The Thomistic Institute

Mar 18, 2024 • 46 min

This lecture was given on September 28th, 2023, at the University of Edinburgh. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the speaker: Dr. Daniel De Haan is a Research Fellow of the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion at the Faculty of Theology and Religion, University of Oxford. He is working on the Renewal of Natural Theology Project directed by Professor Alister McGrath. Before coming to Oxford, De Haan was a postdoctoral fellow in the Faculty of Divinity at the University of Cambridge working on the neuroscience strand of the Templeton World Charity Foundation Fellowships in Theology, Philosophy of Religion, and the Sciences Project, directed by Sarah Coakley. During this postdoctoral fellowship, he conducted research on the intersections of theology, philosophy, and neuroscience in Lisa Saksida’s Translational Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory in the Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge.

Mar 15, 2024 • 41 min

This lecture was given on October 10th, 2023, at Regent University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the Speaker: Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. is a doctoral student in Christology at the University of Fribourg. He serves as the Assistant Director for Campus Outreach with the Thomistic Institute in Washington, DC. Prior to the TI, he was an associate pastor at St. Louis Bertrand Church in Louisville, KY where he also taught as an adjunct professor at Bellarmine University. Born and raised near Philadelphia, PA, he attended the Franciscan University of Steubenville, studying mathematics and humanities. Upon graduating, he entered the Order of Preachers in 2010. He was ordained a priest in 2016 and holds an STL from the Dominican House of Studies.

Mar 14, 2024 • 51 min

Join Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. of Aquinas 101, Godsplaining, and Pints with Aquinas for an off-campus conversation with Prof. Timothy Pawl about how the integration of philosophy, the wisdom of Christian morality, and psychology can help us grow in virtue. You can watch this interview on YouTube here: youtu.be/0Xdq7weIhmc About the speaker: Timothy J. Pawl is Professor of Philosophy at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, and holds a Ph.D. from Saint Louis University in philosophy. He specializes in the philosophy of religion, metaphysics, Thomistic philosophy, analytic theology, and moral psychology. His books include In Defense of Conciliar Christology (Oxford, 2016), In Defense of Extended Conciliar Christology (Oxford, 2019), The Incarnation (Cambridge, 2020), and Jesus and the Genome: The Intersection of Christology and Biology (Cambridge, 2024), co-authored with a philosopher of science and an evolutionary biologist. In addition, he has published more than forty academic articles in his areas of expertise and given more than 100 academic or popular-level talks or interviews about his work, including a series of interviews for the PBS show Closer to Truth. He is the husband of another philosopher, Faith Glavey Pawl, and the proud father of one son and four daughters.

Mar 14, 2024 • 53 min

This lecture was given on September 9th, 2023, at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington D.C. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the Speaker: Professor John Cuddeback (Christendom College) is professor of Philosophy at Christendom College, where he has taught for twenty-five years. He lectures widely on topics including virtue, fatherhood, friendship, and household, and his professional writings appear in various academic journals and books. His book True Friendship was republished by Ignatius Press. His blogging at LifeCraft is renowned for applying an ancient wisdom to life today.

Mar 13, 2024 • 39 min

Professor John Cuddeback (Christendom College) is professor of Philosophy at Christendom College, where he has taught for twenty-five years. He lectures widely on topics including virtue, fatherhood, friendship, and household, and his professional writings appear in various academic journals and books. His book True Friendship was republished by Ignatius Press. His blogging at LifeCraft is renowned for applying an ancient wisdom to life today.

Mar 12, 2024 • 52 min

Patrick Callahan is director of the Newman Institute for Catholic Thought & Culture at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as well as Assistant Professor of English & Humanities at St. Gregory the Great Seminary. He did his undergraduate work at the University of Dallas and his graduate work at Fordham University in Classical Philology. While his doctoral work focused on ancient Greek commentaries to the lyric poet Pindar, his recent work focuses on early Jesuit Latin texts.

Mar 11, 2024 • 40 min

Candace Vogler is the David B. and Clara E. Stern Professor of Philosophy and Professor in the College at the University of Chicago, and Principal Investigator on "Virtue, Happiness, and the Meaning of Life," a project funded by the John Templeton Foundation. She has authored two books, John Stuart Mill's Deliberative Landscape: An Essay in Moral Psychology (Routledge, 2001) and Reasonably Vicious (Harvard University Press, 2002), and essays in ethics, social and political philosophy, philosophy and literature, cinema, psychoanalysis, gender studies, sexuality studies, and other areas. Her research interests are in practical philosophy (particularly the strand of work in moral philosophy indebted to Elizabeth Anscombe), practical reason, Kant's ethics, Marx, and neo-Aristotelian naturalism.

Mar 8, 2024 • 50 min

Brian T. Carl earned his Ph.D. in Philosophy from The Catholic University of America. He is an assistant professor at the Center for Thomistic Studies at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas. His research focuses on Thomistic metaphysics, philosophical theology, cognitive theory, and moral psychology.

