Andrew Radde-Gallwitz, Loyola University Chicago Thursday, May 16, 4:30 PM
Swift Hall, Common Room
1025 East 58th Street

REGISTER HERE

The creed recited by Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and many Protestant Christians every Sunday originated from the first two ecumenical councils of the Church, Nicea (325) and Constantinople (381), which affirmed the divinity of Christ and the unity of the Trinity. Among the Cappadocian Fathers who developed and defended the affirmations of the creed, Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335-395) is known for his contribution to the doctrine of the Trinity. Although he was cited by the Emperor Theodosius as an exemplar of Trinitarian orthodoxy, the exact nature of his doctrine remains a matter of dispute. He has been accused of every heresy from modalism to tritheism. This lecture will attempt to sort out Gregory’s teaching by focusing on his discussion of the Spirit’s inseparable connection with the Father and the Son.

Andrew Radde-Gallwitz is Assistant Professor of Theology at Loyola University Chicago. He as published numerous articles on the Fathers of the Church and was awarded the Templeton Prize for Theological Promise in 2011 for his book Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa and the Transformation of Divine Simplicity (Oxford, 2009).

John Welch, O.Carm.
Wednesday, May 1, 7:00 PM
Swift Hall, 3rd Floor, 1025 East 58th Street 

REGISTER HERE

Long before developmental psychologists charted the seasons and passages of our human journey, St. Teresa of Avila mapped the transformation of her personality under the impact of God’s love in 16^th century Spain. At age 62, this Carmelite nun wrote The Interior Castle, a classic summary of her prayer experience. She images the soul’s journey through a crystal castle to its center, culminating in intimate union with God.

This lecture is cosponsored by the History of Christianity Club and made possible by a grant from the Carmelite Friars at St. Thomas the Apostle. 

John Welch, O.Carm. is a Catholic priest of the Carmelite Order and currently serves as supervisor of the eastern region of the province of the Most Pure Heart of Mary. He holds the chair of Carmelite Studies at the Washington Theological Union and is past president of the Carmelite Institute. He is the author of numerous articles and books, including Spiritual Pilgrims: Carl Jung and Teresa of Avila (Paulist, 1982) and When Gods Die: An Introduction to John of the Cross (Paulist, 1990) both of which received National Catholic Book Awards. His most recent book is The Carmelite Way: An Ancient Path for Today’s Pilgrim (Paulist, 1996).

Machaut receiving Nature and three of her children. From an illuminated Parisian manuscript of the 1350s

Machaut’s Musical Monuments
a concert featuring Schola Antiqua of Chicago
Sunday, April 28, 4:00 PM
Rockefeller Memorial Chapel
5850 South Woodlawn Avenue

BUY TICKETS

Schola Antiqua presents some of the most notable works by the fourteenth century’s most celebrated composer, Guillaume de Machaut. Program highlights include a complete performance of Machaut’s Mass for Our Lady, as well as a sampling of the composer’s enigmatic motets and playful song repertory.

Schola Antiqua of Chicago is the Artist in Residence at the Lumen Christi Institute. You can find out more about them here.

A Master Class on
The Cloud of Unknowing
with Steven Justice, UC Berkeley

Friday, April 26, 2:00-5:00 PM
Gavin House, 1220 East 58th Street

Co-sponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

This master class is intended for graduate and advanced undergraduate students. If you have any questions, please contact Mark Franzen at mfranzen@lumenchristi.org.

REGISTER HERE

The Cloud of Unknowing is a work of spiritual counsel, a guide to a kind of contemplation, by a fourteenth-century English author, now unnamed but with several other works to his credit. It is a recognized masterpiece: serious, brilliant intellectually, and in literary terms cunning and audacious. It is easy to understand but hard to explain: making sense of its doctrine is not difficult, but making sense of what is means by that doctrine, how it should be used, and what it should be interpreted as part of, is not. This seminar will discuss both sides of this coin, exploring that doctrine (and, if we have time, the literary devices by which it is expounded), but also exploring the conundra the work poses for intellectual and cultural history. For the benefit of those who’s Middle English is rusty, we will use a modernized edition, but I will bring along some Middle English passages for inspection.

Steven Justice is Professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley. He received his PhD from Princeton in 1985 and has taught at Berkeley since 1987. His recent essays include “Did the Middle Ages Believe in their Miracles?” (Representations 103 [2008]); “Who Stole Robertson?” (PMLA 124 [2009]); “Literary History,” in David Raybin and Susanna Fein, ed., Chaucer: Contemporary Approaches (2010); “Chaucer’s History-Effect,” in Andrew Galloway and Frank Grady, eds., Answerable Style: The Idea of the Literary in Medieval England (forthcoming); “Eucharistic Miracle and Eucharistic Doubt,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, forthcoming. He is finishing one book (Adam Usk’s Secret) and working on another (Did the Middle Ages Believe in their Miracles?).

Reading List
The Cloud of Unknowing, Paulist Press, ISBN 0809123320
(Other versions are acceptable) 

Schedule
2:00pm  Welcome
2:15pm   Session I
3:30pm  Coffee Break
3:45pm   Session II
5:00pm  Reception

Steven Justice, University of California, Berkeley
Thursday, April 25, 4:30 PM
Swift Hall, 1025 East 58th Street

REGISTER HERE

Co-sponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

Readers interested in the history of Christian writing are often surprised and nonplussed by the uninhibited polemic they find;  scholarship  often treats such polemics as obviously pathological. This talk takes one common form of medieval denunciation—the habit of calling  certain opinions and practices “shameless”—as a sort of laboratory specimen, showing what it meant, how it worked, and why serious thinkers took to it.  It will suggest that the same judgment, in different words, is still part of scholarly discourse today.

Steven Justice is Professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley. He received his PhD from Princeton in 1985 and has taught at Berkeley since 1987. His recent essays include “Did the Middle Ages Believe in their Miracles?” (Representations 103 [2008]); “Who Stole Robertson?” (PMLA 124 [2009]); “Literary History,” in David Raybin and Susanna Fein, ed., Chaucer: Contemporary Approaches (2010); “Chaucer’s History-Effect,” in Andrew Galloway and Frank Grady, eds., Answerable Style: The Idea of the Literary in Medieval England (forthcoming); “Eucharistic Miracle and Eucharistic Doubt,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, forthcoming. He is finishing one book (Adam Usk’s Secret) and working on another (Did the Middle Ages Believe in their Miracles?).

A Public Symposium in Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Pope John XXIII’s Encyclical on Establishing Universal Peace on Earth

April 4, 2013, 4:00-6:00 PM
Max Palevsky Cinema, Ida Noyes Hall
University of Chicago
1212 East 59th Street, Chicago, IL 60637

KEYNOTE:
Roland Minnerath, Archbishop of Dijon

RESPONDENTS:
Mary Ann Glendon, Harvard Law School
Joseph Weiler, New York University Law School
Russell Hittinger, University of Tulsa

On April 11, 1963, amid the global tensions of the Cold War, and shortly after the erection of the Berlin Wall, Pope John XXIII addressed his famous encyclical Pacem in terris to all people of good will. He invites them to consider the conditions for establishing universal peace on earth in truth, justice, charity, and liberty. On the 50th Anniversary of this event, this symposium will examine the affirmations of Pacem in terris as they bear on human rights, religious freedom, and the international political and economic order today.

Roland Minnerath is the Archbishop of Dijon, France, president of the French Bishops Conference, a member of the International Theology Commission, and a member of the Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences. He was ordained priest in the Archdiocese of Strasbourg in 1978, and was made Archbishop of Dijon in 2004. He holds PhDs in Catholic theology and canon law from the Pontifical Gregorian University and Faculty of Theology at Strasbourg, where he also taught church history and canon law.

Mary Ann Glendon is the Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. She served as U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See from 2008 to 2009 and served two terms as a member of the U.S. President’s Council on Bioethics (2001-2004). Prof. Glendon is author of many articles and books, most recently The Forum and the Tower: How Scholars and Politicians Have Imagined the World, from Plato to Eleanor Roosevelt.

