Can intentionality and authenticity be transferred through a computer screen and phone over hundreds and thousands of miles? Franciscan University is out to answer that question with a firm yes!
“Changed my life.” “Deepened my faith.” “Helped me through a cancer scare.” These are ways students describe Franciscan University’s online school program. Yes, you read that correctly—online school.
For many online programs, the extent of interaction students have with their professors and peers is often limited to occasionally turning on their microphone to ask a question. But at the core of the Franciscan University experience is intentional and authentic encounter with the Catholic faith. So, how can that be transferred to an online program?
Franciscan Life Online is the University’s answer to that question.
According to Franciscan Life Online Director Lindsey Haynes, the program “exists to bring Franciscan’s three core values—community conversion, and encounter—to our students who may never set foot on campus.”
“For a lot of universities that try to have some form of student life online, it’s very surface-level. We are not about that,” explains Haynes. “We’re here to let students know they are seen, known, and loved.”
Since launching in 2011, Franciscan’s online school has experienced massive growth. Today, it has an enrollment of 1,230 students, including doctoral, graduate, undergraduate, and dual-enrolled high school students living in every U.S. state and 10 countries. And the program is still growing.
“Our online students are in vastly different stages and states of life,” says Haynes. “So, we take a multi-level approach based on where you are in life to meet you there tangibly.”
At its core, Haynes says Franciscan Life Online is about the intentionality and authenticity that are central to Franciscan. The program offers every student the opportunity to participate in weekly Rosaries, Bible and book studies, and coffee hours with other students. There are also regular regional events that help gather students together to meet in person.
Though simple, these opportunities for encounter go a long way.
For Isaac Falls, a corporal in the U.S. Marine Corps who enrolled in the online undergraduate Theological Studies Program while stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Israel, Franciscan Life Online has been a vital connection to his faith amidst the unpredictable pace of military life.
Falls says the program has given him a family of faith.
“It’s really helped me stay in touch with my faith and not lose sight of certain ways I should be conducting myself as a Catholic man,” he says.
And in times of stress and tragedy, Falls says the Franciscan community has been there for him. He was stationed in Israel when the horrific October 7 attacks took place in 2023. Falls says professors, peers, and even the dean of Online Programing reached out to him, assuring him of their prayers.
“I felt probably the most loved I have ever felt in my entire life during that time,” he says. “It really reminded me that to the right people, I’m not just a number, and I’m being seen, being talked about, and being prayed for.”
Dr. Cory Maloney, Franciscan’s dean of Online Programing, says, “It is an intentional strategy of ours to bring the fullness of Franciscan to our online students.
“Franciscan is a very incarnational and very heart-to-heart kind of place,” says Maloney. “So, my online students are not just a picture and a discussion post to me. I really want to know them and know their hearts and their minds and be able to walk with them through this formation.
“I think all Franciscan faculty have that same motivation,” he adds. “They want to have that incarnational experience with students, even though we’re separated by an ocean sometimes.”
Though not quite an ocean away, Robin Hake, who is pursuing a master’s in theology and Christian ministry, lives several states away in Illinois. She says the weekly Rosaries, Bible studies, and coffee hours have given her a Christ-centered community of friends who have been with her in good times and bad.
Hake shares that one semester, she found herself facing the possibility that her cancer had resurfaced. One day, while being treated at the Mayo Clinic, she logged onto a virtual coffee hour from the clinic.
“I just totally lost it. I just didn’t know if I could face going through that again. I was just distraught and devastated, and I can’t even begin to tell you the love and the comfort these people gave me,” she says, concluding, “It’s hard to put it into words.”
Hake says it ended up not being cancer, but she still had to undergo surgery to heal. Her Franciscan community continued walking with her every step of the way.
“I know I can pick up the phone at any time, and they will stop whatever they’re doing, and we’ll pray together because prayer is the foundation,” says Hake. “It’s shown me that I’m not alone.”
Swiss student Monika Wiesli, a Catholic school principal in Zurich who is pursuing a master of arts in catechetics and evangelization, echoes this sentiment. She says that in starting the program, “I really didn’t feel that I was 4,000 miles away; it was like coming home.”
Nourished by the Franciscan online academics and community, Wiesli says, “My own teaching became so much better from the first day on.”
Prompted by a professor telling her she should “not go one lesson” without proclaiming the core message of the Gospel, Wiesli brought it up in a religious education class one day.
“I started to explain how Jesus loved us and why he died on the cross for us,” she says. “Then, there was one student—she was 9 years old at the time—who raised her hand and said, ‘So, you are telling us that Jesus, when he was dying on the cross, he knew my birthday and all?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ And the whole class really just said, ‘Wow.’ And there was a complete silence.”
After this, Weisli says, the room was filled with a “radiance” as the children joined her in saying a silent prayer, saying yes to Jesus.
“I can hardly describe the atmosphere that was in that room,” she says. “There was a joy and a wonder that cannot be put into words, at the same time with a truly tangible presence, a love that surpasses anything.”
At the end of the day, it is encounters such as these that are at the heart of Franciscan University.
“Every student at Franciscan University should experience formation in discipleship spiritually, academically, and emotionally,” says Father Jonathan St. André, TOR ’96, vice president for Franciscan Life.
“Franciscan Life Online has allowed us to offer this formation to our online students in a way that meets their particular hopes and needs,” he explains.
“We’ve seen lives changed through our encounters with our students who study online, and we are excited to continue to provide that support.”
