On Nicholas of Cusa

On Nicholas of Cusa

Thursday, June 4, 2020
8:00PM EDT (7:00PM CDT)
Registration required

On Thursday, June 4th, the spring webinar series Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought will conclude with a presentation by Professor David Albertson “On Meister Eckhart.” The webinar will be held on Zoom at 8:00PM EDT (7:00PM CDT) on Thursday, June 3th. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Nicholas of Cusa (d. 1464) was a great late medieval, early modern thinker and polymath who digested the medieval theological and contemplative traditions and pressed these in new directions. Living in tumultuous times, his career in the Church as a cardinal was occupied by his work as a reformer and his efforts to re-unify the Eastern and Western Churches. Professor David Albertson will offer an introduction to the lesser-known but rich life and thought of this great German personality.

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David Albertson is Associate Professor of Religion at the University of Southern California. He received his B.A. in Religion from Stanford University, and both his M.A and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Professor Albertson studies the history of Christian thought in medieval and early modern Europe, particularly the way that theological discourses have been conditioned by other modes of knowledge. His research has focused especially on mystical literature. He is the author of Mathematical Theologies: Nicholas of Cusa and the Legacy of Thierry of Chartres (Oxford University Press, 2014), and has co-edited a volume on biotechnology and ecological crisis in contemporary religious ethics, Without Nature? A New Condition for Theology (Fordham University Press, 2009).

The Economic Costs of the Pandemic

The Economic Costs of the Pandemic: Catholic Social Teaching and Economics in Dialogue

Tuesday, May 5, 2020
6:00PM ET
Registration required

Join us at 6:00PM ET (5:00PM CT) on Tuesday, May 5th as we cosponsor, together with the Lumen Christi Institute, a webinar on “The Economic Costs of the Pandemic: Catholic Social Teaching and Economics in Dialogue.” In this timely dialogue, economists Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde (Penn), Joseph Kaboski (Notre Dame) and Casey Mulligan (University of Chicago) will share their thoughts on economics, Catholic social thought, and the cost of the pandemic. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

COVID-19 has put much of the world on standstill for the sake of reducing the risk to some of its citizens. What has been the cost of this in terms of economic recession, unemployment, human suffering, and even mortality? When the pandemic subsides, will government action be justified or will it have aggravated human suffering in an "economy that kills”? How do we measure or place values on the tradeoffs in terms of lives saved versus economic costs and human suffering? Join us for a dialogue between Economists Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde (Penn), Joseph Kaboski (Notre Dame) and Casey Mulligan (University of Chicago) on Economics, Catholic Social Thought, and the cost of the pandemic.

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Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde is Professor of Economics at the University of Pennsylvania. He serves as a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, Penn’s Population Studies Center, and the Centre for Economic Policy Research. His research focuses primarily on the computation and estimation of dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models. He is co-author ofMacroeconomics: A Dynamic Approach (Forthcoming from Princeton University Press).

Joseph Kaboski is the David F. and Erin M. Seng Foundation Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at the University of Notre Dame. He holds a PhD from the University of Chicago. Kaboski's research focuses on growth, development, and international economics. In 2012, he was awarded the prestigious Frisch Medal for the best paper in the journal Econometrica and has published scholarly articles in many other journals, including the American Economic Review and The Journal of Economic Theory. He is the president of CREDO, a past consultant to Catholic Relief Services, and is currently a Consultant to the USCCB, Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development.

Casey B. Mulligan, Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago, received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago in 1993. He has also served as Chief Economist of the White House Council of Economic Advisers and as a visiting professor teaching public economics at Harvard University, Clemson University, and the Irving B. Harris Graduate School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. Mulligan's research covers capital and labor taxation, the gender wage gap, health economics, Social Security, voting and the economics of aging. He is author of Side Effects and Complications, The Redistribution Recession, Parental Priorities and Economic Inequality, and most recently co-wrote Chicago Price Theory. He has also written numerous opeds and blog entries for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, and the Chicago Tribune.

