Mass of St. Thomas Aquinas

Archbishop Di Noia to Celebrate Mass of St. Thomas Aquinas

Thursday, Jan. 27, 12:10 p.m.

Archbishop Augustine Di Noia, O.P. , the secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, will travel from the Vatican to be the principal celebrant and homilist at the Mass in honor of Catholic University's patron St. Thomas Aquinas. CUA faculty attend the Mass in academic regalia and classes are canceled to allow the full university community to celebrate the beginning of the spring semester with prayer.

Archbishop Di Noia will served as a concelebrant at the Jan. 25 inaugural Mass for CUA President John Garvey at the Basilica.

Archbishop Di Noia is an American Dominican theologian who was ordained to the episcopacy on July 11, 2009, at the Basilica.

Previously, he was the under-secretary at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, serving under Prefect Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger - who is now Pope Benedict XVI. Before that, he was the director of the Intercultural Forum for Studies in Faith and Culture at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center, and executive director of the secretariat for Doctrine and Pastoral Practices of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Archbishop Di Noia earned a doctorate in theology from Yale University in 1980 and a licentiate in theology from the Pontifical Faculty at the Dominican House of Studies in 1971. He was awarded the degree of Master of Sacred Theology (S.T.M.) by the Dominican Order in 1998. Archbishop Di Noia is the author of "The Diversity of Religions: A Christian Perspective" (The Catholic University of America Press, 1992) and the co-author of "The Love That Never Ends: A Key to the Catechism of the Catholic Church" (Our Sunday Visitor Press, 1996). He taught systematic theology at the Dominican House of Studies (which is located across the street from Catholic University) for 20 years and was an adjunct professor at the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family Studies.