Well Done, my Good and Faithful Servant!

Dr. David Brian Warner   1955-2010     It is with great sadness, but also with great hope in Our Lord, that we announce the peaceful passing of OLSWA’S first President and President Emeritus, Dr. David Warner. He died at 1:30 PM on May 13th, Ascension Thursday (Feast of Our Lady of Fatima), surrounded by his wife, children, grandchildren, mother, sister, and in-laws.   The members of the faculty, staff, and student body will fondly remember Dr. Warner for his inspired leadership at a time when the Academy was entering a new period of dynamic growth in its bid to become an accredited four-year liberal arts university-college. With exceptional skill and compassion he led the Academy through some of her most trying moments, most notably the tragic deaths of two of OLSWA’s students, Paul Sanders and Janine Lieu—this at a time when he himself was beginning to manifest signs of the illness that would eventually strike him down.   Born and raised in California, and most recently a resident of Virginia, Dr. David Brian Warner was a specialist in the theology of education, earning his doctorate in Theology and Religious Studies (Ph.D., 2001) from Maryvale Institute, England, in collaboration with Greyfriars, University of Oxford.  The title of his doctoral thesis was:  John Henry Newman’s Idea of a Catholic Academy: Contributions from his Life and Work Towards a Theology of Education, with Reference to Recent Documents of the Catholic Church.   A former ordained Protestant minister, Dr. Warner and his family returned to the Catholic Church in 1988 while he was completing a second Bachelor’s degree (Theology, 1987) and the M.A. in Theology and Christian Ministry (1991) at Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio.    An experienced academic administrator and teacher since 1979, Dr. Warner lectured in nine states and eight countries, while teaching for a dozen higher education institutes including visiting or adjunct professorships on the faculties of: Mary Immaculate College (Ireland), Maryvale Institute (England), the University of Sacramento (California) and the St. John Vianney Theological Seminary (Denver, Colorado), an affiliate of the Lateran Pontifical University in Rome. While teaching Theology, History, and Education courses for Franciscan University (1990-95), he became an Assistant Professor and Director of Administration for their Austrian Semester Abroad Program.    In 2003 Warner was named the first Director of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, founded by Dr. Scott Hahn, and continued as a non-resident Senior Fellow of the St. Paul Center. He was also Director of Catholic Adult Education for the Archdiocese of Denver and Academic Dean for Ave Maria College of the Americas in Nicaragua.    In January of 2008 he moved to Barry’s Bay, Ontario, with his wife Patrice and youngest son, Elliott, where he was installed as Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Academy’s first full-time president. In March 2008 he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. While fighting cancer, he continued to pour himself out in the mission of excellence in Catholic Higher education, advancing OLSWA’s efforts to become an accredited four-year liberal arts university-college. In the autumn of 2009 he returned to Virginia with his family, where he spent his final months.   The OLSWA community will sorely miss Dr. Warner for his special ability to connect with people in a personal way. Cardinal Newman’s motto, cor ad cor loquitur (“heart speaketh unto heart”), is one that Dr. Warner adopted as his own, and this attitude shone through in his interactions with all those whom he met. Let us pray with confidence that now that he sees the Lord not “darkly, as in a mirror,” but face to face, in the full splendour of His heavenly presence, he will redouble his efforts on behalf of the Academy.   Our hearts go out to Dr. Warner’s wife, Patrice, sons, Ben-David and Elliott, and the rest of his beautiful family.   < Prev