St Anslem Institute

Robert Louis Wilken
"Catholicism and Culture"

Thursday / March 25, 2010
UVA / Minor Hall Auditorium / 5:00-7:00pm
 

On the Feast of the Annunciation, the faculty and friends of the St. Anselm Institute for Catholic Thought welcomed back Robert Louis Wilken by inaugurating the annual Robert Louis Wilken Lecture in honor of his dedicated service to and leadership of the St. Anselm Institute since its founding in 2000. The University of Virginia Department of Religious Studies cosponsored this public lecture.

Robert Louis Wilken, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Emeritus Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia, is the author, editor and translator of numerous scholarly books and articles, including Isaiah: Interpreted by Early Christian and Medieval Commentators (Eerdmans, 2007); The Spirit of Early Christian Thought: Seeking the Face of God (Yale, 2003); On the Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ: selected writings of St. Maximus the Confessor (St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 2003); Remembering the Christian Past (Eerdmans, 1995); The Land Called Holy: Palestine in Christian History and Thought (Yale, 1992); Christians as the Romans Saw Them (Yale, 1984); and The Myth of Christian Beginnings (Doubleday, 1971).

Prof. Wilken used the copy of Raphael's School of Athens painting in UVA's Cabell Hall Auditorium as an initial point of ref­erence. He noted the original painting not only depicted Plato and Aristotle and the greatest minds of ancient Greece, but that Ra­phael also painted a companion work known as the Adora­tion of the Sacrament. Both paintings hang on opposite walls in the Pope's Vatican residence. The Adoration painting depicts a mon­strance on an altar with an exposed Eucha­ristic host. The Eu­charist is encircled, above, by the dove of the Holy Spirit, Christ, and God the Father, and below by many of the Church's greatest teach­ers and inspirational leaders, including Sts. Augustine, Am­brose, Aquinas, Do­minic and Francis as well as artists Fra Ange­lico and Bramante, and the poet Dante. Prof. Wilken explained how early medieval Christian writers recognized the contributions of classical civilization and appropriated the best of the ancient world to create a new Christian culture. For example, Prudentius, a 4th century Latin Christian poet, employed classical Latin verse--not the lyrical structures of the Psalms-- to sing Christ’s praises, thereby opening a path for the development of Chris­tian poetry in the world’s literature. Isidore, a bishop of 6th century Seville, offers a second instructive example: he focused his great talents on the recovery and systematic compilation of the etymologies, grammar, and rhetoric of the Latin language. Isidore understood that the preserva­tion of a common language of the Mediterranean basin was not only necessary for reading the Bible, but that it readied a gateway for the contemplation, communication, and con­tinuation of all truths--including both the wisdom of the an­cients and the faith of the Church's Fathers.

         Catholic culture, thus, is never solely religious; it embraces what is best in thought, literature, art and the sciences, a truth that St. Paul saw at the beginning of the Church’s history. In his letter to the Philippians, St. Paul wrote; “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on these things” (Phil 4:8).

CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA 
CHAMBER CHOIR CONCERT

CANCELLED DUE TO WEATHER CONDITIONS

Leo Nestor, Conductor
Verena Anders, Assistant Conductor
William Atwood, Organ 

• Newcomb Rd.,behind Alderman Library (20 spaces)
• Rugby Rd., behind Madison Bowl (34 spaces)
• Madison Hall (31 spaces)
• Chancellor St. Lot (40 spaces - NOT on deck)
• Elliewood Parking lot (Elliewood Ave. - 44 spaces)
• Behind College Inn (72 spaces)
• 14th St. Parking Deck (175 spaces)
• Hospital Drive/Barringer lots (45 spaces).

Paul Mariani
Boston College

"The Life and Poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J."

October 22, 2009 / Minor Hall / University of Virginia/ 5:00pm

"Sometimes a Lantern moves along the night
That interests our eyes."
-- GMH, SJ

On Thursday evening (Oct. 22), the St. Anselm Institute warmly embraced and welcomed Boston College Professor Paul Mariani to the University of Virginia.  Prof. Mariani is a widely acclaimed and prolific authority on British and American poetry and literature, including his sixteenth and latest book: Gerard Manley Hopkins, A Life (Viking, 2008).  Among numerous awards, Mariani has received the John Ciardi Lifetime Achievement Award in Poetry, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts award, and two National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships. 

