The Holiness of John XXIII
Lawrence Cunningham (University of Notre Dame) REGISTER HERE cosponsored by Calvert House Just days before his canonization in the Catholic Church, this lecture will meditate on the spiritual life of Pope John XXIII (Angelo Roncalli) with special attention to the posthumous publication of his The Journal of a Soul. It will argue that his long pastoral ministry, including those few years in the papal office, derived its energy from a sustained life of prayer seeking the “face of Christ.” The seamless weaving of action and contemplation explains why in his own lifetime he was familiarly known as “Good Pope John.”
Francis the Jesuit: The Sources of Thought of Pope Francis Non-Credit Course
The course will examine selected discourses of Pope Francis against a background of classical and recent Jesuit spiritual writings, beginning with the founder of the Jesuit order, St. Ignatius Loyola, and his contemporaries. No prior familiarity with the subject matter will be presumed. 6:00PM Informal Dinner 6:30PM Presentation Intended for university students and recent graduates. Others interested in attending please contact info@lumenchristi.org.
After Huizinga: The Low Countries as Cradle of Spiritual Innovation in the Late Middle Ages
Frits van Oostrom (Ultrecht University) This public lecture is presented by the University of Chicago Divinity School. Cosponsored by the Martin Marty Center for the Advanced Study of Religion, the Medieval Studies Workshop, and the Lumen Christi Institute. Free and open to the public. Reception to follow.
Master Class on “Thinking on One’s Knees: Von Balthasar and Nasr on Theology and Sanctity”
Fr. Raymond Gawronski, S.J. (Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Berkeley) REGISTER HERE Open to all graduate and undergraduate students (including non-University of Chicago students). Copies of the readings will be provided. Registration is required as space is limited. Please contact Mark Franzen with any questions. Hans Urs von Balthasar’s distinction between “sitting” and “kneeling” theologies has become paradigmatic. He also thought the split between thinking (dogmatic) and praying (mystical/spiritual) theologies has been the worst tragedy to befall Christianity in its long history. In his Gifford Lectures of 1980-81, Persian born scholar and “perennialist” Seyyed Hossein Nasr surveyed the sweep of Western intellectual history,…
Saint John Paul II and the Polish Catholic Experience
Fr. Raymond Gawronski, S.J. (Dominican School of Philosophy & Theology, Berkeley) cosponsored by The Copernicus Foundation, Calvert House, and the Polish American Student Association Often referred to as “The Polish Pope,” John Paul II is better described as a global pope. The Polish experience offers a unique perspective that bore fruit in the person of Pope John Paul II, who held the world’s attention for decades and offered a way to be Catholic in the Church’s new situation of worldly powerlessness. Through the lens of the Polish experience in Europe and America – the “Polish hermeneutic” – this talk will explore…
David Dancing Before the Ark: The Liturgical Theology Implicit in 2 Samuel 6
Fr. Robert Barron (Rector of Mundelein Seminary/University of Saint Mary of the Lake; founder of Word on Fire) David danced before the Ark as an image of humanity dancing with the Lord, recovering the effortless harmony of Eden. In this lecture, Robert Barron will explore the role of King David as a new Adam and cite the solemn protection God extends to the Ark of the Covenant as an example of the importance of proper worship. Throughout the Scriptures, God attempts to “Eden-ize” man — that is, to return him to harmony with Himself, his fellow men and women, and…
Pope Francis and the New Evangelization
Fr. Robert Barron (Rector, Mundelein Seminary/University of Saint Mary of the Lake; founder, Word on Fire) Cosponsored by Word on Fire In this lecture, Fr. Robert Barron discussed how to put faith into action in today’s increasingly secular world. With Pope Francis as a model of how to present “the joy of the Gospel,” Barron argued that Catholics have a duty to awaken the faith of the baptized and bring back those who have drifted. While the message has remained unchanged since the first century, Catholics are called to share the beauty, goodness, and truth of the faith with new ardor, new…
Baudelaire and Maistre: the Weight of Original Sin
By 1851, the poet Charles Baudelaire had become obsessed — in contrast to his previous anarchist position — with the views of the reactionary and fiercely Catholic Joseph de Maistre. Maistre argued that Original Sin “explains everything,” a perspective that Baudelaire was to adopt, and which markedly changed his poetry. This lecture will consider Baudelaire’s preoccupation with sin in light of Kierkegaard’s treatment of anxiety and sin in The Concept of Anxiety.
Aquinas: Poet and Contemplative
Cosponsored by the Medieval Studies Workshop and the Theology and Religious Ethics Workshop “The well-known is what we have yet to learn.” T.S. Eliot What do we know of the prayer-life of St Thomas Aquinas? This lecture will be directly concerned with this question, and the answer may well come as a surprise to many people. Aquinas is still today almost exclusively regarded as an outstanding scholastic philosopher and theologian. But what is little known is that he was also a master of the spiritual life and a very considerable poet, perhaps even the greatest Latin poet of the Middle…
Spring Non-Credit Course on the Sacraments
6:00 Dinner | 6:30 Lecture Intended for current students and faculty. Others interested in attending please contact info@lumenchristi.org. Registrants are free to attend as many sessions as they choose. REGISTER HERE Jesus’ words and actions during his hidden life and public ministry were already salvific, for they anticipated the power of his Paschal mystery. They announced and prepared what he was going to give the Church when all was accomplished. The mysteries of Christ’s life are the foundations of what he would henceforth dispense in the sacraments, through the ministers of his Church, for “what was visible in our Savior has…