Science, Creation, & the Catholic Imagination
Listen to the lectures as podcast episodes. You can subscribe to the Lumen Christi Institute Podcast via our Soundcloud page, iTunes channel, Stitcher, TuneIn, ListenNotes, Podbean, Pocket Casts, and Google Play Music. To view photos of the conference, visit Lumen Christi’s Facebook page. Have you ever wondered if science and religion can co-exist? Or whether it is rational (or irrational) to believe in God? How can the story of Adam and Eve in the Book of Genesis be reconciled with the Big Bang? Or with evolution? What does The Lord of the Rings have to do with Jesus? And what exactly is hillbilly thomism? The intellectual tradition of the Catholic Church has been asking (and answering!) questions…
Weekly Non-Credit Course: “The Prophets and Christian Prayer”
REGISTER HERE 6:00 Dinner | 6:30 Lecture This weekly non-credit course is open to current students and faculty. Registrants are free to attend as many sessions as they choose. Sessions do not presuppose previous attendance or prior knowledge of the subject. In its broadest sense, biblical prophecy—in both the Old and New Testaments—includes the activities and utterances of seers, dreamers, ecstatics, diviners, mystics, and declaimers of unmediated divine discourse: oracles, instruction, admonition, consolation. This course will examine literary and non-literary prophecy as a supernaturally accomplished conduit of God’s will, along with the various instruments by which that will is communicated….
Symposium on “The Cross: History, Art, and Controversy”
Listen to the symposium as a podcast episode. You can subscribe to the Lumen Christi Institute Podcast via our Soundcloud page, iTunes channel, Stitcher, TuneIn, ListenNotes, Podbean, Pocket Casts, and Google Play Music. To view photos of the symposium, visit Lumen Christi’s Facebook page. Cosponsored by the Martin Marty Center for the Public Understanding of Religion, the Medieval Studies Workshop, the Early Christian Studies Workshop, and the Research in Art and Visual Evidence Workshop. Free and open to the public. Copies of the book will be available for sale at the event by the Seminary Coop Bookstore. Persons with disabilities who may need assistance should contact us at 773-955-5887…
Mary at the Art Institute
REGISTER HERE Open to all university students. Registration Required. Cosponsored with Calvert House. Mary is the most-depicted woman in the history of Western art, which means that images of her are both ubiquitous and bewildering in their variety. Marian images are used in the Christian liturgy, for private devotion, for political statements, and for pushing boundaries—and for almost everything else as well. Join University of Chicago graduate students Fr. Gabriel Torretta, OP, and Lauren Beversluis for a visit to the Chicago Art Institute as they explain the building blocks of Marian images by discussing works that span both Mary’s own…
Flannery O’Connor and the Vision of Grace
Flannery O’Connor is one of the most celebrated American fiction writers. Yet she has often been misunderstood by the very critics who praise her. O’Connor was sometimes called a hillbilly nihilist, but she responded that she was simply “a hillbilly Thomist.” In this talk, Dr. Frey explores the action of divine grace in the short stories of O’Connor, and how her vision of grace is inspired by the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. Prof. Frey also gave a talk on What Good is Happiness? at the University of Chicago on February 12, 2020, and led a lunch discussion for students and faculty…
Iris Murdoch on Philosophy and Literature
This luncheon seminar for students and faculty examined essays by Dame Iris Murdoch on literature, philosophy, morality, virtue, and the concept good. The focus of discussion centered on why Murdoch thinks truth, understood as a clear vision of reality, is the fundamental goal of literature, philosophy, and virtue. Iris Murdoch studied at Oxford and Cambridge (where she studied with Wittgenstein) and was close friends with the philosophers Elizabeth Anscombe and Philippa Foot. Murdoch was for many years a fellow of St. Anne’s College, Oxford, where she taught philosophy. In addition to two substantial books of philosophical essays, she also wrote twenty-six novels. Her…
Schola Antiqua – Music in Secret
The sounds flowing from pre-modern convents constitute one of the better kept secrets of music history. This spring, the women of Schola Antiqua, long-time Artists-in-Residence at the Lumen Christi Institute, return to the convent repertoire with a revamped “Music in Secret” program in Chicago. Under the direction of British organist and harpsichordist Naomi Gregory, this special concert of nuns’ music has brought the group around the country in the last two years with appearances from New York to St. Louis. The lone performance of “Music in Secret” in the Chicago area will take place on Friday, April 24 at St. Clement Church….
WEBINAR: Dante as Poet and Philosopher
A conversation with Professors Jason Aleksander (San Jose State University) and Arielle Saiber (Bowdoin College). Part of our Summer webinar series on “Reason and Beauty in Renaissance Christian Thought and Culture,” presented in collaboration with the American Cusanus Society Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) was a Florentine writer and poet, whose long poetic work, The Divine Comedy, has received recognition as one of the greatest artistic achievements in the West. Dante’s poetic artistry stands alongside his intellectual and philosophical thought throughout his writings and in his Comedy. In this webinar, Professor Jason Aleksander (San José State U) and Professor Arielle Saiber (Bowdoin College) will…
Alberti and Renaissance Architecture
An evening webinar with Professor of Architecture Il Kim (Auburn University). Part of our summer webinar series on “Reason and Beauty in Renaissance Christian Thought and Culture,” presented in collaboration with the American Cusanus Society Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) was a humanist and polymath. His On Painting (1435/36) and On Architecture (1440s-1472) theorized the arts of painting and architecture, elevating them to the level of the Liberal Arts. The legacy of these works cast a long shadow in the Renaissance. In this webinar, Professor Kim will discuss Alberti’s architectural theory and practice as an all-encompassing pursuit of artistry in Italian Renaissance. 2020 Summer…
Titian’s Icons: Logos and Kairos in Renaissance Devotion
An evening webinar lecture with Christoper Nygren (University of Pittsburgh). Part of our summer webinar series on “Reason and Beauty in Renaissance Christian Thought and Culture,” presented in collaboration with the American Cusanus Society Titian is one of the most famous painters of the Italian Renaissance. He is mostly known for his amazing mythological paintings and depictions of the female nude, which became a staple of the tradition of European painting. It is less well known that Titian was credited by his contemporaries with painting a miracle-working image. Looking at his paintings in light of this fact, it becomes clear that…