Joseph Weiler is Joseph Straus Professor of Law and European Union Jean Monnet Chair at New York University Law School and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He also serves as Director of the Straus Institute for the Advanced Study of Law & Justice, The Tikvah Center for Law & Jewish Civilization, and The Jean Monnet Center for International and Regional Economic Law and Justice. His recent publications include Un’Europa Cristiana and The Constitution of Europe.

Russell Hittinger is Warren Professor of Catholic Studies and Research Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa, a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences and a member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas and has held professorships at the Catholic University of America, Princeton University, Fordham University, and New York University. His books include The First Grace: Rediscovering Natural Law in a Post-Christian Age and A Critique of the Natural Law Theory. He is currently at work on a book on the evolution of Catholic social theory and doctrine during the 19th and 20th centuries.

Co-sponsored by the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago and the Center for Civil and Human Rights at the University of Notre Dame Law School

Sacred study is the prayerful and attentive reading of a work with the initial goal of understanding it, the intermediate goal of reflectively appropriating it, and the final goal of making its teaching concrete in a life devoted to God. Sacred study is study because it puts ques­tions to the text, as an apprentice questions the master, so as to come to grips with the deeper meanings. With these aims we will study St. Francis de Sales’s Introduction to the Devout Life this winter quarter.  In this classic work of spirituality the reader is presented with “counsels” and “practices” to aid him in deepening his hunger for God while overcoming the obstacles that impede his progress in moral integrity and spiritual wisdom.

The Sacred Study Circle will meet weekly, covering a minimal amount of text each week. Fr. Paul Mankowski, S.J., scholar-in-residence at the Lumen Christi Institute, will guide participants in a reflective discussion of the text. Each session will meet at Gavin House, 1220 East 58^th Street on Mondays from 4-5PM. While participants are encouraged to attend every session, this is not required. Copies of the book will be provided. We will be using the 400th Anniversary Edition, Eremitical Press, 2009.

REGISTER HERE

Schedule

January 14: Counsels concerning the soul’s first aspiration to the devout life.
(Pt.1, Ch.6-22, pp.26-51)

January 21: Counsels concerning the soul’s firm resolution to pursue the devout life.
(Pt.2, Ch.1-9, pp.55-66)

January 28: Counsels concerning the practice of virtue.
(Pt.3., Ch.1-5, pp.91-106,119-126)

February 4:  Counsels concerning poverty of spirit amid riches.
(Pt.3, Ch.14-16, 37-38,  pp.127-133, 175-178)

February 11: Counsels concerning true and false friendship.                                                         (Pt.3, Ch.17-22, pp.133-146)

February 18: Counsels concerning commonly experienced temptations.
(Pt.4, Ch.1-10, 13-14, pp.191-204, 209-219)

February 25: Counsels concerning renewal of the soul in devotion.
(Pt.5, Ch.1-6, 18, pp.223-230, 240-241)

Sacred study is intended for university students and faculty. Please contact Mark Franzen at mfranzen@lumenchristi.org with any questions.

Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought
Winter 2013 Non-Credit Course
Gavin House, 1220 East 58th Street
Informal Dinner: 6:00PM
Lecture: 6:30PM

Intended for University students, faculty, and recent graduates. Others interested in attending, contact info@lumenchristi.org.

With the recovery of the works of Aristotle in the Latin West, the development of the scholastic method of reasoning, and the creation of the universities, a style of academic philosophy and theology developed in the late medieval period in which the practice of reasoning about Christian revelation was developed independent of spirituality and, often, the search for wisdom. Previously, in the works of the Church Fathers and the great monastic writers, theology was rooted in a spiritual life uniting prayer and the search for understanding.

This course will consider the practice of dialectic reason within philosophy and theology and the potential consequences of scholastic method when loosed from spirituality, the interior life, and a life of wisdom.

PAST SESSIONS:

Tuesday, January 8:
Shameful Curiosity? Dialectics and Wisdom in the
Thought of Abelard and Bernard of Clairvaux
James DeFrancis, University of Notre Dame

Tuesday, January 15:
Reason in the Service of Faith: Anselm of Canterbury
Willemien Otten, University of Chicago

Tuesday, January 24, 7:00PM
Francis of Assisi: Lost Between Myth and History
Swift Hall, 3rd Floor Lecture Hall, 1025 East 58th Street
Augustine Thompson, O.P., Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Berkeley

Tuesday, January 29, 7:00PM
The Capacious Mind of St. Thomas Aquinas
Swift Hall, Common Room, 1025 East 58th Street
Kevin Flannery, S.J., Gregorian University

Tuesday, February 5:
Wisdom in 12th Century Paris: Richard and Hugh of St. Victor
Willemien Otten, University of Chicago

Tuesday, February 12
The Meaning of Wisdom in St. Thomas Aquinas
Bernard McGinn, University of Chicago

Tuesday, February 19:
St. Bonaventure on Reason and Wisdom
Peter Casarella, DePaul University

Tuesday, February 26, 4:30PM
The Careful Rationality of Monotheism: Thomas Aquinas on Analogical Knowledge of God
Swift Hall, Common Room, 1025 East 58th Street
Thomas Joseph White, O.P., Dominican House of Studies

Tuesday, March 5:
The Many Sides of Jean Gerson
Ralph Keen, University of Illinois Chicago

Tuesday, March 12:
Thomas à Kempis’s The Imitation of Christ in the Christian Spiritual Tradition
Ralph Keen, University of Illinois Chicago

Wednesday, February 27, 7:00PM
“The Virgin Mary as Model of the Church:
From Vatican II to Thomas Aquinas”
Thomas Joseph White, O.P., Dominican House of Studies

Swift Hall, 3rd Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

Co-sponsored by the History of Christianity Club

The Second Vatican Council insisted that the Virgin Mary is to be understood in light of the Church, and the Church is to be understood in light of the Virgin Mary. Why should the Church seek to recover today a greater emphasis on Marian devotion? How is the Virgin Mary a model of the faith and spiritual life of Christians? Thomas Aquinas provides the basis for a contemporary interpretation of the Council’s Marian teachings.

 REGISTER HERE

Thomas Joseph White, O.P. is Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C. Fr. White is an expert in Thomistic metaphysics and Christology and is the author of Wisdom in the Face of Modernity: A Study in Modern Thomistic Natural Theology and editor of The Analogy of Being: Invention of the Anti-Christ or Wisdom of God?

Tuesday, February 26, 4:30PM
“The Careful Rationality of Monotheism: Thomas Aquinas on Analogical Knowledge of God”
Thomas Joseph White, O.P., Dominican House of Studies
Swift Hall, Common Room
1025 East 58th Street

Co-sponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

How can philosophers speak about God in a reasonable fashion? Does speech about God exceed the capacities of human reason? In responding to these questions, Thomas Aquinas develops a path between the extremes of apophaticism (rejecting the applicability of human language to God) and rationalistic optimism. This lecture will argue for the validity of Thomist doctrine of divine naming and its relevance to contemporary debates in analytic theism and to Heidegger’s critique of “onto-theology” (the theology of being).

REGISTER HERE

 Thomas Joseph White, O.P. is Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C. Fr. White is an expert in Thomistic metaphysics and Christology and is the author of Wisdom in the Face of Modernity: A Study in Modern Thomistic Natural Theology and editor of The Analogy of Being: Invention of the Anti-Christ or Wisdom of God?

Thursday, February 21, 7:00PM
“Philosophy and Martyrdom: Tertullian and Justin Martyr”
Jean-Luc Marion, University of Chicago, Université Paris-Sorbonne
Kent 107, 1020 East 58th Street

Co-sponsored by the Department of Philosophy and Philosophy of Religions Club

During the first two centuries of Christianity believers were led to confess their faith before a pagan world and endure persecution and trial, often leading to martyrdom. One might expect from them the posture and tactics of an irrational and “prophetic” theology. But in fact they chose to make arguments for the consistency and rationality of faith under the literary genre of the apology. They even claimed that this rational confession of faith deserves the title of philosophy. This paradox sheds light on our contemporary situation.

