The Thomistic Institute

Dec 12, 2018 • 56 min

This lecture was given at Duke by Fr. Andrew Hofer OP (Dominican House of Studies) on October 25th, 2018. For more information about upcoming TI events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/ Speaker Bio: Fr. Andrew Hofer, O.P., grew up as the youngest of ten children on a farm in Kansas, and studied history, philosophy, and classics at Benedictine College. He then went to St Andrews, Scotland for a Master of Letters in medieval history. He entered the Order of Preachers as a son of the Province of St. Joseph, and was ordained a priest in 2002. After finishing his S.T.L. and serving as an associate pastor for a brief time, he was sent to Kenya as a missionary for two years. He taught at the Tangaza College of The Catholic University of Eastern Africa and other institutions in Nairobi. He returned to the U.S. and completed the Ph.D. in theology at the University of Notre Dame, with the primary area of history of Christianity (specializing in patristic theology with additional studies in medieval theology) and the secondary area of systematic theology. His research appears in such journals as Vigiliae Christianae, Augustinianum, International Journal of Systematic Theology, New Blackfriars, Nova et Vetera, Pro Ecclesia, The Thomist, Communio, and Angelicum and in books published by Catholic University America Press and Ignatius Press. He is the author of Christ in the Life and Teaching of Gregory of Nazianzus (Oxford Early Christian Studies), Oxford University Press, 2013, and the editor of Divinization: Becoming Icons of Christ through the Liturgy, Hillenbrand Books, 2015.

Dec 11, 2018 • 1h 5m

This lecture was offered at UVA on October 19th, 2018. For more information about upcoming TI events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/ Speaker Bio: Jennifer A. Frey (University of South Carolina) received her BA from Indiana University in Bloomington Indiana in 2000, and her PhD at the University of Pittsburgh in 2012. In 2013 she was Collegiate Assistant Professor and Harper Schmidt Fellow at the University of Chicago prior to taking up her current appointment as Assistant Professor in the Philosophy department at the University of South Carolina. Jennifer's research interests lie at the intersection of virtue ethics and action theory. She has publications in The Journal of the History of Philosophy, The Journal of Analytic Philosophy, and in several edited volumes. She is the recipient of several grants, including a 2.1 million dollar project awarded by the John Templeton Foundation, titled "Virtue, Happiness, and Meaning in Life." She is currently at work on three separate book projects.

Dec 8, 2018 • 1h 3m

This talk was offered on October 17th, 2018 at Brown University. For more info about upcoming TI events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/ Speaker Bio: Tim Pawl is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of St. Thomas, in St. Paul, MN, where he works on metaphysics and philosophical theology. In metaphysics he works on "truthmaker theory, modality, and free will. In philosophical theology, he has published on transubstantiation, Christology, and divine immutability. Publications where his work has appeared include: The Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Faith and Philosophy, and Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion. A listing of his publications is available on his PhilPapers Profile. Additionally, Prof. Pawl published a monograph in the Oxford Studies in Analytic Theology series, entitled In Defense of Conciliar Christology: A Philosophical Essay. In this book he argues that the philosophical objections to the traditional Christian doctrine of the incarnation fail. Prof. Pawl currently leads a grant with Gloria Frost called The Classical Theism Project, and recently finished a grant in collaboration with Kevin Timpe called Exploring the Interim State Writing Workshop. He is the husband of another philosopher, Faith Glavey Pawl, and the proud father of one son and four daughters.

