Lumen Christi Institute
Making the Catholic intellectual tradition a vital part of the secular university
Featured Events & News
Make a gift this Lent
Make a special gift this Lent to help the Lumen Christi Institute build a pipeline to the professoriate for faithful Catholic students. Your gift of $50, $100, or even $250 will help to create and sustain seminars and reading courses, just like those hundreds of current and future professors who were formed by the Christian intellectual tradition during our 10+ years of summer seminars! All new and increased gifts will be matched.
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April 1–May 14 | Non-Credit Course | Experience of Grace
Christian faith proclaims that we are saved by divine grace. What is “grace” and how do we experience it? What is special about the Catholic understanding of grace? This class will draw on Scripture, short autobiographical accounts, and film to show the transformative power of grace in the lives of men and women such as Paul of Tarsus, Augustine of Hippo, Ignatius of Loyola, Edith Stein, Dorothy Day, and Bernard Nathanson.
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Rooms for Rent | Catholic Student Housing
Rooms are available for rent at LCI's residential community for university students. The house has capacity for 9 male student residents. As an intentional Catholic residence, the residents receive weekly community meals, community prayer, and access to a private chapel.
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What Can We Say About God? An Interview with David Novak on God-Talk
David Novak, one of the most distinguished Jewish theologians in the world, offers a new interpretation of how the Jewish people and the Jewish tradition talk about God. What does the Torah say about God? How does the God of the Torah talk about Himself? And how does the God of the Torah talk about human beings? Join us over lunch as Melanie Barrett, professor of moral theology at the University of Saint Mary of the Lake, interviews David Novak on his new book on God-talk in Judaism.
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Confederacy of Dunces Graduate Reading Group
Take a journey with us through the vibrant streets of New Orleans’ French Quarter as we read A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole’s masterpiece of humor and a character study of one of the giants of literature, Ignatius J. Reilly. In this group, we will explore the book’s cadre of distinctive characters and Toole’s synthesis of New Orleans’ contradictory gumbo of vice, race, and French Catholicism. Meets over dinner.
Learn MoreLumen Christi has been one of the great spiritual achievements of the last 25 years. And to see Lumen Christi flourishing so well and expanding around the country is a sign of tremendous hope for the Church.
The longest intellectual tradition of any institution in the contemporary world.
Celebrated University of Chicago President Robert Maynard Hutchins once remarked that the Catholic Church has “the longest intellectual tradition of any institution in the contemporary world.” The mission of the Lumen Christi Institute is to make the Catholic intellectual tradition a vital part of the secular university and the broader culture. The Lumen Christi Institute’s programs enrich academic communities at the University of Chicago and beyond with the insights of Catholic thought, in order to engage our secular culture in dialogue and ultimately to renew our civilization by forming leaders for a global society in need of Christian wisdom.
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Making the Catholic intellectual tradition a vital part of the secular university