Foundations Guild
The Gateway to Discipleship
Scripture Anchor
"But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect."
Is this Guild for me?
The Foundations Guild is designed as the starting block for the entire Institute because it bridges the gap between passive learning and active discipleship, making it a perfect fit for a variety of callings:
Foundations
Guild
For the Layperson
If you want to step up your theological depth but feel intimidated by academic seminary culture, these workshops provide a welcoming, high-caliber environment to build an unshakeable faith.
For Parents
If you are navigating the difficult questions your children are bringing home, this Guild equips you to move past managing behavior and start actively forming their hearts and minds to withstand cultural pressures.
For Church Leaders & Pastors
If you want to raise up mature leaders in your congregation, these workshops serve as a standardized, reliable tool to disciple lay staff and elders, ensuring your team is doctrinally aligned and relationally equipped.
For Missionaries
If you are preparing to engage new cultures, this Guild sharpens your critical thinking and provides the basic intellectual toolkit required to stand firm on foreign front lines.
For the Curious Learner
If you are simply hungry for truth and want to explore why we believe what we believe, this is your low-barrier, high-reward entry point into classical Christian thought.
What kind of work is involved?
While our educational model is highly structured, the workload is designed to be accessible because we want to challenge your mind without overwhelming your weekly calendar.
Intellectual Rigor:
Your weekly reading consists of 5 to 10 pages of robust, faithful, and engaging material. The reading is designed to stretch your thinking and introduce you to classical concepts without burying you under unnecessary academic jargon.
Balancing Head
and Hands:
The curriculum is split evenly between the intellectual and the practical. You will spend time strengthening your mind with logical clarity, but you will spend equal energy taking those concepts out of the abstract and habituating them into your daily life.
Socratic Engagement:
Your live meetings are not second lectures, because they are interactive, Socratic discussion cohorts capped strictly at 20 peers. You will be expected to participate actively meaning you should read, ask honest questions, and engage in real-world practice, such as Socratic roleplays or home audits, to ensure the material moves from intellectual information to personal transformation.
Because there are no term papers or academic exams, the entire weekly commitment remains a highly manageable two to three hours.
How does this Guild connect to the rest of the ICA?
The Foundations Guild does not operate in a vacuum, because it serves as the master key that unlocks the rest of our specialized curriculum pathways:
1. The Link to the
Bible Guild
In Foundations, you will cover How to Study the Bible, which is the foundational science of hermeneutics. This intellectual baseline is crucial before you step into the specialized historical and contextual studies of the Old and New Testament Hubs.
2. The Link to the
Philosophy Guild
Your foundational workshops on "The Strengthened Mind" introduce you to classical logic and natural theology, which directly prepares you to tackle the more rigorous classical metaphysics and Thomistic logic found inside the Philosophy Guild.
3. The Link to the
Virtue Guild
Our model rejects pure "head knowledge" because we believe you must love the truth to live the truth. The character development workshops in the Foundations Guild directly feed into the Virtue Guild's deep habituation of Classical Thomistic virtues and spiritual disciplines.
Our Curriculum & Course Offerings
Why We Do Not Have Hubs in Foundations
Unlike the other Guilds which are split into specialized "Hubs" (departments), the Foundations Guild functions as a single, unified launchpad. We have intentionally structured it this way to prevent beginners from specializing too early. If you have studied apologetics but have never learned how to study the Bible, or if you have memorized Scripture but have never taken a basic logic course, your foundation has weak spots.
By keeping the Foundations Guild unified, we encourage you to survey all the essential introductory workshops, including Logic, How to Study the Bible, Doctrine, and Character Formation, so that you can ensure your intellectual and spiritual armor has no gaps before you move into specialized Hub Concentrations.
Current and Upcoming Workshops
Our workshop listings are dynamic and expand regularly to meet the needs of our global student campus. Click on any active workshop below to view its specific objectives, syllabus, and live schedule:
Active Workshops
- FOUND.101.A Primer on Apologetics: The historical, evidential, and logical starting point for defending the Christian worldview.
- FOUND.121.The Strengthened Mind: An introduction to thinking biblically, avoiding deception, and loving God with your mind.
- FOUND.161.The Beginning of Wonder: Developing a classical, Christian approach to learning, education, and wisdom.
Upcoming Workshops
- FOUND.141.Character Formation: Translating apologetic knowledge into moral habituation and classical Thomistic virtue.
- FOUND.201.Introduction to Apologetics I: An introductory, hands-on workshop focused on defining faith and truth.
- FOUND.202.Introduction to Apologetics II: The second part of our practical defense series, focusing on the nature of God and Jesus.
- FOUND.203.Introduction to Apologetics III: The third part of our practical defense series, focusing on the Bible and how to share our faith.
- FOUND.221.How to Study the Bible I: Learning the literal, historical, grammatical method of interpreting Holy Scripture.
- FOUND.222.How to Study the Bible II: Advanced applications of biblical interpretation across different genres of biblical literature.
- FOUND.241.Essential Doctrines: Mastering the core historical creeds and systematic doctrines of the historic Christian faith.
- FOUND.301.Apologetics in the Church: How to build and nurture a culture of gentle, respectful defense in your local church.
- FOUND.321.Saints and Sages: A biographical and historical study of the Church's great defenders to learn how virtue is caught.
- FOUND.341.Should Old Aquinas Be Forgotten?: A gentle, lay-level introduction to classical Thomistic realism and its modern value.