On Peter Abelard and Bernard of Clairvaux

On Peter Abelard and Bernard of Clairvaux

Thursday, May 7, 2020
8:00PM ET
Registration required

Join us at 8:00PM ET (7:00PM CT) on Thursday, May 7th as we cosponsor, together with the Lumen Christi Institute, a webinar on Zoom with Willemien Otten. Dr. Otten will speak on “On Peter Abelard and Bernard of Clairvaux” as a part of the spring webinar series Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Peter Abelard (d. 1142) and Bernard of Clairvaux (d. 1153) were contemporaries who both emerged from the new twelfth-century schools. But their dispositions, personalities, and eventual conflict have come to represent a conflict between the rising scholastic and the traditional monastic cultures of learning. Professor Willemien Otten will introduce these iconic twelfth-century personalities, the direction of their work, and the theological controversy that put them on opposing sides.

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Willemien Otten is Professor of Theology and the History of Christianity; also in the College; Associate Faculty in the Department of History, Social Sciences Division at the University of Chicago. She holds an M.A. and PhD from the University of Amsterdam. Otten studies the history of Christianity and Christian thought with a focus on the Western medieval and the early Christian intellectual tradition, including the continuity of Platonic themes. She is coeditor of Eriugena and Creation (2014), On Religion and Memory (2013), and the Oxford Guide to the Historical Reception of Augustine (430–2000) (2013). Her most recent project is entitled “Natura Educans: The Psychology of Pantheism from Eriugena to Emerson.”

Hildegard of Bingen, Doctor of the Church

Hildegard of Bingen, Doctor of the Church

Thursday, April 30, 2020
8:00PM ET
Registration required

Together with the Lumen Christi Institute, we will cosponsor the fourth installment of the spring webinar series, Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought. Renowned medievalist Barbara Newman, will present on “Hildegard of Bingen, Doctor of the Church.” The webinar will be held on Zoom at 8:00PM ET (7:00PM CT) on Thursday, April 30th. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

A German Benedictine Abbess, Hildegard (1098-1169) produced works of visionary theology drawn from her mystical vision and one of the largest surviving collections of medieval musical compositions.

As a female religious in the 12th century, she held a remarkable influence in the Church through preaching tours across Germany and correspondence with popes, emperors, and other monastic reformers. In 2012, she was named a Doctor of the Church by Pope Benedict XVI.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

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Barbara Newman is John Evans Professor of Latin; and Professor of English, Religious Studies, and Classics at Northwestern University. Her work is focused upon medieval religious culture, comparative literature, and women's spirituality. She has authored or edited 10 books, most recently a translation of Mechthild of Hackeborn's The Book of Special Grace (2017)  She has also written three books on Hildegard of Bingen: an edited volume, Voice of the Living Light: Hildegard of Bingen and Her World (1998); an edition and translation of Hildegard's collected songs, Symphonia Armonie Celestium Revelationum (1988, rev. 1998); and Sister of Wisdom: St. Hildegard's Theology of the Feminine (1987). Professor Newman has been a Fellow of the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Alice Berline Kaplan Center for the Humanities at Northwestern. Professor Newman is a past president of the Medieval Academy of America 

Disease and the Problem of Evil

Disease and the Problem of Evil

Tuesday, April 28, 2020
6:00PM ET
Registration required

Join us at 6:00PM ET (5:00PM CT) on Tuesday, April 28th as we cosponsor, together with the Lumen Christi Institute, a webinar with Jeffrey Bishop and Stephen Meredith. This moderated dialogue, “Disease and the Problem of Evil” will take place on Zoom. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Whether caused by pathogens, environmental exposure, or genetics, disease is typically understood to be an unwarranted and unwanted removal from one’s normal condition of good health. While a natural phenomenon, disease raises classic questions of theodicy. If illness is a privation of the good of health, should we also understand disease to be an evil? How can science, theology, philosophy, and literature help us to account for the occurrence of deadly diseases and the suffering that results from them?

In this moderated conversation, Stephen Meredith, professor of pathology and molecular biology at the University of Chicago, and Jeffrey Bishop, healthcare ethicist and professor in philosophy and theology at Saint Louis University, will engage these questions and others surrounding disease and the problem of evil.

Jeffrey P. Bishop is the Tenet Endowed Chair in Health Care Ethics, professor of philosophy and professor of theology at Saint Louis University. He holds an MD from the University of Texas and a PhD in philosophy from the University of Dallas. Bishop's scholarly work is focused on the historical, political, and philosophical conditions that underpin contemporary medical and scientific practices and theories.  He has written on diverse topics from transhumanism and enhancement technologies to clinical ethics consultation and medical humanities. Dr. Bishop is the author of The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying and is currently working on a second book with colleagues M. Therese Lysaught and Andrew Michel tentatively titled, 'Chasing After Virtue: Neuroscience, Economics, and the Biopolitics of Morality'.

