Academic Bulletin 2020-22

Library All the glory of the world would be buried in oblivion, unless God had provided mortals the remedy of books.

Richard de Bury Completed in 2004, the beautiful St. John the Evangelist Library, named in honor of Our Lord’s “beloved disciple,” is the hub of the educational resources for Christendom College. The Library has a high quality collection of more than 100,000 volumes specifically designed to support the Catholic liberal arts curriculum of the undergraduate college, the theological, philosophical, and catechetical studies of The Notre Dame Graduate School of Christendom College, and faculty research. The library serves and supports the intellectual and spiritual formation of the students, faculty, administration, and staff. With this in mind, the library aims to provide an uplifting atmosphere and excellent instructional, reference, collection services, and other educational and cultural events to the constituencies of Christendom College.

The Reference Collection, located on the Main Level, contains general and specialized encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, maps, and other resources which aid students in their studies and research. The collections include such important sources as the Leonine Edition of the Opera Omnia of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, the complete Acta Synodalia of the Second Vatican Council, more than 250 volumes of the United States Supreme Court Reports, and the collection of Senior Theses from the first Christendom Class of 1981 to the present.

Internet Public Access terminals are available in the Information Commons in the central area of the Main Level, providing access to in-house and online electronic resources and the library’s catalog. The catalog is also available at several computers located among the general collections in both the Main and Gallery Levels. In addition, the library is equipped with wireless access for immediate access on personal laptops to all those resources. A public photocopier is available in the Reference area on the Main Level. The Library also has a growing multi-media collection providing both educational and popular titles.

The Main and Gallery Levels house the monograph collections supporting the academic disciplines taught at Christendom College. These levels also offer numerous individual study carrels, four small group study areas, and one larger Senior Study Room. The Rare Book and Special Collections Room in the Gallery Level includes a Special collections room showcasing the lives of saints and religious who died in the odor of sanctity; histories of religious orders and other ecclesiastical, spiritual, and literary works in several European languages from the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries; in addition it houses a thorough collection of works by and about G.K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc, and other Catholic luminaries, many of them first editions and fine printings, including a rare complete run of the journal G.K’s Weekly.

The Periodicals Collection is housed in the Main Level, surrounding a comfortable reading area containing the current issues of the collection. A Microform reader-printer is available in this general area. The Library receives some 250 periodicals and has a developing 27