Mar 5, 2024 • 43 min

Farr Curlin is the Josiah C. Trent Professor of Medical Humanities and CoDirector of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative (TMC) at Duke University. Dr. Curlin’s ethics scholarship takes up moral questions that are raised by religionassociated differences in physicians’ practices. He is an active palliative medicine physician and holds appointments in both the School of Medicine and the Divinity School, where he is working with colleagues to develop a new interdisciplinary community of scholarship and training focused on the intersection of theology, medicine, and culture.

Mar 4, 2024 • 50 min

Christopher T. Baglow is the director of the Science and Religion Initiative in the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame, where he also serves as Professor of the Practice in the theology department. He is the author of the textbook Faith, Science, & Reason: Theology on the Cutting Edge (2nd ed., Midwest Theological Forum, 2019) and his work has been featured by the Word on Fire Institute and in That Man is You, Crux, Notre Dame Magazine and Church Life Journal. He is a consultant for the USCCB Committee on Catechesis and Evangelization, and his thirty-two year career in Catholic education has spanned high school, undergraduate, graduate, and seminary teaching. Baglow earned a bachelor’s degree from Franciscan University of Steubenville, a master’s degree from the University of Dallas, and a doctorate from Duquesne University. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Society of Catholic Scientists. He is best known for his work helping Catholic educators integrate faith and science in their classrooms, most notably for creating and directing the Steno Learning Program in Faith and Science (named for Blessed Nicholas Steno) and the Integrating Faith and Science at Catholic High Schools Nationwide project. Baglow was one of four people to receive an Expanded Reason Award for Teaching in 2018 from the University of Francisco de Vitoria and the Vatican–Joseph Ratzinger Foundation. He lives with his family in the South Bend, Indiana, area.

Feb 29, 2024 • 53 min

Join Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. of Aquinas 101, Godsplaining, and Pints with Aquinas for an off-campus conversation with Prof. Catherine Pakaluk about the philosophy of Edith Stein (St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross). Learn how she inspired Prof. Pakaluk and why her work matters today! Discovering Wisdom: A Journey with Edith Stein w/ Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. and Prof. Catherine Pakaluk (Off-Campus Conversations) You can listen to more from Prof. Pakaluk here: on.soundcloud.com/JMU9u About the speaker: Catherine Ruth Pakaluk is an Associate Professor of Political Economy in the Busch School of Business at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. She received the Acton Institute's prestigious Novak Award in 2015, and the Freedom and Opportunity Prize from The Heritage Foundation in 2023. Her widely anticipated book, Hannah's Children: The Women Quietly Defying the Birth Dearth, explores the relation between biblical faith and childbearing. Pakaluk earned her doctorate in economics at Harvard University. She lives in Maryland with her husband, philosopher Michael Pakaluk, where her kitchen table is joyfully crowded with children, grandchildren, and students.

Feb 28, 2024 • 1h 9m

This lecture was given on June 16th, 2023, at Glencomeragh House, Ireland. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events Fr. Conor McDonough, O.P. (Dominican House of Studies, Dublin) is a Dominican friar from Galway. He studied science and theology at the University of Cambridge and taught theology at secondary school before joining the Dominicans in 2009. He was ordained priest in 2016 and undertook further studies in theology at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland), focussing on the writings of St Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin. He is currently based in Dublin where he teaches theology to the students at the Dominican House of Studies in Dublin.

Feb 27, 2024 • 57 min

This lecture was given on November 18th, 2023, at University of South Florida. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the speaker: Professor Paul Symington graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in Philosophy and Religion from Roberts Wesleyan College in 1998. He received an M.A. in Theology from Northeastern Seminary in 2001 and an M.A. in Philosophy from Boston College in 2004. He graduated from the State University of New York at Buffalo with a Ph.D. in Philosophy in 2007. He then taught for one year at the University of San Francisco before receiving a position in 2008 at Franciscan University of Steubenville. He was a Service-Learning Faculty Fellow at the University of San Francisco and received a NYS Professional Development Award from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 2007. He is a member of The Society for Medieval and Renaissance Philosophy, The American Catholic Philosophical Association, and The American Philosophical Association. His research is mainly focused on areas in metaphysics and medieval philosophy

Feb 26, 2024 • 45 min

This lecture was given on November 7th, 2023, at University of North Texas. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the Speaker: Erik Dempsey (PhD, Boston College) is the Assistant Director of UT's Thomas Jefferson for the Study of Core Texts and Ideas. He completed his doctorate at Boston College in June 2007. He is interested in understanding human virtue, and the proper place of politics in a well-lived human life, the different ways in which human virtue is understood in different political situations, and the ways in which human virtue may transcend any political situation. His dissertation looks at Aristotle's treatment of prudence in the Nicomachean Ethics, and Aristotle's suggestion that virtue should be understood as an end in itself. He is currently at work turning his dissertation into a book by adding chapters which consider Thomas Aquinas' interpretation of Aristotle in terms of natural law, and Marsilius of Padua's critique of Thomas. He grew up in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY and graduated from Hastings High School. As an undergraduate, he attended St. John's College in Annapolis, MD where he began to study the Great Books seriously. From June 2000 until August 2001, he worked for DynCorp in Chantilly, VA, doing mathematical modeling and providing other support for the GETS program. From September 2007 - May 2008, he taught in the Herbst Program for the Humanities at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Feb 23, 2024 • 58 min