REGISTER HERE

Jean-Luc Marion is Professor in the Divinity School, the Committee on Social Thought, and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Chicago. He is also Professor Emeritus of Modern Philosophy and Metaphysics at the University of Paris IV (Sorbonne) and is a member of the Académie Française. Among his books are In the Self’s Place: The Approach of Saint Augustine, God Without Being, and The Erotic Phenomenon.

Saturday, February 16, 4:00pm-8:00pm
Monastery of the Holy Cross
3111 South Aberdeen Street
Chicago, IL 60608

Intended for University Students. Transportation from Hyde Park will be provided. Registration required as space is limited.

REGISTER HERE

SCHEDULE:

4:00 Depart from Hyde Park.
4:30 Talk on “Spirituality and the Liturgy” by Fr. Peter Funk, OSB.
5:15 Chanted Office of Vespers.
5:40 Silent Prayer.
6:00 Dinner.
6:30 Discussion and Questions.
7:15 Chanted Office of Compline.
8:00 Arrival back in Hyde Park.

Fr. Peter Funk, O.S.B., is the Prior of the Monastery of the Holy Cross, a contemplative Benedictine monastery in the South Side neighborhood of Bridgeport. Fr. Peter received his BA in music from the University of Chicago. After graduating, he was a choral conductor at St. Thomas the Apostle parish and the University of Chicago and led a rock band that performed in Chicago clubs. He entered monastic life in 1997. Fr. Peter studied theology at St. John’s School of Theology in Collegeville, Minnesota, where he majored in Scripture and was ordained to the priesthood in 2004.

A link to the monastery website can be found here.

Click here to watch a short documentary about life in the Monastery.

Thursday, February 7, 4:30PM
“The Theologico-Political Problem Today”
Russell Hittinger (University of Tulsa)
Rosenwald 405, 1101 East 58th Street

Co-sponsored by the History of Christianity Club

For three hundred years the modern nation-state appeared to determine the relationship between politics and religion. Indeed, the modern state was devised to solve this troubled relation. This is no longer the case. The present weakness of nations in discerning matters religious and theological, along with its cool disinterest in religion, presents a particular crisis for the Church. This lecture will consider the history of the theologico-political problem and address the condition of three essential institutions: marriage, polity and church.

REGISTER HERE

Russell Hittinger is the William K. Warren Professor of Catholic Studies and Research Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa. He is also a member of the Pontifical Academy of the Social Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. Professor Hittinger is the author of many books, including A Critique of the New Natural Law Theory, The First Grace: Rediscovering Natural Law in a Post-Christian Age, and ThomasAquinas the Rule of Law.

Tuesday, January 29, 7:00PM
“The Capacious Mind of St. Thomas Aquinas”
Kevin Flannery, S.J., Gregorian University, Rome
Swift Hall, 3rd Floor Lecture Hall
Note Room Change       
1025 East 58th Street

Co-Sponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

The thought of Thomas Aquinas, especially as it bears upon human action, leads one to make difficult choices. Aquinas insists that a lie—even to save the life of another—is always a sin. He also insists that one ought not ever by means of a direct act to take the life an innocent human being. Understanding Thomas’s “capacious mind” and the nature of the acts in question held us to understand why we should follow him in these matters.

REGISTER HERE

Kevin Flannery, S.J., is Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Ordinary Professor of the History of Ancient Philosophy at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Fr. Flannery is the author of many works on ethics and on the history of logic, including Acts Amid Precepts: The Aristotelian Logical Structure of Thomas Aquinas’s Moral Theory. He received his D.Phil. from the University of Oxford.

Friday, January 25, 2-5PM 
“How to Write a Biography of a Medieval Saint”
a master class on Francis of Assisi: A New Biography
Augustine Thompson, O.P., Dominican School of Philosophy & Theology
Gavin House, 1220 East 58th Street 

Cosponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

In his new book, Francis of Assisi: A New Biography, Augustine Thompson, O.P., sifts through the surviving evidence for the life of Francis using modern historical methods. The Francis who emerges here is both more complex and more conflicted than that of older biographies. This one-day master class will consider whether “the historical Francis” can be recovered from countless modern and medieval appropriations and compare Fr. Thompson’s biography on Francis’s early life with a variety of biographical sources.

Among the most beloved saints in the Catholic tradition, Francis of Assisi (c. 1181-1226) is popularly remembered for his dedication to poverty, his love of animals and nature, and his desire to follow perfectly the teachings and example of Christ. During his lifetime and after his death, followers collected, for their own purposes, numerous stories, anecdotes, and reports about Francis. As a result, the man himself and his own concerns became lost in legend.

Participants are also encouraged to attend the symposium on Francis of Assisi: A New Biography (Wednesday, January 23 at 4:30PM) and lecture on “Francis of Assisi: Lost between Myth and History” (Thursday, January 24 at 7:ooPM ) by Fr. Thompson, both of which will take place in Swift Hall, 3rd Floor Lecture Hall, 1025 East 58th Street. 

Reading List:

1. “The Franciscan Question” (pp. 153-70)
2. “Chapter 1: When I was in my sins, 1181-1205″ (pp. 3-18)
3.  ”Sources and Debate on Chapter 1″ (pp. 189-206)

REGISTER HERE

Augustine Thompson, O.P., is Professor of History at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California. He has taught in the religious studies department of the University of Oregon and the department of Religious Studies and History at the University of Virginia. His most recent books are Francis of Assisi: A New Biography and Cities of God: The Religion of the Italian Communes, 1125–1325.

This master class is intended for graduate and advanced undergraduate students. If you would like to participate in the class with Fr. Thompson, register below. Space is limited and offered on a first-come, first-served basis. If you have any questions, please contact Mark Franzen at mfranzen@lumenchristi.org.

Thursday, January 24, 7:00pm
“Francis of Assisi: Lost Between Myth and History”
Augustine Thompson, O.P.,
Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Berkeley
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

Cosponsored by the Department of History and the Medieval Studies Workshop

REGISTER HERE

Among the most beloved of saints, Francis of Assisi is celebrated for his dedication to poverty, his love of nature, and his desire to follow perfectly the teachings and example of Christ. His followers compiled numerous, often legendary, accounts. The man and his own concerns seem lost to view. Fr. Augustine Thompson, O.P. will speak on the “Quest for the Historical Francis” and attempt to portray—beyond the legends—the man who was Francis of Assisi.

Augustine Thompson, O.P., is Professor of History at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California. He has taught in the religious studies department of the University of Oregon and the department of Religious Studies and History at the University of Virginia, where he was director of the doctoral program in Religious Studies. His most recent books are Francis of Assisi: A New Biography and Cities of God: The Religion of the Italian Communes, 1125–1325.

Wednesday, January 23, 4:30 PM
Book Symposium on Francis of Assisi: A New Biography
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street 

Cosponsored by the Department of History and the Medieval Studies Workshop
with
Augustine Thompson, O.P., Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Berkeley
Karen Scott, DePaul University
Lawrence Cunningham, University of Notre Dame

In this authoritative and engaging new biography, Augustine Thompson, O.P., sifts through the surviving evidence for the life of Francis using modern historical methods. The result is a complex yet sympathetic portrait of the man and the saint. Francis emerges from this account as very much a typical thirteenth-century Italian layman, but one who, when faced with unexpected crises in his personal life, made decisions so radical that they challenge his own society—and ours. Unlike the saint of legend, this Francis never had a unique divine inspiration to provide him with rules for following the teachings of Jesus. Rather, he spent his life reacting to unexpected challenges, before which he often found himself unprepared and uncertain. The Francis who emerges here is both more complex and more conflicted than that of older biographies. 

