditional Ave Maria College, the Web site of the St. Petersburg Times found that Ave Maria, at least initially, will teach only about Catholicism in its religion classes while the other schools typically teach “the religions of the world.”

Ave Maria will also have a stricter core curriculum than St. Thomas in Miami, Barry in Miami Shores and St. Leo in Pasco County. Unlike Barry and St. Leo, Ave Maria will join St. Thomas in having only single-sex dormitories.

Like the existing Catholic colleges, the campus will feature crucifixes and other religious images and not sponsor an organization for homosexual students.

All of which prompted Monika Hellwig, president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, to classify the state's existing Catholic colleges as “middle-of-the-road.”

Cash Infusion

ATLANTA BUSINESS CHRONICLE, Aug. 8 — Southern Catholic College has sold 64 acres of land for $3.2 million as part of its plan to offer a mixed-use community campus that will serve and interact with surrounding businesses, the weekly publication reported.

The property was purchased by Greg Palen and his father, Dick Palen, a retired businessman and chairman of the board of trustees at St. John's University in Collegeville, Minn.

The new owners plan to develop retail and office space that will include a town center, said Greg Palen, owner of an aluminum refining company.

“Not only will this venture have economic impact,” he said, “it will help make Southern Catholic College a reality.”

New Chief

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE, July 31 — Mary Lyons, president of Minnesota's College of St. Benedict, has been named president of San Diego University, which is affiliated with the Diocese of San Diego. She replaced Alice Hayes, who completed eight years as president earlier this summer.

Before becoming president of St. Benedict's, a women's college, Lyons served as the academic dean and professor of rhetoric and homiletics at the state University of California at Berkeley and then president of the California Maritime Academy in Vallejo.

In Touch

THE CATHOLIC NEW WORLD, Aug. 6 — Vincentian-run DePaul University astronomy professor Bernard Beck-Winchatz coordinated the financing and publication of Touch the Universe: A NASA Braille Book of Astronomy, reported the newspaper of the Chicago Archdiocese.

The book includes detailed images and information coming from the Hubble Space Telescope. And, unlike an earlier version of Touch the Sky, the current edition can be used by both sighted and blind readers.

Beck-Winchatz is an associate director of NASA's Space Science Center for Education and Outreach.