Episodes

Dr. Rebekah Lamb argues that St. John Henry Newman’s idea of the saint is deeply relational: saints are friends knit together in the communion of saints, and holiness is lived through prayer, hidden service, and ordinary fidelity. This lecture was given on February 19th, 2026, at Queen's University, Belfast. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Dr. Rebekah Lamb is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in theology and the ...

Dr. Wes Siscoe argues that true happiness and the good life are not found in pleasure, wealth, fame, or even bodily health, but in a fully ordered human flourishing that culminates in union with God. This lecture was given on February 19th, 2026, at Indiana University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Wes Siscoe is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at The Ohio State University. He is also a...

Prof. Steven Jensen presents several arguments in favor of the conclusion that the life of a fetus has intrinsic human dignity on account of what a human being is and not merely as an effect of psychological or cognitive capacity, ultimately concluding that the intentional killing of a fetus as a means to save a mother's life is morally impermissible. This lecture was given on February 19th, 2026, at North Dakota State University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomistici...

Dr. John-Paul Heil argues that Christians should “elect Christ as king” by judging political institutions according to whether they actually lead people toward holiness, the common good, and heaven. This lecture was given on February 17th, 2026, at Virginia Tech. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: John-Paul Heil is a Core Fellow in history, philosophy, Catholic anthropology, English, and theology at Mount St. Mary'...

Dr. Lydia Dugdale argues that the “lost art of dying” can be recovered by reviving older practices of mortality awareness, community, reconciliation, and hope rather than accepting medicalized dying as normal. This lecture was given on February 16th, 2026, at University of Galway. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Dr. Lydia Dugdale is the Silberberg Professor of Medicine and Director of the Cen...

Fr. Aquinas Guilbeau presents the Catholic disagreement over honoring Truman as a serious moral dispute rooted in differing judgments about just war, innocent life, and the necessity of the atomic bomb. This lecture was given on February 14th, 2026, at Dominican House of Studies. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: A native of Louisiana, Fr. Aquinas Guilbeau, O.P., entered the Dominican Province of St. Joseph in 200...

Prof. Michael Krom argues that just war principles still govern contemporary warfare, especially drone warfare and autonomous weapons, and that moral judgment cannot be replaced by technology or legal convenience. This lecture was given on February 14th, 2026, at Dominican House of Studies. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Michael Krom started reading Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae shortly after his conversion at the...

Prof. Michael Krom argues that just war theory remains morally necessary today because war must be judged by justice, right intention, and the common good rather than by realpolitik, legal minimalism, or national self-interest. This lecture was given on February 14th, 2026, at Dominican House of Studies. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Michael Krom started reading Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae shortly after his con...

Prof. Thomas Ward argues that Stoicism offers valuable detachment and moral discipline, but Boethius and Christianity deepen it by reordering the human person toward friendship, hope, and beatitude in God. This lecture was given on February 12th, 2026, at Franciscan University of Steubenville. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Thomas M. Ward is Associate Professor of Philosophy at The University of Texas at Austin...

Prof. Christopher Frey argues that Stoicism offers real insights about freedom and detachment from externals, but its ideal of self-sufficient serenity risks flattening human emotion, moral life, and the need for grace. This lecture was given on November 7th, 2024, at United States Military Academy. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Christopher Frey is currently the McFarlin Professor of Philosophy at The Universi...

Sr. Anna Wray argues that sorrow can either deform the soul as acedia or save it when rightly faced, and she offers a Thomistic account of how sorrow, friendship with God, and spiritual remedies shape the Christian life. This lecture was given on November 6th, 2025, at Iowa State University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Sister Anna Wray is a native of Connecticut and a member of the Domini...

Prof. Michael Dauphinais contends that modern Christians, formed by empiricism, individualism, and a this‑worldly hope that easily turns to despair, especially need the Eucharist because it is the concrete, sacramental way Christ draws us into the Trinitarian communion for which we were created, making his paschal mystery present and reproducing his own filial relation to the Father in us. This lecture was given on November 14th, 2025, at University of Oklahoma. For more information on upcomin...

