As the students entering U.S. colleges and universities become increasingly
diverse, the number of Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI's) continues to increase.
Catholic colleges and universities, similarly, are seeing an increase in student
diversity on campus, with an emergence of Catholic HSIs as well. As the number of
Catholic colleges and universities in the United States that are HSI-eligible increases
they must grapple with what it means to be both Catholic and Hispanic-serving. The
purpose of this article is to propose a U.S. Catholic HSI (C- HSI) identity that brings
together the extensive literatures on Catholic identity and HSI identity through the
lens of decolonial theory and Latinx theologies. We argue that in order to effectively
serve students of color who have intersectional identities, Catholic HSIs must
intentionally recognize the ways of knowing (epistemologies) and being of these groups,
which includes a collective understanding of the theo-political, social, historical, and
economic forces that have subjugated them since before the founding of the present day
United States and long before the founding of the first Catholic institution in the
country. Building off the Catholic Identity and Mission Models (CIMA) currently used by
the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities to assess mission integration, we
propose a C-HSI model.