Stephen Meredith is Professor in the Departments of Pathology, Neurology, and Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Chicago, where he also teaches courses on literature, philosophy, and theology. He works on the biophysics of protein structure, concentrating on amyloid proteins associated with neurodegenerative diseases. He also teaches courses in the College on James Joyce’s Ulysses, St. Thomas Aquinas, Augustine’s City of God, and other authors, particularly Dostoevsky and Thomas Mann. His main theological interest is in the problem of evil, and in this connection, he is currently writing a book on the philosophical and literary perspectives on disease. His current interests also center on the impact of biotechnology and the genetic revolution on the definition of human nature.

Thomas Aquinas on Ways to Know God

Thomas Aquinas on Ways to Know God

Thursday, April 23, 2020
8:00PM ET
Registration required

Join us on Thursday, April 23rd, at 8:00PM ET (7:00PM CT) for the third installment of the Lumen Christi Institute’s Spring Webinar Series, Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought. Professor Brian Carl, who teaches philosophy at the University of St Thomas in Houston, will present on “Thomas Aquinas on Ways to Know God” on Zoom. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

Thomas was a friar of the Order of Preachers whose capacious mind bequeathed many treasures for the Christian tradition, including scriptural commentaries, philosophical treatises and commentary, his Summa theologiae, and devotional and liturgical texts. Thomas' approach to the knowledge of God is complex, acknowledging dialectical, rational, as well as revelatory, gracious, and mystical modes.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Brian Carl is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy in the Center for Thomistic Studies, at the University of St. Thomas (Texas). He received both his bachelor's and master's degrees in philosophy from Saint Louis University, and his doctorate in philosophy from the Catholic University of America in 2015. Professor Carl's research is primarily in medieval philosophy, specializing in the work of Thomas Aquinas. Before starting at the University of St. Thomas, Dr. Carl was Assistant Professor in the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception.

Cardinal Francis George, the American Contribution to Catholic Social Thought, and Our Current Moment

Cardinal Francis George, the American Contribution to Catholic Social Thought, and Our Current Moment

A Memorial on the 5th Anniversary of the Death of Cardinal Francis George, O.M.I.

Friday, April 17, 2020
5:00PM ET
Registration required

At 5:00PM ET (4:00PM CT) on Friday, April 17th the Saint Benedict Institute, together with the Lumen Christi Institute will cosponsor “Cardinal Francis George, the American Contribution to Catholic Social Thought, and Our Current Moment.” This live-stream panel discussion with Russell Hittinger, Stephen Schneck, and Theresa Smart will be moderated by Matt Malone, SJ.

After his appointment as archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal George emerged as an intellectual leader within the Church, nationally and world-wide, and served as president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. His thought on American culture and society—expressed in numerous lectures and in three major books—provides a challenging, critical view of the American experiment from the perspective of post-Vatican II Catholic thought. Revisiting his book on social questions and public life—God in Action: How Faith in God Can Address the Challenges of the World—allows us to reflect on the American contribution to Catholic Social Thought and to apply it to consider our situation today as we confront a great global crisis.

The panel will include Russell Hittinger, Senior Fellow of the Lumen Christi Institute and Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago Law School (Fall, 2020); Stephen Schneck, emeritus Professor at the Catholic University of America and Executive Director of the Franciscan Action Network; and Theresa Smart, assistant professor in the School of Civic and Economic Thought at Arizona State University. Each will draw from their own expertise and entertain the question of what distinctly American contributions have been made to Catholic Social Thought and how Cardinal George’s work fits within this tradition.

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Russell Hittinger is Senior Fellow at the Lumen Christi Institute, visiting fellow in the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago, and Professor Emeritus of Catholic Studies and Law at the University of Tulsa. He is also Ordinarius of the Pontifical Academy of the Social Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. 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, Thomas Aquinas and the Rule of Law, and most recently Paper Wars: Catholic Social Doctrine and the Modern State (forthcoming).

