Notre Dame de Paris : Devastation and Reconstruction
Jean-Luc MarionUniversity of Chicago
Thomas PavelUniversity of Chicago
To watch the video of the discussion, visit the Alliance Française's Facebook page here (first half) and here (second half).
To view photos of the discussion, visit Lumen Christi's Facebook page.
Organized by the Lumen Christi Institute with co-sponsor and host the Alliance Française de Chicago.
Free for Alliance Française members/ $10 for non-members.
Notre Dame de Paris in flames. Smartphone and television screens across the world light up one after the other, sending shockwaves as the heart of Paris burns. What is it about the old stones, the stained glass rosette, and the 800 year old charpente (wood roof frame) called “the forest" that brought people together for a few hours?
Artifact of a medieval faith; icon immortalized by Victor Hugo and turned into a hit on Broadway; haut-lieu of the most touristic city in the world; pawn in renewed political and architectural high stakes. What does the cathedral in the heart of Paris mean for them, and for each of us?
To sort out the history, the meaning, and most of all, the future of Notre Dame de Paris, the Alliance Francaise de Chicago welcomes Jean-Luc Marion, theologian, member of the Académie Française and an active participant in the founding of the Lumen Christi Institute. Jean-Luc Marion will be in conversation with Thomas Pavel, professor at the Department of Romance Languages of the University of Chicago.
Jean-Luc Marion is the Thomas Greeley and Grace McNichols Greeley Professor of Catholic Studies and the Philosophy of Religions and Theology at the Divinity School and Professor in the Committee on Social Thought and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Chicago. He holds the Dominique Dubarle chair at the Institut Catholique de Paris and is Professor Emeritus of the University of Paris IV (Sorbonne). In 2008 he was elected a member of the Académie Française. Among his books are In the Self’s Place: The Approach of Saint Augustine, God Without Being, and The Erotic Phenomenon. In 2014 he delivered the Gifford Lectures on Givenness and Revelation. Marion served a critical role in the founding of the Lumen Christi Institute and serves as a member of its academic committee.
Thomas Pavel is the Gordon J. Laing Distinguished Service Professor in Romance Languages and Literatures, Comparative Literature, the Committee on Social Thought, Fundamentals, and Creative Writing at the University of Chicago. Educated in his native country of Romania and in France, he has taught at University of Ottawa, the Université du Québec à Montréal, University of California (Santa Cruz), Princeton University, and now University of Chicago. He is author of several books on literature and linguistics, including The Spell of Language: Post-structuralism and Speculation and The Lives of the Novel. His teaching focuses on the history of the novel, 17th-century French literature, 20th-century French literature and intellectual life, as well as the interactions between literature and philosophy. Thomas Pavel has participated frequently in events of the Lumen Christi Institute and serves on its academic committee.
