On October 15, 2026, the Saint Benedict Institute hosted speakers Fr. Damian Ference and James Matthew Wilson to discuss, “The Christ-Haunted South: Grotesques, Poetry, and the Sacramentality of Being,” at Hope College.
In the middle of the twentieth century, the American South became a place of religious reckoning for American culture. The soul of America, its sins and its spiritual destiny, seemed at stake. Out of that great cultural drama arose some of modern America’s greatest authors, including the celebrated Catholic novelist and short story writer, Flannery O’Connor, and—a generation later—the poet and critic, John Martin Finlay, whose troubled life culminated in his conversion to the Church. Fr. Damian Ference and James Matthew Wilson have both published books on O’Connor and Finlay. They show us why the South became such an exciting if agonized milieu for Catholic writers and a milieu where modern America looked itself in the mirror. During this special evening, they introduced us to the authors, read from their new books, and considered what can be learned today from what O’Connor once called the “Christ-haunted South.”
Fr. Damian Ference is a priest of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, where he serves as Vicar for Evangelization and Professor of Philosophy at Borromeo Seminary. He holds a licentiate in philosophy from The Catholic University of America and a doctorate in philosophy from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. He is the author of two books on Flannery O’Connor, and he writes and speaks regularly on the intersection of faith and culture. Fr. Ference is the founder and director of Tolle Lege Summer Institute and is a lifetime member of the Flannery O’Connor Society.
James Matthew Wilson is the Cullen Foundation Chair in English Literature and the founding director of the MFA program in Creative Writing at the University of Saint Thomas. The author of sixteen books, his most recent collection of poems is Saint Thomas and the Forbidden Birds (Word on Fire, 2024). In addition to his role at the University of Saint Thomas, he serves as poet-in-residence of the Benedict XVI Institute, scholar-in-residence of Aquinas College, editor of Colosseum Books, and poetry editor of Modern Age magazine. Wilson was educated at the University of Michigan (BA), the University of Massachusetts (MA), and the University of Notre Dame (MFA, PhD).
The talk was supported by a grant from the Lumen Christi Institute with funding from the John Templeton Foundation and was cosponsored by the English, History, and Religion Departments.
Event photos by Adam Vander Kooy.
Reception photos by Nicholas Renken.