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889), a Catholic convert from Anglicanism while a student at Oxford, entered the Society of Jesus at the age of 24 and lived the rest of his life as a Jesuit priest. He taught Latin, Greek and the Classics in several secondary schools and served as a parish priest in several working class parishes in Dublin, Wales and England.  Interestingly, in late 1878, Hopkins was assigned to St. Aloysius Gonzaga Church in a working class neighborhood near Oxford University, where he participated in the founding of the Catholic Club, which later was renamed the Newman Society in honor of John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801-1890). Hopkins died in Dublin in 1889, at the age of 44, likely from typhoid fever.
 

Brendan McAnerney, O.P.
Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology, Graduate Theological Union

"Holy Icons - Holy Churches"

 Minor Hall / University of Virginia
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMEBER 30, 2009, 7:00-8:30pm 

"In the study of revealed truth East and West have used different methods and approaches in understanding and confessing divine things.  It is hardly surprising, then, if sometimes one tradition has come nearer to a full appreciation of some aspects of a mystery of revelation than the other, or has expressed them better.  In such cases, these various theological formulations are often to be considered complementary rather than conflicting" (Second Vatican Ecumencal Council)*.

Fr. Brendan McAnerney, O.P.--a Dominican priest with additional priestly faculties in the Melkite Greek Catholic Church --visited the University of Virginia on September 30-October 1, 2009.  Trained as an artist and art historian in the Byzantine tradition, with a deep reservoir of experiences as  a Dominican, former gallery employee and director, and in his present position leading DominICON Ministry in Sacramento,  Fr. Brendan exposed his UVA audiences to the theology, history, grammar and techniques that comprise the holy art of icons, from its origins in the Eastern Roman Empire through its development in the Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

    Icons, Fr. Brendan made clear, are not created by artists as immediate forms of self-expression or commodities for self-promotion. By contrast, artists associated with the iconographic tradition see their efforts as a form of service to the Church and their artistic "property" as the property of the community.  Icons, moreover, are not simply painted pictures of Christ, saints, or Biblical figures.  Instead, icons are part of a tradition of knowing whereby both the narrative and meaning of Scriptural stories are captured and learned, and also a medium in which  the material world becomes transparent of its ultimate origin and future.  For example, this Burning Bush icon depicts not only a familiar Biblical event, but also the relationship between the Divine and humanity in terms of Moses's willingness to heed God's command to remove his earthly sandals as he approached, thereby ensuring the  transcendent contact and character of his experience.

Icons, thus, do not exist as mere representations of the material world or to evoke fleeting emotional responses from their audiences.  They, rather, are revelatory experiences for the artist and the audience in that they offer foretastes and transcendent glimpses beyond the present moment and space.  Properly understood, the effect is transformative and restorative because the new and ultimate nature revealed necessitates a radical reviewing of the rest of the material world and, especially, of humanity. The iconographic tradition sees this process as a vicarious experience that is open to all,but its underlying metaphysics demand a lot of heavy lifting for unfamiliarized audiences--especially in the West --who seek to think their way back to this fascinating and still vibrant part of the Christian tradition.

   Following Pope John Paul II's call for promoting greater unity between the Western and Eastern Churches in Orientale Lumen (1995), Fr. Brendan further encouraged his attentive audience to become more familiar with and appreciative of the artistry of sacred icons and the interpretative grammar and vocabulary of the iconographic tradition.  As an aide to a fuller understanding of icons, Fr. Brendan explained how the lack of external light sources, the simultaneous representation of different events, the idea of luminous darkness, and the use of reverse perspectives, shallow spaces, and gold  were common iconographic techniques that were intended to reinforce the transmaterial and transtemporal purposes that all icons aim to effect.  To conclude his talk, Fr. Brendan also explained the meaning of several of the most common iconographic hand gestures. 

 




* Second Vation Ecumenical Council, Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio.

W. David Solomon
University of Notre Dame
 
"The Assault on Human Dignity: Can Bioethics Do Without it?"

Thursday / April 16, 2009 / 5:30-7:00pm
McKim Auditorium / Univ. of Virginia Medical School

David Solomon is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame.  His principal areas of research include contemporary moral philosophy and medical ethics.  His numerous scholarly works center on topics of moral realism and moral dilemmas, but he is equally adept at engaging, enlightening, and elevating contemporary, public discussions that cut to the core of how we understand ourselves as individuals, as workers, as societies, and as thoughtful persons who aim to achieve both happiness and what is good.

The University of Notre Dame Alumni Club, and it local chapter, cosponsored this public talk.