Dec 6, 2018 • 1h 8m

This lecture was held on October 17th, 2018 at the Catholic Information Center, Washington DC. For more info about upcoming TI events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/ Lecture Description: More than any other work of high modernist literature, Eliot's The Waste Land (1922) captures the loss of meaning and purpose that has overwhelmed an entire civilization. Surrounded by fragments of past knowledge that now seem barely intelligible in the wake of World War I, modern society appears mired in an unprecedented spiritual crisis. Yet unlike his modernist peers (e.g., Virginia Woolf, Bertrand Russell, Ezra Pound, et al.), Eliot's critique of modern life is not confined to the conceptual resources and secular axioms that have shaped modern life. Though it predates Eliot's “conversion” to Christianity by five years, The Waste Land's forceful summation of spiritual, ecological, psycho-sexual, and moral devastation already contains the seeds for the spiritual awakening that will be at the center of Eliot's "Ash Wednesday" (1927) and his Four Quartets (1936-1943). This lecture is the second of a three-part series titled "Tales That Tell: Moral Devastation and Original Sin in Literature," co-sponsored by the CIC and the Thomistic Institute. Speaker Bio Thomas Pfau (PhD 1989, SUNY Buffalo) is the Alice Mary Baldwin Professor of English, with secondary appointments in Germanic Language & Literatures and the Divinity School at Duke University. He has published forty-five essays on literary and philosophical subjects ranging from the 18th through the early 20th century, translations of Hölderlin and Schelling (SUNY Press, 1987 and 1994). Having edited seven essay collections and special journal issues, he is also the author of three monographs: Wordsworth’s Profession (Stanford UP 1997), Romantic Moods: Paranoia, Trauma, Melancholy, 1790-1840 (Johns Hopkins UP 2005), and Minding the Modern: Intellectual Traditions, Human Agency, and Responsible Knowledge (Notre Dame UP, 2013). His current book project focuses on phenomenology of image-consciousness in literature, theology, and philosophy.

Dec 5, 2018 • 1h 10m

On October 9th, 2018, Rusty Reno, the editor of "First Things" offered this talk at Blackfriars, Oxford elaborating on his May 2017 article in First Things of the same name. This lecture was presented in collaboration with the Aquinas Institute, Blackfriars Hall. For more about the TI's upcoming events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/

Dec 4, 2018 • 1h 18m

This lecture was given for the Harvard Medical School Chapter on November 6th, 2018. Speaker Bio: Daniel De Haan is a Research Fellow in Natural Theology at the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion and the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford. Before coming to Oxford he was a postdoctoral fellow working on the neuroscience strand of the Templeton World Charity Foundation’s Theology, Philosophy of Religion, and the Sciences project at the University of Cambridge. He has a doctorate in philosophy from the Catholic University of Leuven and University of St Thomas in Texas. His research focuses on philosophical anthropology and the sciences, natural theology, and the thought of Thomas Aquinas. More information on upcoming events can be found on our website: thomisticinstitute.org

Dec 1, 2018 • 57 min

In this lecture, Prof. Christopher Kaczor draws from the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas and research in contemporary psychology to discuss the final end to which human beings are ordered. This lecture was delivered by Prof. Christopher Kaczor(Loyola Marymount University) to the University of Arizona chapter of the Thomistic Institute on October 17, 2018.

Nov 29, 2018 • 35 min

This lecture was given on October 27, 2018 in Philadelphia, PA as part of the "Emerging Leaders Conference" cosponsored with World Youth Alliance.

Nov 28, 2018 • 1h 8m

This talk was offered on October 4th, 2018 at Harvard University. For more information on the Thomistic Institute's upcoming events, visit: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/ Speaker Bio: Sr. Mary Madeline Todd is a Dominican Sister of Saint Cecilia Congregation, serving as Assistant Professor of Theology at Aquinas College in Nashville. She studied theology at Franciscan University of Steubenville and earned her doctorate from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. She writes and speaks on spiritual and moral theology, especially on the dignity of the human person in Christ.

Nov 27, 2018 • 53 min

This talk was given at Yale University on October 15th, 2018. For more information on upcoming events, visit our website: www.thomisticinstitute.org Speaker bio: Michael Gorman is professor of philosophy at The Catholic University of America, and has doctorates in philosophy and theology. He has authored over thirty academic papers and a book entitled Aquinas on the Metaphysics of the Hypostatic Union (Cambridge University Press, 2017). His main interests are metaphysics, human nature, and ethics.