REGISTER HERE

Augustine Thompson, O.P., is Professor of History at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California. He has taught in the religious studies department of the University of Oregon and the department of Religious Studies and History at the University of Virginia. His most recent books are Francis of Assisi: A New Biography and Cities of God: The Religion of the Italian Communes, 1125–1325.

Karen Scott is an associate professor of Catholic Studies and History at DePaul University. She teaches courses in church history, medieval intellectual history, medieval mysticism, Renaissance Italy, Reformation Europe, and has written extensively on Catherine of Siena.

Lawrence S. Cunningham is the John A. O’Brien Emeritus Professor of theology at the University of Notre Dame. A leading American scholar in the areas of systematic theology and culture, Catholic spirituality, and Catholic saints, Cunningham has edited or written over twenty-five books. His most recent books are Things Seen and Unseen and An Introduction to Catholicism.

Saturday, January 19, 5:30 PM
“Benedict XVI on the Liturgy”
Paul Mankowski, S.J.
Gavin House, 1220 East 58th Street

Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) has long cherished Catholic liturgy, and his writings on the subject illuminate the man as well as the meaning of Christian ritual. This talk is intended as an introduction to the concept of liturgy as understood by Catholics and of the contributions Ratzinger-both as theologian and as worshiper-has made to its authentic development and reception within the Church.

REGISTER HERE

Paul Mankowski, S.J., is Scholar-in-Residence at the Lumen Christi Institute. A native of South Bend, Indiana, and a member of the Society of Jesus, Paul Mankowski has an A.B. from the University of Chicago, an M.A. from Oxford, and a Ph.D. in Semitic Philology from Harvard University. He taught for many years at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome and has published in areas of language, theology, and the biblical text.

This event is intended for University students. An informal dinner will be served. Please contact mfranzen@lumenchristi.org with any questions.

Mosaic of the Creation, St. Mark’s Basilica

Saturday, January 5, 2013, 1 PM to 6:15 PM
Wyndham Riverfront New Orleans
701 Convention Center Boulevard
New Orleans, LA 70130

Conference Topic: The Statement on the Nature of Law from Evangelicals and Catholics

The cost of the conference is $30 per person, and the registration deadline is Thursday, January 3rd.

Pay by check or credit card. Visa, Mastercard, and American Express accepted. PayPal account not required for credit card payment.

REGISTER NOW

Conference Schedule

1:00 PM: Registration (coffee available)

1:15 PM – 2:45 PM: Session One: Christian Perspectives on the Nature of Law
Chair: Michael Moreland (Villanova University School of Law)

William Brewbaker III (University of Alabama School of Law)

Nora O’Callaghan (Loyola University Chicago School of Law)

David Skeel (University of Pennsylvania Law School)

2:45 PM – 3:00 PM: Coffee Break

3:00 PM – 4:30 PM: Session Two: Non-Christian Perspectives on the Nature of Law
Chair: Zachary R. Calo (Valparaiso University Law School)

Bruce Ledewitz (Duquesne University School of Law)

Dan Markel (Florida State University College of Law)

Seval Yildirim (Whittier Law School)

4:45 PM – 5:15 PM: Vespers

5:15 PM: Reception

This conference is intended for legal scholars and law students. 
Others interested in attending, please contact info@lumenchristi.org or 773-955-5887.

“Tidings True:
Advent Music from Long Ago”
Schola Antiqua of Chicago
Michael Alan Anderson, Artistic Director

BBC Music Magazine has placed Schola Antiqua’s “Tiding True” concert series among the top 20 recommended concerts in the United States during the month of December.

The centerpiece of this Schola Antiqua program will be Pierre de la Rue’s Missa Conceptio tua. This extensive work for extremely low voices was very much in demand in the early sixteenth century, but has not seen the light of day in modern performances or recordings. La Rue’s mass will be complemented by other diverse songs for the Advent season, including the traditional “O antiphons” and several medieval English carols, including Nova, Nova and There is no rose of sywch vertue. This program is sponsored by the Lumen Christi Institute, with supplemental grants from the Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation, the Illinois Arts Council, and the Sage Foundation.

Schola Antiqua of Chicago, Artist in Residence at the Lumen Christi Institute since 2008, is a professional vocal ensemble dedicated to western liturgical chant and polyphonic music before the year 1600. The ensemble is the 2012 winner of the Noah Greenberg Award, given by the American Musicological Society for outstanding contributions to historical performing practice.

General admission will be $25 at the door; $10 students/seniors (cash or check only).
There will be a 20% discount available for those that order online.
Groups of 10 or more, please call 773-955-5887 to get an additional 20% discount on tickets.

PURCHASE TICKETS HERE
Visa, Mastercard, and American Express accepted.
PayPal account not required for credit card payment.

December 7, 8pm
Sacred Heart Parish
1077 Tower Road
Winnetka, IL 60093

December 9, 3pm
St. James Chapel at Quigley Center of the Archdiocese of Chicago
835 North Rush Street
Chicago, IL 60611

Tuesday, November 20, 4:30 PM
“Augustine and the Doctrine of Universal Restoration”
Ilaria Ramelli, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Milan
Swift Hall, Room 106
1025 East 58th Street

Cosponsored by the History of Christianity Club

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Encouraged but not Required.
RSVP HERE

The great theologian Augustine of Hippo (354-430) is known to have condemned the doctrine of universal restoration and salvation (apokatastasis)—devised by Origen of Alexandria († 255ca.)—as heretical. But in his earlier defense of Christian Orthodoxy against Manicheism, Augustine adhered to this doctrine. This lecture will show how Augustine’s later polemic against the Pelagians and his ignorance of Greek played a significant role in his eventual rejection of Origen’s doctrine.

Ilaria Ramelli is Professor of History of the Roman Near East, and Assistant of History of Ancient Philosophy at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Milan. She is internationally recognized as one of the foremost scholars of classic and early Christian literature and thought. She is author of textual editions, with notes and commentary, on major ancient texts, both Christian and non-Christian, and has published numerous articles on the influence of Greek Philosophy on Christian doctrine.

A Conversation on Faith and Science
with Mark Wyman and Minyoung Wyman
Saturday, November 10, 5:30pm-7:00pm
Gavin House
1220 East 58th Street

This event is intended for college students.
Dinner will be served.
RSVP HERE
 

Contemporary culture is built in part on a mythology of the natural sciences. This mythology characterizes Christianity, particularly Catholicism, as a reactionary force clinging to a pre-modern worldview that brave men and women have replaced with a modern, scientific one. Two postdoctoral researchers at the University of Chicago—a theoretical cosmologist and an evolutionary biologist—will explain why this myth is false. Each will give a brief account of their own experience as scientists and reflect on the compatibility of faith and modern science. Ample time for questions and discussion will follow.

Mark Wyman is a post-doctoral scholar in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Chicago. He received his PhD from Cornell University.

Minyoung Wyman is a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Toronto and is a visiting scholar at the University of Chicago. She received her PhD from the University of Toronto.

Wednesday, November 7, 7:00 PM
“Shakespeare, Identity, and Religion”
John Finnis, Notre Dame Law School
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

Cosponsored by The Nicholson Center for British Studies

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Encouraged but not Required.
RSVP HERE

Whether Shakespeare was Catholic has long been a point of speculation. Recent research into the life of Oxford philosopher and double agent William Sterrell has revealed a neglected group of Catholics connected to Shakespeare at and around the courts of Queen Elizabeth and King James. The potential influence of these crypto-Catholics—practicing their faith in animo while outwardly complying with the legally enforced state religion—offers a new understanding of Shakespeare’s works and audience.