This lecture was given on September 28th, 2023, at Georgetown University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the speaker: Robert P. George is the sixth McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, a program founded under his leadership in 2000. George has frequently been a Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. Born on July 10, 1955, Robert George has served as Chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom as well as a presidential appointee of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and the President’s Council on Bioethics. In addition, Professor George has served as the U.S. member of UNESCO’s World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology. He was also a Judicial Fellow at the Supreme Court of the United States, where he received the Justice Tom C. Clark Award. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Swarthmore, he holds J.D. and M.T.S. degrees from Harvard University as well as D.Phil., B.C.L., D.C.L., D.Litt. degrees from Oxford University. He holds twenty-two honorary doctorates. George is a recipient of the U.S. Presidential Citizens Medal, the Honorific Medal for the Defense of Human Rights of the Republic of Poland, the Irving Kristol Award of the American Enterprise Institute, the Canterbury Medal of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, and one of Princeton University’s highest honors – the President’s Award for Distinguished Teaching. George is the author of hundreds of books, essays, and articles. He is a finger-style guitarist and bluegrass banjo player.

Feb 23, 2024 • 45 min

This lecture was given on February 23rd, 2024, at Ave Maria University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the Speaker: Sister Anna Wray is a native of Connecticut and a member of the Dominican Sisters of Saint Cecilia of Nashville, TN. Sister received her phD in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, having written her dissertation on Aristotle’s account of the activity of contemplation. Sister is an assistant professor on the faculty of CUA's School of Philosophy in Washington, DC, where she regularly teaches courses in the history of philosophy, logic, rhetoric, ethics, philosophy of religion, and philosophical psychology. She is also an adjunct professor for Aquinas College, where she teaches metaphysics and epistemology to her sisters in formation. When time permits, sister enjoys the occasional trip that allows her to speak to (and with) others who share her loves.

Feb 22, 2024 • 1h 12m

This lecture was given on June 21st, 2023, at Stonyhust College. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events Prof. Joshua Hochschild (Mount St. Mary’s University) is Professor of Philosophy and Director of Philosophy, Politics and Economics. He also served six years as the inaugural Dean of the College of Liberal Arts. His primary research is in medieval logic, metaphysics, and ethics, with broad interest in liberal education and the continuing relevance of the Catholic intellectual tradition. He is the author of The Semantics of Analogy: Rereading Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia (2010), translator of Claude Panaccio’s Mental Language: From Plato to William of Ockham (2017), and co-author of A Mind at Peace: Reclaiming an Ordered Soul in the Age of Distraction (2017). His writing has appeared in First Things, Commonweal, Modern Age and the Wall Street Journal. For 2020-21 he served as President of the American Catholic Philosophical Association.

Feb 21, 2024 • 1h 10m

Prof. Joshua Hochschild (Mount St. Mary’s University) is Professor of Philosophy and Director of Philosophy, Politics and Economics. He also served six years as the inaugural Dean of the College of Liberal Arts. His primary research is in medieval logic, metaphysics, and ethics, with broad interest in liberal education and the continuing relevance of the Catholic intellectual tradition. He is the author of The Semantics of Analogy: Rereading Cajetan’s De Nominum Analogia (2010), translator of Claude Panaccio’s Mental Language: From Plato to William of Ockham (2017), and co-author of A Mind at Peace: Reclaiming an Ordered Soul in the Age of Distraction (2017). His writing has appeared in First Things, Commonweal, Modern Age and the Wall Street Journal. For 2020-21 he served as President of the American Catholic Philosophical Association.

Feb 19, 2024 • 56 min

Balderdash: what is it, exactly? Why do we tolerate balderdash? How can we reduce it? Join Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. of Aquinas 101, Godsplaining, and Pints with Aquinas for an off-campus conversation with Sr. Anna Wray, O.P. about her latest Thomistic Institute lecture, "Balderdash: What It Is, Why We Tolerate It, and How We Can Reduce It." Making Sense of Balderdash w/ Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. & Sr. Anna Wray, O.P. (Off-Campus Conversations) You can listen to the original lecture here: https://on.soundcloud.com/vjbae About the speaker: Sister Anna Wray is a native of Connecticut and a member of the Dominican Sisters of Saint Cecilia. Sister received her PhD in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, having written her dissertation on Aristotle’s account of the activity of contemplation. Sister is on faculty in CUA's School of Philosophy, but enjoys the occasional trip that allows her to speak to (and with) others who share her loves.

Feb 16, 2024 • 56 min

Seminars and discussions on themes surrounding the common good and spiritual conferences framed by the traditional elements of a retreat (Mass, adoration, the Divine Office, etc.).