Stephen Schneck is retired Associate Professor of Politics at the Catholic University of America, where he was also Director of CUA's Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies. He received his BA from Rockhurst University and his MA and PhD in Government from the University of Notre Dame.  He is the author of several books and articles in the field of political philosophy, including Person & Polis: Max Scheler's Personalism as Political Theory (SUNY Press), and a recent edited volume, Letting Be: Fred Dallmayr’s Cosmopolitical Vision (University of Notre Dame Press). He was a founding board member of Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and served on the board of Democrats for Life.  He is currently the Executive Director of Franciscan Action Network, in Washington, DC.

Theresa Smart is an assistant professor in the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, specializing in ancient and medieval political philosophy. Her curernt book project explores the ethics of citizenship in Thomas Aquinas, especially tensions between political and moral commitments. She engages in research on virtue ethics, natural law, jurisprudence, liberal education and Catholic social thought. Dr. Smart received her Ph.D from the University of Notre Dame and a postdoctoral fellow in the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University.

Matt Malone, S.J., is the President and Editor in Chief of America Media. Fr. Malone began his tenure on October 1, 2012. Previously, he served for two years as an associate editor, from 2007-2009, when he covered foreign policy and domestic politics. Fr. Malone entered the Society of Jesus in 2002 and was ordained a priest on June 9, 2012 by Edward Cardinal Egan, late Archbishop of New York. From 1997-2002, he served as the founding deputy director of MassINC, an independent political think tank, and co-publisher of CommonWealth, its award-winning review of politics, ideas and civic life. He is the author of Catholiques Sans Etiquette, a book concerning the church and the political, which was published in 2014 by Salvator Press in Paris.

Anselm of Canterbury on the Rationality of Faith

Anselm of Canterbury on the Rationality of Faith

Thursday, April 17, 2020
8:00PM ET
Registration required

Join us on Thursday, April 16th, at 8:00PM ET (7:00PM CT) for the second installment of the Lumen Christi Institute’s Spring Webinar Series, Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought. Professor Aaron Canty, who teaches theology and medieval thought at Saint Xavier University, will present on “Anselm of Canterbury and the Rationality of Faith” on Zoom. The Saint Benedict Institute is a cosponsor of this event.

Anselm was a startlingly original monastic writer and thinker who drank deeply of Augustinian and patristic theology but formulated his own theological and philosophical writings in spare and compelling chains of reasoning. His Why God Became Man, Monologion, and Proslogion each chart new ways to practice 'believing in order to understand (credo ut intelligam).'

This event is free and open to the public, but online registration is required. For more information and to register for this webinar, click here.

Aaron Canty is professor of religious studies at Saint Xavier University. His current research focuses on the development of medieval Christology, eschatology, and scriptural exegesis. He is author of Light and Glory: The Transfiguration of Christ in Early Franciscan and Dominican Theology (Catholic University of America Press, 2011), A Companion to Job in the Middle Ages, eds. Franklin T. Harkins and Aaron Canty (Leiden: Brill, 2017), and an edition of excerpts from John of La Rochelle’s commentaries on the Synoptic Gospels (in Archivum Franciscanum Historicum).

Gregory the Great on Reading Scripture for Wisdom [VIDEO]

Gregory the Great on Reading Scripture for Wisdom

Tuesday, April 7, 2020
7:00PM CDT
Registration required

How can scripture guide our search for wisdom? Bernard McGinn, professor emeritus in the Divinity School of the University of Chicago, began the Lumen Christi Institute’s webinar series on Reason and Wisdom in Medieval Christian Thought by presenting on “Gregory the Great on Reading Scripture for Wisdom.” The Saint Benedict Institute was a cosponsor of this event.

Pope Saint Gregory the Great lived in an age of tumult--war, waves of disease, economic depression, and civil deterioration. Alongside his administrative reforms and leadership, Gregory described a spirituality that centered around meditative and contemplative reading of sacred scripture. Gregory's practice of reading scripture, particularly the Book of Job, and his description of the practice had great influence upon medieval meditative and contemplative practices of reading the Word of God. 

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. He has written extensively about the history of apocalyptic thought, spirituality, and mysticism. McGinn's many books include Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination with Evil, The Presence of God, a multivolume history of Western Christian mysticism, and most recently Thomas Aquinas’s Summa theologiae: A Biography.