John Finnis, F.B.A., is the Biolchini Family Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame and Professor Emeritus of Law and Legal Philosophy at Oxford University.  A Rhodes Scholar from South Australia, he earned his doctorate at Oxford and has been a fellow of University College, Oxford, since 1966. He is the author of Natural Law and Natural Rights, Fundamentals of Ethics, Moral Absolutes: Tradition, Revision and Truth, and Aquinas: Moral, Political and Legal Theory. Collected Essays of John Finnis was published in five volumes by Oxford University Press in 2011. In the past ten years he has published six articles on Elizabethan history and literature, including two long articles in the Times Literary Supplement.

credit: Franklin McMahon

Thursday, November 1, 4:30 PM
“Vatican II’s Declaration on Religious Liberty, 50 Years Later”
Russell Hittinger, University of Tulsa
Fulton Recital Hall, Goodspeed Hall
1010 E. 59th St.

Cosponsored by The Department of History and The St. Thomas More Society

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Encouraged but not Required.
RSVP HERE

At the third plenary session of Vatican II, Fr. John Courtney Murray said that “The issue of religious liberty [is] the American issue at the Council.” Yet it took the longest to write, and, after undergoing thousands of comments and corrections over four years, it was signed by Pope Paul VI less than twenty-four hours before the Council was adjourned.  This lecture will consider, (1) the reasons for this Declaration on Religious Liberty and the difficulties and debates at the Council, and (2) how the doctrine of religious liberty has fared a generation later.

Russell Hittinger is Warren Chair of Catholic Studies at the University of Tulsa. His research focuses on the intersection of philosophy, religion, and law. He is author of Thomas Aquinas and the Rule of Law and The First Grace: Rediscovering the Natural Law in a Post-Christian World.

Wednesday, October 24, 7:00 PM
“The Dialogue of Economics and Catholic Social Thought”
Joseph Kaboski, University of Notre Dame
Martin Schlag, Pontifical University of the Holy Cross
Social Sciences 122
1126 East 59th Street

Cosponsored by the University of Chicago Ethics Club

The presence of two Catholic candidates for vice-president have raised questions about Catholic social thought and American free market economics.  In this symposium, an economist and a theologian consider how the Church’s teaching bears on contemporary economic questions. The questions to be explored will include: What does the Catholic social thought—developed by popes from Leo XIII and Pius XI to John Paul II and Benedict XVI—say about economic issues? How can economists engage the principles of Catholic Social Thought and reflect on questions such as the just wage, social solidarity and the market economy? How can economists assist the Church to develop and implement its social teaching?

Joseph Kaboski is the David F. and Erin M. Seng Foundation Associate Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at the University of Notre Dame. His research focuses on growth, development and international economics, with an emphasis on structural change, finance and development, schooling and growth, microfinance, explaining international relative price patterns, and the role of inventories in international trade. He has consulted for the Federal Reserve Banks of Chicago, Minneapolis, and St. Louis, as well as the World Bank.

Fr. Martin Schlag is Professor of the Social Doctrine of the Church at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. He holds doctorates in law and theology from the University of Vienna. He has recently edited, together with Juan Andrés Mercado, Freedom of Markets and the Culture of Common Good.

Gregory the Great dictating Chant.

Friday, October 19, 4:00 PM
“Gregorian Chant as Splendor Formae of the Liturgy”
William Mahrt, Stanford University
Classics 110
1010 E. 59th Street

Cosponsored by the Department of Music and the Medieval Studies Workshop

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Required.
RSVP HERE

A principal Medieval definition of beauty is splendor formae, the manifesting of the very nature or form of a thing. While the liturgy can be described as a great divine action, it is also comprised of a variety of discrete chants. Being entirely sung, its Gregorian chants differentiate the character and function of each action and thus express a purposeful variety. This lecture will illustrate the beauty of the liturgy by comparing these chants—particularly the gradual and alleluia in relation to the responsories of the Divine Office.

William Mahrt is Associate Professor and Director of Early Music Singers at the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies at Stanford University, President of the Church Music Assocation of America, and editor of Sacred Music, the oldest continuously published journal of music in North America. His research interests include theory and performance of Medieval and Renaissance music, troubadours, Machaut, Dufay, Lasso, Dante, English Cathedrals, Gregorian chant, and Renaissance polyphony.

Thursday, October 18, 7:00 PM
“What Makes Music Sacred?”
William Mahrt, Stanford University
Social Sciences 122
1126 East 59th Street

Cosponsored by the Department of Music and the Medieval Studies Workshop

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Required.
RSVP HERE

While it is easy to recognize traditional forms of sacred music—Gregorian chant, classical polyphony, organ music, choral music, and vernacular hymns—it is difficult to pinpoint what it is that makes music “sacred.” This lecture will reflect upon the relation of the sacred and the beautiful in the liturgy. It will consider what is meant by “sacred,” as distinguished from “holy” and place those things considered sacred in the context of their reception and intrinsic suitability.

William Mahrt is Associate Professor and Director of Early Music Singers at the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies at Stanford University, President of the Church Music Assocation of America, and editor of Sacred Music, the oldest continuously published journal of music in North America. His research interests include theory and performance of Medieval and Renaissance music, troubadours, Machaut, Dufay, Lasso, Dante, English Cathedrals, Gregorian chant, and Renaissance polyphony.

The Book of Psalms
Autumn 2012 Non-Credit Course
Instructor: Paul Mankowski, S.J.

Location: Gavin House
1220 East 58th Street

Lecture: 7:00PM
Informal Dinner: 6:30PM

Intended for University students, faculty, and recent graduates. Others interested in attending, contact info@lumenchristi.org.

October 16:  The Prayer Book of Jesus
What are the psalms and how did they become a psalter? The introductory class will address the nature of Jewish prayer and Hebrew poetry, lay out the various genres of psalms, and discuss the compilation of psalms into a book of the Old Testament and a keystone of the Church’s liturgy. Particular attention will be given Psalms 6, 19, and 27.

October 23: Songs of Wrath
God’s anger and man’s find full-throated expression in the Psalms, often in ways that shock or bewilder us. In coming to grips with the cursings in the Psalms we come to a deeper understanding of the blessings that are their contraries, and the nature of the injuries that prompt them. Particular attention will be given Psalms 2, 49, 53, 58, 109, and 137.

October 30: Songs of Joy
The Psalmist’s capacity for delight exceeded even his capacity for rage. Discussion of various examples of exultation will show how enraptured contemplation of the created order was to be extended into the Church’s sacramental theology.  Particular attention will be given Psalms 16, 23, 66, 92, 96, 119, and 139.

November 6: Songs of Entreaty & Assent
The desires of the Psalmist were always present to him, and entreaty is a constant force in his prayer.  At the same time the psalms take delight in affirming the hand of God in the history of His people.  Particular attention will be given Psalms 22, 42, 57, 106, and 110.

November 13: Songs of Pain
Lament, sorrow and remorse are part of every human life, and consequently part of the prayer offered by every believer.  A discussion of some of the penitential psalms and psalms of lament will examine the moral self-understanding of ancient Israel and way in which it is and is not continued by Christian belief and prayer. Particular attention will be given Psalms 51, 55, 69, 73, 79, and 88.

November 20:  Songs of Praise
It is a striking fact about Israel that it was willing, even delighted, to give praise and thanks to God simply for who He is in Himself, and not only in response for those benefits He had conferred upon His people.  The psalm of praise is the psalm par excellence.  Particular attention will be given Psalms 8, 65, 104, 68, 84, 117, 148, and 150.

Thursday, October 11, 7:00 PM
“The Second Vatican Council and the Church’s Engagement with the Modern World”
Edward Oakes, University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary
Rosenwald 405
1101 E. 58th Street

Cosponsored by the University of Chicago Ethics Club

Lecture Free and Open to the Public.
RSVP Required.
RSVP HERE

After decades of ideological upheaval that often placed the Catholic Church in conflict with modernity, Pope John XXIII convened the Second Vatican Council in part to open a dialogue with modern culture. This lecture will reflect on the theological developments that led to Vatican II’s “Pastoral Constitution on the Modern World,” Gaudium et Spes, the document’s text itself, and the history of its reception, and offer a perspective on the current health of the Church and its prospects for bringing the light of Christ to the world.