Prof. Gavin D’Costa explains how, since Vatican II, the Catholic Church has rethought its relationship to Judaism by affirming the enduring validity of God’s covenant with the Jewish people, recovering the Church’s identity as a fundamentally Jewish–Gentile reality, and opening unresolved but fertile questions about mission, ecclesiology, and antisemitism. This lecture was given on October 9th, 2025, at University of Edinburgh. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinst...

Prof. Michael Root argues that, in Catholic theology, we are saved wholly by the unmerited grace of Christ, and that this grace brings us into a Spirit‑given life of faith, hope, love, and morally significant works, so that eternal life is at once pure gift and, in a secondary sense, a “merited destiny.” This lecture was given on September 9th, 2025, at North Carolina State University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speak...

Fr. Dominic Langevin defends the Catholic priesthood as a divinely willed, sacramental system of mediation in which ordained men, configured to Christ the High Priest, bestow God’s gifts on the faithful and offer their prayers and sins to God, thereby promoting both God’s glory and the sanctification and dignity of the Church. This lecture was given on November 10th, 2025, at West Virginia University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. ...

Fr. John Baptist Ku unpacks St. Thomas Aquinas’s doctrine of predestination, showing how God’s universal salvific will, efficacious grace, and real human freedom coexist without collapsing into Calvinist double predestination or Pelagian self-salvation. This lecture was given on November 22nd, 2025, at Dominican House of Studies. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Fr. John Baptist Ku was born in Manhattan (1965) an...

Prof. Thomas Osborne clarifies how, for Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas, the distinctive immateriality of human intellectual knowledge grounds a philosophical case for the soul’s immortality, going beyond today’s narrower “problem of consciousness.” This lecture was given on October 16th, 2025, at University of Connecticut. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Thomas M. Osborne, Jr. (Ph.D, Duke U...

Prof. Marshall Bierson uses Aristotle’s distinction between work, play, and deeper “energetic” activities to argue that friendship and contemplation uniquely allow us to “rest” in what is truly good and meaningful, and then shows how Aquinas radicalizes this by making both contemplation and friendship with God the heart of human fulfillment. This lecture was given on November 20th, 2025, at Cornell University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.or...

Dr. Erik Dempsey explains how St. Thomas Aquinas sees pleasure as a natural and God-given part of the good life, one that both signals our true human ends and yet must be disciplined by temperance in a fallen world. This lecture was given on December 4th, 2025, at Southern Methodist University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Professor Erik Dempsey an Associate Professor of Instruction in the...

Prof. Timothy O’Connor examines why an all-loving, omnipotent God permits horrendous suffering and explores how, within a Christian framework, such evils can be “defeated” and taken up into the communion of saints as part of our eternal union with God. This lecture was given on December 3rd, 2025, at University of Scranton. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Tim O’Connor is the Mahlon Powell Professor of Philosophy...

Sr. Mary Madeline Todd draws upon Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, and friendship with Christ in order to show that sharing a common journey and life, together with mutual self-gift, turns everyday relationships into true, virtuous friendships that enable us not merely to survive but to thrive in happiness with God and one another. This lecture was given on November 27th, 2025, at Thomistic Institute in Limerick. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.o...

Dr. R. J. Snell analyzes our “burnout society” as an achievement-obsessed culture that drives people to anxiety, depression, and exhaustion by demanding endless self-optimization while starving them of leisure, contemplation, and a meaningful narrative for their lives. This lecture was given on December 8th, 2025, at University of Pennsylvania. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: R. J. Snell is E...

Dr. Kevin Kambo argues that our culture has moved from a “dictatorship of relativism” to a “tyranny of pathos,” in which appeals to hurt feelings and empathy displace reasoned deliberation about truth, justice, and human nature. This lecture was given on October 23rd, 2025, at Fordham University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Kevin M. Kambo is an assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Dallas in...

Prof. Steven Jensen argues that right and wrong are not just a matter of opinion by defending moral realism over moral relativism, showing that moral truths are grounded in human nature and goals rather than mere subjective attitudes. This lecture was given on November 13th, 2025, at Fordham University. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events. About the Speakers: Steven J Jensen holds the Bishop Nold Chair in Graduate Ph...