An Augustinian Theology of Mass Incarceration

Thursday, February 27, 2020
7:00PM
Mulder Chapel, Western Theological Seminary
101 E. 13th Street, Holland, MI 49423

On Thursday, February 27, Western Theological Seminary is welcoming Dr. Gregory Lee, who will present a talk on “An Augustinian Theology of Mass Incarceration.” The lecture will be held at 7:00PM in Western Theological Seminary’s Mulder Chapel (101 E. 13th Street, Holland, MI 49423). This event is hosted by the Girod Chair of Western Theological Seminary and the Saint Benedict Institute is a co-sponsor.

The United States incarcerates far more individuals than any nation in the world, at radically disparate rates for different racial groups. This lecture draws on the thought of Augustine to encourage new approaches toward criminal justice. Augustine’s understanding of personal sin stresses the possibility of redemption for individual wrongdoers, and his account of collective evil exposes systemic injustice as a pervasive feature of humanity’s fallen condition. These insights commend Christians’ solidarity with oppressed communities, and the exercise of mercy and restorative practices in response to criminal offenses.

Dr. Gregory Lee is associate professor of theology and urban studies at Wheaton College and a core faculty member for Wheaton in Chicago, a residential program in the Woodlawn neighborhood of Chicago. His scholarship draws on Augustine’s theology to analyze contemporary social issues, focusing especially on race, class, and justice. He lives with his family in the inner city of Chicago, where he is theologian in residence at Lawndale Christian Community Church.

This event is co-sponsored by the Girod Chair of Western Theological Seminary, the Hope-Western Prison Education Program, and the Saint Benedict Institute.

Taking Advantage of Freedom: What to Do with Liberty When You Have It [PHOTOS & VIDEO]

On Monday, February 17th at 7:00PM, Dr. David Deavel presented his talk, "Taking Advantage of Freedom: What to Do with Liberty When You Have It” in Winants Auditorium (Graves Hall, 263 College Ave., Holland, MI 49423).  This event was co-hosted by Markets & Morality and the Saint Benedict Institute.

While political, economic, and intellectual freedom is a precious gift to humans, our long history shows that we are ready to give it away. Why is that? One answer might be given from the Nobel-Prize-winning Russian writer, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008): when people don’t understand and use the freedom they have, they will throw it away to the detriment of themselves and their loved ones. This lecture will give a brief introduction to the life and career of Solzhenitsyn and then outline four enemies of freedom along with the way to defeat them. The goal is to take advantage of freedom in order to preserve it and flourish as individuals and societies.

David Paul Deavel, Ph.D. is editor of Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture and a visiting assistant professor at the University of St. Thomas. His Ph.D. is in historical theology from Fordham University. The 2013 winner of the Novak Prize, his book, Solzhenitsyn and American Culture: The Russian Soul in the West, co-edited with Jessica Hooten Wilson, is forthcoming this fall. He is a senior contributor at The Imaginative Conservative and has written over 300 articles and reviews in a wide variety of books and popular and scholarly journals including: America, First Things, Journal of Markets & Morality, Library of Law and Liberty, National Review, Nova et Vetera, and the Wall Street Journal.

Co-sponsors for this event include Hope College’s departments of History, Political Science, and Religion, and the Tocqueville Forum.

Traditional Latin Mass [PHOTOS]

On Wednesday, January 29th at 7:30PM, the Saint Benedict Institute hosted a Traditional Latin Mass in Winants Auditorium (Graves Hall, 263 College Ave., Holland, MI 49423) commemorating the Feast of Saint Francis de Sales, the patron saint of our parish in Holland. The Mass was sung by Gaudete Grand Rapids, a brand new professional choral ensemble dedicated to propagating the beautiful chant and polyphony of the Roman Rite. They sang the Mass for Four Voices by William Byrd, motets by Anton Bruckner and Maurice Duruflé, as well as Gregorian chant. 

This event was free and open to the public.

Gaudete Grand Rapids is a small, professional choral ensemble dedicated to performing perennial Latin liturgical music in the context for which it was written, the Traditional Latin Mass. Director Jonathan Bading ('18) converted to the Catholic faith upon witnessing the Traditional Latin Mass in all its musical splendor, his main impetus for founding Gaudete.  While now a choir of 12, their five founding members recorded a promotional album, Woman, Behold Thy Son, which can be purchased at gaudetegr.bandcamp.com (digital and CD) or following Mass. All funds will go towards supporting their first season, of which this Mass is the inaugural event. 

Jonathan Bading recently shared his conversion story on the Journey Home.  You can watch his beautiful testimony here.

Co-sponsors of this event included the Departments of Music and Religion at Hope College.