About Divine Word College

Divine Word College is a private undergraduate Roman Catholic seminary explain the Society of the Divine Word in Epworth, Iowa. It was founded by the Divine Word Missionaries in 1964. It educates students for missionary support in the Catholic Church as priests, brothers, sisters, and laypersons. It is owned and operated by the Society of the Divine Word (SVD). The college offers three baccalaureate degrees as competently as English as a second language (ESL) classes to further Catholic religious missionaries and those aspiring to Catholic lay ministries.

During their truth semester of undergraduate studies at Divine Word College, young men who pick to continue with the SVD may apply for the Society’s one-year novitiate program at the Chicago Province Headquarters in Techny, Illinois. These men may then apply to profess first vows as members of the Society near the grow less of the novitiate program and continue taking into account seminary studies at the Chicago Theologate.

Founded in 1875 in Steyl, the Netherlands, the Roman Catholic order The Society of the Divine Word (SVD) sent the first Divine Word Missionary, Fr. Joseph Freinademetz, SVD, to China by 1879. In 1895, Brother Wendelin Meyer, SVD, went to America. By 1909, the Society had normal the first seminary in the United States subsequent to the mission of training priest and brother candidates for facilitate in foreign missions. The Society of the Divine Word originally time-honored a Divine Word Seminary, a four-year ahead of its time arts college, in 1912 at Techny, Illinois. In 1931, the Society purchased property in Epworth, Iowa, where it customary St. Paul’s Mission House, an SVD high school seminary. In 1964, Divine Word College replaced the tall school seminary and has back served as the principal site of SVD undergraduate seminary education in the United States.

Epworth is a city in Dubuque County, Iowa, United States. It is portion of the Dubuque, Iowa Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 1,860 at the 2010 census, up from 1,428 in 2000.