The Thomistic Institute

Prof. Mathew Thomas introduces the Church Fathers as the first theologians and explains how their witness to Scripture, Christian discipleship, and early worship can still help readers understand the faith and its unity today.

This lecture was given on June 9th, 2025, at University of Oregon.

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About the Speaker:

Dr. Matthew J. Thomas is Associate Professor of Biblical Studies and Theology Department Chair at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, CA. His research areas include Pauline theology, patristics (particularly the ante-Nicene period), and early Christian interpretation of Scripture. His writings include Paul's 'Works of the Law' in the Perspective of Second Century Reception, Christian Theology: An Introduction with Alister McGrath, "Justification" in the St. Andrews Encyclopedia of Theology, and the 1 and 2 Maccabees commentaries in the Ignatius Study Bible with his wife Leeanne.

Keywords: Church Fathers, Christian Unity, Early Church, Eucharist, Ignatius Of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Martyrdom, Scripture, Theology

Prof. Thomas Ward examines medieval arguments for God’s existence in Anselm, Aquinas, and Scotus, showing how each thinker approaches the question from a different starting point and why their arguments still matter for faith and reason.

This lecture was given on April 21st, 2025, at Saint Vincent College.

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About the Speaker:

Thomas M. Ward is Associate Professor of Philosophy at The University of Texas at Austin, in the School of Civic Leadership. He specializes in the history of philosophy and theology of the Middle Ages. Ward is the author of After Stoicism: Last Words of the Last Roman Philosopher (Word on Fire, 2024), Ordered by Love: An Introduction to John Duns Scotus (Angelico, 2022), Divine Ideas (Cambridge University Press, 2020), and has translated, with commentary, John Duns Scotus’s Treatise on the First Principle (Hackett, 2024). He has been a NEH Fellow (2022) and Harvey Fellow (2009-2011), and is a past winner of the Society for Medieval and Renaissance Philosophy Founder's Award (2013) and the American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly Rising Scholar Essay Contest (2018). He studied philosophy at Biola University (BA 2004) and theology at Oxford University (M.Phil 2006), where he was Head Resident at the Kilns, the former residence of C.S. Lewis. His PhD in philosophy is from UCLA (2011). Ward is married with six children and is a member of St. Peter Catholic Student Center in Waco.

Keywords: Anselm, Aquinas, Arguments For God, Cosmological Argument, Faith And Reason, John Duns Scotus, Ontological Argument, Philosophy, Theology

Prof. John O’Callaghan examines the Big Bang in relation to the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo and argues that cosmology and belief in God as creator address different kinds of explanation.

This lecture was given on February 27th, 2025, at University of South Carolina.

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About the Speaker:

Prof. John O'Callaghan is the Director Emeritus of the Jacques Maritain Center at the University of Notre Dame as well as a permanent member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas, appointed by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010. He served as the past President of the American Catholic Philosophical Association. His areas of scholarly interest include medieval philosophy, the philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, and Thomistic metaphysics and ethics.

Keywords: Big Bang, Creation Ex Nihilo, Cosmology, Evolution, Genesis, Natural Science, Providence, Stephen Hawking, Thomism

Prof. Brad Gregory argues that the Protestant Reformation set off a chain of unintended consequences that helped produce the secular, fragmented modern world, ultimately showing why and how that history still shapes how we live, believe, and consume today.

This lecture was given on February 27th, 2025, at West Virginia University.

To make a gift this June, visit https://truth.thomisticinstitute.org/pod.

About the Speaker:

Brad S. Gregory is Henkels Family College Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame, where he has taught since 2003. From 1996-2003 he taught and received early tenure at Stanford University; prior to that he was a Junior Fellow in the Harvard Society of Fellows and earned his Ph.D. from Princeton as well as two degrees in philosophy from the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. His first book, Salvation at Stake: Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern Europe (Harvard, 1999) received six book awards, and he has won teaching awards at both Stanford and Notre Dame. In 2005, he was named the inaugural winner of the first annual Hiett Prize in the Humanities, a $50,000 award from the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture given to the outstanding mid-career humanities scholar in the United States. His book The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society (Belknap, 2012) garnered over 100 reviews internationally and has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Polish, and Arabic, with forthcoming translations into Chinese and Romanian. The working title of his current book project is The Way of the World: Power, Wealth, and Civilization from the Last Ice Age to the Anthropocene.

Keywords: Consumerism, Modernity, Pluralism, Protestant Reformation, Reformation, Religion And Politics, Secularism, Secularization, Western Christianity

Prof. Christopher Kaczor argues that the common claim that all religions are just different paths to the same destination collapses under scrutiny, and that Christianity uniquely holds together truth, toleration, and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

This lecture was given on February 9th, 2026, at University of Florida.

To make a gift this June, visit https://truth.thomisticinstitute.org/pod.

About the Speaker:

Dr. Christopher Kaczor (rhymes with razor) graduated from the Honors Program of Boston College and earned a Ph.D. four years later from the University of Notre Dame. A Fulbright Scholar, Dr. Kaczor is a former Federal Chancellor Fellow at the University of Cologne and William E. Simon Visiting Fellow in the James Madison Program at Princeton University and Honorary Professor in Bishop Barron's Word on Fire Institute. His eighteen books include Is Belief Believable? The Gospel of Happiness, The Seven Big Myths about Marriage, A Defense of Dignity, The Seven Big Myths about the Catholic Church, The Ethics of Abortion, O Rare Ralph McInerny: Stories and Reflections on a Legendary Notre Dame Professor, Thomas Aquinas on the Cardinal Virtues; Life Issues-Medical Choices; Thomas Aquinas on Faith, Hope, and Love; The Edge of Life, and Proportionalism and the Natural Law Tradition. Dr. Kaczor’s views have been in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, National Review, NPR, BBC, EWTN, ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS, MSNBC, TEDx, and The Today Show.

Keywords: Christianity, Faith and Reason, Hiddenness of God, Jesus Christ, Religious Pluralism, Tolerance, Truth