Edward T. Oakes, S.J. is Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary, the Catholic seminary for the Archdiocese of Chicago. He earned his doctorate in systematic theology from Union Theological Seminary in New York City. He is the author of Pattern of Redemption: The Theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar, editor of German Essays on Religion, and has recently published Infinity Dwindled to Infancy: A Catholic and Evangelical Christology.

Wednesday, September 26, 5:30pm
Richard Garnett (University of Notre Dame Law School)
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP
155 North Wacker Drive, 28th Floor
Chicago, IL 60606

As President Clinton observed, “religious freedom is . . . our first freedom.” It was central to the Founders’ vision for the American political community. They did not always agree about what religious freedom means or requires, but they knew that it matters, and that it should be respected in policy and protected by law. James Madison, the Father of our Constitution, hoped that America’s religious-liberty experiment “promised a lustre to our country.” This lecture will take stock of this experiment and consider the rights of religious believers and institutions and their roles and voices in American public life today.

Co-sponsored by the Catholic Lawyers Guild

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Richard Garnett is Associate Dean for Faculty Research and Professor of Law and Concurrent Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame Law School. A graduate of Duke University and Yale Law School, Garnett has been visiting professor at the University of Chicago Law School, Northwestern Law School and other institutions. In 1996-1997, he served as clerk to Chief Justice William Rehnquist. His work focuses on the freedoms of speech, association, and religion, and on constitutional law more generally. He is working on a research project entitled Two There Are: Understanding the Separation of Church and State. A regular contributor to national print and broadcast media, he writes for several law-related blogs, including “Mirror of Justice,” “PrawfsBlawg,” and “Law, Religion, and Ethics.”

Thursday, May 31, 2012
“Toward a Moral Economy: Policies and Values for the 21st Century”
Ida Noyes Hall, Max Palevsky Cinema
1212 East 59th Street

Keynote Address: Reinhard Cardinal Marx, Archbishop of Munich
Presentations: Roger Myerson, University of Chicago,
Kevin M. Murphy, University of Chicago,
and Russell Hittinger, University of Tulsa

This event opens the Fourth Lumen Christi Institute Conference on Economics and Catholic Social Thought and inaugurates the Institute’s Collaboration with the German-American Colloquium of the Katholische Sozialwissenschaftliche Zentralstelle.

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Co-sponsored by the Katholische Sozialwissenschaftliche Zentralstelle and The John U. Nef Committee on Social Thought

As the United States and the global economy continue to reel from the effects of the 2008 financial crisis, we face several questions:

• What went wrong?
• How to prevent another such crisis?
• Can there be moral responsibility in a globalized economy?
• What would a moral economy look like?

On May 31, 2012, Reinhard Cardinal Marx, the Archbishop of Munich and a leading figure in contemporary Catholic social thought, explored these questions in a major address, “Toward a Moral Economy.” Two leading University of Chicago economists—Roger Myerson, winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize, and Kevin Murphy, winner of the John Bates Clark Medal and the MacArthur Fellowship—offered their perspectives. They were joined by Russell Hittinger, member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences and co-chair of the Lumen Christi Institute’s Program in Catholic Social Thought.

Thursday Evenings, Non-Credit Course, Spring Quarter 2012
“The Church Fathers”
Gavin House
1220 East 58th Street
Lecture, 7:00pm
Informal Dinner, 6:30pm

Intended for University students, faculty, and recent graduates. Others interested in attending, contact info@lumenchristi.org.

May 24
“John Climacus: Cleansing, Death, and Resurrection in his The Ladder of Divine Ascent”
Perry Hamalis (North Central College)

Co-sponsored by the Orthodox Christian Fellowship

John Climacus (ca. 579-ca. 659) uses a number of analogies to describe the dynamics of spiritual development in his famous ascetical work, The Ladder of Divine Ascent. In addition to the image of a “ladder,” embedded in the work’s title, St. John uses a range of medical imagery, appeals to figures and events from the Hebrew Bible, and even compares a monastery to a “laundry” where the dirt, grossness, and deformity of the soul are scrubbed away. Through reflection on several passages from this classic work in Christian ascetical theology, this lecture contends that St. John’s images reveal a deeper, existential focus within his ethical vision–one that links cleansing and the acquisition of the virtues with a passing over from death to a resurrected way of living.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012
“The Making of Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae”
Bernard McGinn, University of Chicago
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

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Co-sponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop

The Summa Theologiae of Thomas Aquinas stands among the finest expressions of the Catholic “understanding of faith” (intellectus fidei). Over a thousand commentaries have been written on it. A leading historian of Medieval Christian thought, Bernard McGinn explores Thomas’s reason for writing the Summa and its principles, structure, and originality.

Bernard McGinn is the Naomi Shenstone Donnelley Professor Emeritus of Historical Theology and of the History of Christianity in the Divinity School and the Committees on Medieval Studies and on General Studies at the University of Chicago. His current long-range project is a seven-volume history of Christian mysticism in the West under the general title The Presence of God, four volumes of which have appeared: The Origins of Mysticism; The Growth of Mysticism; The Flowering of Mysticism; and The Harvest of Mysticism in Medieval Germany.

Rubens, "Constantine's conversion"

Wednesday, May 16, 2012
“The Catholic Roots of Religious Freedom”
Robert Wilken, University of Virginia
Social Sciences 122
1126 East 59th Street

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Co-sponsored by the St. Thomas More Society

The roots of modern ideas of religious freedom are as much religious as they are political and philosophical. The American political leaders who first championed these ideas were well aware of the religious sources supporting their views. This lecture explores how early Christian thinkers developed a theological understanding of religious freedom.

Robert Louis Wilken is the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of the History of Christianity Emeritus at the University of Virginia. He is the author of numerous books, including The Spirit of Early Christian Thought: Seeking the Face of God.

Saturday, May 12, 4:30pm-8:10pm
Monastery Visit and Lecture on “St. John Cassian, Monasticism, and the Kingdom of God”
Fr. Peter Funk, Prior at Monastery of the Holy Cross and U of C Alum

Registration Required. RSVP to info@lumenchristi.org.

About the Lecture:
John Cassian, a monk with broad experience of Greek, Latin and Coptic monasticism, wrote his most important works, The Institutes and The Conferences to assist the Pope in establishing the monastic tradition of the Desert Fathers in fifth-century Europe.  Since Cassian maintains that the monastic life is simply the life of the apostolic church, his insights  are relevant for all Christians. This talk unfolds Cassian’s spirituality and the practices required of anyone who seeks the purity of heart that leads towards  the realization of the Kingdom of God both in the interior life and in the social realm.

About the Monastery:
The Monastery of the Holy Cross is a contemplative Benedictine monastery in the South Side neighborhood of Bridgeport.

Tentative Schedule:
4:30pm Departure from Hyde Park.
5:00pm Welcome and Orientation to Divine Office.
5:15pm Chanted Office of Vespers.
5:45pm Dinner.
6:15pm Lecture on “St. John Cassian, Monasticism, and the Kingdom of God” by Fr. Funk.
7:30pm Chanted Office of Compline.
7:45pm Departure from the Monastery.
8:10pm Arrival back in Hyde Park.

Fr. Peter Funk, OSB, is Prior of the Monastery of the Holy Cross. Fr. Peter received his BA in music from the University of Chicago. After graduating, he was a choral conductor at St. Thomas the Apostle parish and the University of Chicago and led a rock band that performed in Chicago clubs. Fr. Peter studied theology at St. John’s School of Theology in Collegeville, Minnesota, where he majored in Scripture. He was ordained to the priesthood in 2004.

Tuesday, May 8, 4:30 PM
The Unintended Reformation
Brad Gregory, University of Notre Dame
Mark Noll, University of Notre Dame
Rachel Fulton Brown, University of Chicago
Classics 110
1010 E. 59th Street

Co-sponsored by the Department of History and The Early Modern Workshop

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In his latest book, The Unintended Reformation, Brad Gregory identifies the unintended consequences of the Protestant Reformation and traces how it has shaped the modern condition. He argues that hyperpluralism, an absence of a shared sense of the common good, and the triumph of consumerism are each the long-term effects of a distinctive religious movement that marked the end of a period of history in which Christianity provided a framework for a shared intellectual, social, and moral life in the West.