Nov 24, 2018 • 1h

The handout for this lecture is available here: tinyurl.com/yc56e2g6 A lecture given during "Desire and the Good Life: Reflections on the Aristotelian Tradition," a conference cosponsored by the Thomistic Institute, the Morningside Institute, and the Philosophy Department of Columbia University at Columbia University in New York City. October 12-13, 2018. For more information on other Thomistic Institute events, check out our website: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/

Nov 22, 2018 • 57 min

The handout for this lecture is available here: tinyurl.com/y7b4m4rz A lecture given during "Desire and the Good Life: Reflections on the Aristotelian Tradition," a conference cosponsored by the Thomistic Institute, the Morningside Institute, and the Philosophy Department of Columbia University at Columbia University in New York City. October 12-13, 2018. For more information on other Thomistic Institute events, check out our website: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/

Nov 21, 2018 • 1h 4m

A lecture given during "Desire and the Good Life: Reflections on the Aristotelian Tradition," a conference cosponsored by the Thomistic Institute, the Morningside Institute, and the Philosophy Department of Columbia University at Columbia University in New York City. October 12-13, 2018. For more information on other Thomistic Institute events, check out our website: thomisticinstitute.org/events-1/

Nov 20, 2018 • 40 min

This lecture was offered on October 9th, 2018 at the University of Oklahoma. “If I ever become a saint—I will surely be one of ‘darkness.’ I will continually be absent from Heaven — to light the light of those in darkness on earth.” With these words, Mother Teresa—now Saint Teresa of Calcutta—summed up the decades long trial of faith that marked her inner life from the early years of the Missionaries of Charity until her death in 1997. A similar trial was endured by her namesake, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, and it bore fruit in a similar resolve. What can we learn about faith, doubt, perseverance, and holiness from the “dark night” experience of the two Teresas? Speaker Bio Carol Zaleski is the Professor of World Religions at Smith College in Northampton Massachusetts, where she has been teaching philosophy of religion, world religions, religion and literature, and Catholic thought since 1989. She is the author of Otherworld Journeys: Accounts of NearDeath Experience in Medieval and Modern Times (Oxford University Press) and The Life of the World to Come: NearDeath Experience and Christian Hope (Oxford University Press); and she is coauthor with Philip Zaleski of Prayer: A History (Houghton Mifflin), The Book of Heaven (Oxford University Press), and The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams (Farrar, Straus & Giroux).

Nov 17, 2018 • 39 min

This lecture was delivered on October 5, 2018. It was part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God."

Nov 15, 2018 • 40 min

This lecture was delivered on October 5, 2018. It was part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God."

Nov 14, 2018 • 42 min

This lecture was delivered on October 6, 2018. It was part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God."

Nov 13, 2018 • 46 min

This lecture was delivered on October 6, 2018 as part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God." Drawing from Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas maintained that the least knowledge of the highest things brings the greatest joy. What exactly are the highest things? God and the things of God. To contemplate and savor the truth of the highest reality-this delights our minds, this is the bold challenge undertaken by would-be scholar-saints. Yet today, a clear thinker is hard to find. The space to have rational discussions and the common ground on which to have them are shrinking. Many people experience difficulty in contemplating and speaking about the highest things-even the least bit. And so before one can propose freely contemplating the ultimate reality, time must be spent on realism. This retreat is designed to clear the way for rational discourse, to tease out and purify some popular worldviews. What are the underlying presuppositions that stunt our conversations? How does one begin to speak of God and the things of God? How does one contemplate the highest things and find joy?

Nov 10, 2018 • 55 min

This lecture was delivered on October 6, 2018 as part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God."

Nov 8, 2018 • 51 min

This lecture was delivered on October 5, 2018. It was part of an intellectual retreat entitled "Philosophical Realism and the Existence of God."