Brad Gregory is the Dorothy G. Griffin Associate Professor of Early Modern European History at the University of Notre Dame. His research interests center on Christianity in the Reformation era (sixteenth and seventeenth centuries), including magisterial Protestantism, radical Protestantism, and Roman Catholicism approached comparatively and cross-confessionally.

Mark A. Noll is the Francis A. McAnaney Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame. Noll’s research concerns mostly the history of Christianity in the United States and Canada. His recent books include Protestantism–A Very Short Introduction and The New Shape of World Christianity: How American Experience Reflects Global Faith.

Rachel Fulton Brown is Associate Professor of Medieval History at the University of Chicago. Her research and teaching focus on the intellectual and cultural history of Europe in the Middle Ages, with particular emphasis on the history of Christianity and monasticism in the Latin West. She is author of History in the Comic Mode: Medieval Communities and the Matter of Person.

Wednesday, April 25, 4:30 PM
“Newman, Vatican II, and the Hermeneutic of Continuity”
Ian Ker, University of Oxford
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

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Often called “the Father of the Second Vatican Council,” Newman both anticipated a number of its teachings and, through his recovery of the thought of the early Church, provides a hermeneutic of continuity for interpreting the Council’s documents.

Ian Ker has taught both English literature and theology at universities in the United States and Britain, where he is currently a member of the Oxford theology faculty. He is the author and editor of more than twenty books on Newman, including the standard biography which Oxford University Press reissued prior to Newman’s beatification. He is also the author of The Catholic Revival in English Literature 1845-1961, Mere Catholicism, and most recently, G. K. Chesterton: A Biography.

Tuesday, April 24, 7:00 PM
“G.K. Chesterton on Humor”
Ian Ker, University of Oxford
Ida Noyes, Third Floor Theatre
1212 East 59th Street

Co-sponsored by The Nicholson Center for British Studies, The American Chesterton Society, and the Literature and Philosophy Workshop

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Chesterton regarded comedy as important an art form as tragedy. He thought humor was integral to Christianity as opposed to paganism, and it was an essential part of his philosophy of wonder.

Ian Ker has taught both English literature and theology at universities in the United States and Britain, where he is currently a member of the Oxford theology faculty. He is the author and editor of more than twenty books on Newman, including the standard biography which Oxford University Press reissued prior to Newman’s beatification. He is also the author of The Catholic Revival in English Literature 1845-1961, Mere Catholicism, and most recently, G. K. Chesterton: A Biography.

Friday, April 20, 8:00 PM

Rockefeller Chapel
5850 South Woodlawn Avenue
Chicago, IL 60637

Saturday, April 21, 8:00 PM
St. Clement Church
642 West Deming Place
Chicago, IL 60614

Sunday, April 22, 3:00 PM
St. Isaac Jogues
306 West Fourth Street
Hinsdale, IL 60521

Schola Antiqua of Chicago, Artists-in-Residence at the Lumen Christi Institute
Michael Alan Anderson, Director

“Music of the Hours,” with special guest Roger S. Wieck, Curator of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the Morgan Library & Museum, features a program of magnificent visual art showcasing late-medieval devotional guides known as Books of Hours, set to music sung by Schola Antiqua.

Purchase Tickets Online Here
Tickets also available at door:
$25 general, $10 students and seniors
Free for University of Chicago students

Tuesday, April 17, 4:30 PM
“Irony and Humanity”
Jonathan Lear, University of Chicago
Alasdair MacIntyre, University of Notre Dame
Oriental Institute, Breasted Hall
1155 East 58th Street

Presented by the Committee on Social Thought and the Department of Philosophy.
Co-sponsored by the Lumen Christi Institute.

 

Jonathan Lear

Jonathan Lear is the John U. Nef Distinguished Service Professor at the Committee on Social Thought and in the Department of Philosophy. He trained in Philosophy at Cambridge University and The Rockefeller University. He works on philosophical conceptions of the human psyche from Socrates to the present. He is author of Radical Hope: Ethics in the Face of Cultural Devastation, Therapeutic Action: An Earnest Plea for Irony, and Happiness, Death and the Remainder of Life.

 

 

Alasdair MacIntyre

Alasdair MacIntyre has made great contributions to the history of philosophy, moral philosophy, and especially to the renewal of Aristotelianism and its challenge to rival traditions. He is Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Contemporary Aristotelian Studies in Ethics and Politics (CASEP) at London Metropolitan University and Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. MacIntyre is author of After Virtue, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? and Dependent Rational Animals. His After Virtue remains the most important text in the recovery of virtue ethics.

Wednesday, April 11, 4:30 PM
Thomas Aquinas on God and Evil
Brian Davies, Fordham University
Denys Turner, Yale University
Michael Kremer, University of Chicago
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street

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Many people find that they cannot reconcile belief in the existence of God with the reality of evil; for if an all powerful and perfectly good God exists, then why is there so much suffering and injustice? Brian Davies, in his most recent book, Thomas Aquinas on God and Evil, argues that Aquinas gives us the proper theoretical framework for dealing with these tensions.

Brian Davies is Professor of Philosophy at Fordham University. Having received his PhD from King’s College, London, he spent over a decade as a lecturer at the University of Oxford before assuming his current position. He is author of An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion and Thinking About God.

Denys Turner is the Horace Tracy Pitkin Professor of Historical Theology at Yale University. He is the author of Marxism and Christianity, Eros and Allegory, and The Darkness of God, as well as many articles and papers on political and social theory in relation to Christian theology, and on medieval thought, especially the traditions of ‘mystical theology.’

Michael Kremer is the Mary R. Morton Professor of Philosophy at the University of Chicago. He has published numerous articles on logic, philosophy of language, and early analytic philosophy. His current research projects include work on the 19th-century mathematician and philosopher Gottlob Frege, and on the early 20th-century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Friday, March 23, 12:00pm-1:30pm
Donald DeMarco
(St. Jerome’s University, Waterloo, Ontario)
Union League Club
65 West Jackson Boulevard

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Dr. Donald DeMarco is Professor Emeritus at St. Jerome’s University in Waterloo, Ontario and currently an Adjunct Professor at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in Cromwell, CT. He is a corresponding member of the Pontifical Academy for Life and a founding member of the American Bioethics Advisory Commission. He is the author of articles both scholarly and for the general public, and 22 books, including Architects of the Culture of Death and The Heart of Virtue.

Allegory of Virtue by Correggio

Friday, March 2, 4:00pm
“Emotion and Virtue in Thomas Aquinas”
Fr. Nicholas Lombardo (Catholic University of America)
Swift Commons
1025 East 58th Street

Co-sponsors: The Templeton Foundation and The Philosophy Department

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Abstract: For Aquinas, ethics is nothing other than the study of human psychology insofar as it flourishes or fails to flourish. Consequently, his thought on emotion is crucial to his account of virtue. This lecture will discuss Aquinas’s theory of the emotions and its implications for his virtue theory.

Fr. Nicholas Lombardo is Assistant Professor of Historical and Systematic Theology at the Catholic University of America. He studied philosophy at Brown University and theology at the Dominican House of Studies, before receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. His past research has focused on Thomas Aquinas and especially his philosophy and theology of the emotions. More recently he has been working on the theology of redemption, with particular attention to patristic theology and its contemporary applications.

Thursday, February 23, 7:00pm
Russell Hittinger (University of Tulsa)
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
1025 East 58th Street
map

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While Roman civilization collapsed around him, Benedict — a fifth-century  monk and abbot — authored his “Rule” for monks and set forth a way of life for the monasteries that would become one of the few lights of wisdom and civility in an age of increasing darkness and social isolation. Benedict taught those who lived in these “dark ages” how to make their daily lives an integrated whole of prayer and work, enlightened by the wisdom of Christ. In this respect, his Rule contains many lessons that apply to Christians in contemporary life.

Russell Hittinger is Warren Chair of Catholic Studies at the University of Tulsa. His research focuses on the intersection of philosophy, religion, and law. He is author of Thomas Aquinas and the Rule of Law and The First Grace: Rediscovering the Natural Law in a Post-Christian World.

Wednesday, February 8, 4pm-6pm
A Symposium on Timothy Matovina’s new book Latino Catholicism: Transformation in America’s Largest Church
Social Sciences 122
1126 East 59th Street
map

Cosponsored by The American Religious History Workshop and The Center for Latin American Studies

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“Finely researched, engagingly written, and more comprehensive than any other book on the subject, Timothy Matovina’s Latino Catholicism is a scholarly labor of love that does justice to the historic presence of Latino Catholics in America….His book raises the bar for studies of U.S. religion and society.”
-Allan Figueroa Deck, S.J.

Timothy Matovina (University of Notre Dame)
with responses from:
Peter Casarella (DePaul University)
Kathleen Conzen (University of Chicago)

Timothy Matovina is professor of theology and the William and Anna Jean Cushwa Director of the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism at the University of Notre Dame. His books include Guadalupe and Her Faithful: Latino Catholics in San Antonio, from Colonial Origins to the Present and Horizons of the Sacred: Mexican Traditions in U.S. Catholicism.

Peter J. Casarella is a professor of Catholic Studies at DePaul University where he is also the director of the Center for World Catholicism and Intercultural Theology (CWCIT). He received his PhD in Religious Studies at Yale University after completing adissertation on the theology of the word of the fifteenth-century Catholic thinker Nicholas of Cusa.

Kathleen Neils Conzen is the Thomas E. Donnelley Professor of American History and the College at the University of Chicago. Conzen’s research and teaching focus on the social and political history of the United States in the 19th century, with a special interest in issues of immigration, ethnicity, religion, western settlement, and urban development.

Thursday, February 2, 7:15pm
“The Grand Design: An Augustinian Reply to Stephen Hawking”
John Cavadini (University of Notre Dame)
Social Sciences 122
1126 East 59th Street
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Cosponsored by The Theology Workshop

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Stephen Hawking has recently declared that philosophy is dead, and that science is the only reasonable method for securing knowledge. In response, Professor Cavadini will argue that philosophy is rooted in man’s wonder about the universe, and that scientific inquiry is only one aspect of true wisdom and should not be privileged over others.

John Cavadini is Associate Professor of Theology and Director of the Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame. Cavadini specializes in patristic and early medieval theology, the theology of Augustine and the history of biblical and patristic exegesis. He has published extensively in these areas, as well as in the theology of miracles, the life and work of Gregory the Great, catechetical theology, and the theology of marriage.

Thursday, January 26, 4:30pm
Thomas C. Kohler (Boston College Law School)
Swift Hall, Room 106
1025 East 58th Street
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Before “solidarity” became a legal concept and later the name of the Polish labor movement, it developed as an economic, political, social, but most fundamentally a theological idea from which the rest of the Catholic social teaching tradition developed.

Thomas C. Kohler is Professor of Law at Boston College Law School. He writes extensively about domestic and comparative labor and employment law issues; mediating institutions; and theories of civil society and personhood.  Among his most recent publications is “Decentralizing Industrial Relations: The American Situation and its Significance in Comparative Perspective” in Decentraling Industrial Relations and the Role of Labour Unions and Employee Representatives.

Thursday Evenings, Non-Credit Course, Winter Quarter 2012
“The Church Fathers: The Shaping of Christian Orthodoxy”
Gavin House
1220 East 58th Street
Lecture, 7:00pm
Informal Dinner, 6:30pm

Intended for University students, faculty, and recent graduates. Others interested in attending, contact info@lumenchristi.org.

January 19
“Athanasius of Alexandria: Theologian of the Incarnation”
Aaron Canty (St. Xavier University)

January 26
“Jerome in Bethlehem”
Robin Darling Young (University of Notre Dame)

February 2, 7:15pm
Social Sciences 122
“The Grand Design: An Augustinian Reply to Stephen Hawking”
John Cavadini (University of Notre Dame)

February 9
“Origen: Christian Faith and Greek Wisdom”
Andrew Radde-Gallwitz (Loyola University Chicago)

February 16
“St. Augustine on Love”
Jean-Luc Marion (University of Chicago, Université Paris-Sorbonne)
Registration closed. The event has reached seating capacity.

February 23
Swift Hall, Third Floor Lecture Hall
“St. Benedict’s Teaching for Dark Ages, His and Ours”
Russell Hittinger (University of Tulsa)

March 1
“Evagrius of Pontus: Master of Spiritual Psychology”
Fr. Peter Funk (Monastery of the Holy Cross)

Saturday, January 7, 2012, 8:45am to 6:00pm
The University Club of Washington DC
1135 Sixteenth Street, NW • Washington, D.C. 20036

Registration Fee $85

This conference is offered for legal scholars, law students, and others interested in Christian legal thought.

REGISTER NOW

For those who need or prefer to pay by check, please print this FORM and mail it to:
Lumen Christi Institute
1220 East 58th Street
Chicago, IL 60637

Conference Schedule

Registration: 8:45am

Panel One: 9:00am-10:30am
“Public Unions and the Current State of Organized Labor ”
David L. Gregory, St. John’s University School of Law
Thomas C. Kohler, Boston College Law School
John O. McGinnis, Northwestern University Law School

Panel Two: 10:45am-12:15pm
“Pedagogy”
Susan Stabile, University of St. Thomas School of Law
Deanell Reece Tacha, Pepperdine University School of Law
Michael Scaperlanda, University of Oklahoma College of Law

Lunch: 12:15pm-1:30pm 

Panel Three: 1:30pm-3:00pm
“Law, Speech, and Morality”
Eric R. Claeys, George Mason University School of Law
Mary G. Leary, Columbus School of Law, Catholic University of America
Michael W. McConnell, Stanford Law School
Paul E. Salamanca, University of Kentucky College of Law

Address and Discussion: 3:15pm-4:15pm
“The Vocation of the Christian Lawyer and the Future of Legal Education”
Kent D. Syverud, Washington University School of Law

Vespers: 4:30pm-5:00pm

Reception: 5:00pm-6:00pm

Thursday Evenings, Non-Credit Course, Autumn Quarter 2011
“The Age of the Church Fathers: From Pagan Philosophy to Christian Wisdom”
Cobb Lecture Hall, Room 201
5811 S. Ellis Avenue 
Lecture, 7:00pm
Informal Dinner, 6:30pm

October 13
“Introduction: Why Study the Fathers?”
Fr. Michael Heintz (University of Notre Dame)

October 20
“Clement of Alexandria: Neo-Platonism and Christian Wisdom”
Brian Daley, S.J. (University of Notre Dame)

October 27
“Justin Martyr: Early Christian Engagement with Greek Philosophy”
Aaron Canty (St. Xavier University)

November 3
“Tertullian: What Does Athens Have to do with Jerusalem?”
Msgr. Michael Heintz (University of Notre Dame)

Tuesday, November 8, Social Sciences 122
“Platonism and Christianity”
Carlos Steel (Catholic University of Leuven)

November 17
“Irenaeus: Bishop, Martyr, and Opponent of Gnosticism”
Scott D. Moringiello (Villanova University)

Intended for University students, faculty, and recent graduates. Others interested in attending, contact info@lumenchristi.org.

About the Course:

A non-credit course for students and members of the University of Chicago community that explores the thought of some of the early Church Fathers, including Clement of Alexandria, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, and Irenaeus. From the close of the apostolic age until the 8th century, the Church Fathers put forth a vision of Christian wisdom and debated the nature of Christ, grace and free will, the role of the Church, and the meaning of a Christian life in the context of a changing social and political world.