

The Thomistic Institute
The Thomistic Institute
The Thomistic Institute exists to promote Catholic truth in our contemporary world by strengthening the intellectual formation of Christians at universities, in the Church, and in the wider public square. The thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Universal Doctor of the Church, is our touchstone.
The Thomistic Institute Podcast features the lectures and talks from our conferences, campus chapters events, intellectual retreats, livestream events, and much more.
Founded in 2009, the Thomistic Institute is part of the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC.
The Thomistic Institute Podcast features the lectures and talks from our conferences, campus chapters events, intellectual retreats, livestream events, and much more.
Founded in 2009, the Thomistic Institute is part of the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Oct 25, 2022 • 1h
Civil Conversation in an Age of Pluralism & Ideological Extremism | Prof. Thomas Hibbs
This talk was given on September 19, 2022 at Regent University.
For more information, please visit thomisticinstitute.org.
About the speaker:
Thomas Hibbs is currently J. Newton Rayzor Sr. Professor of Philosophy at Baylor University, where he is also Dean Emeritus, having served for 16 years as Dean of the Honors College and as Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Culture. Hibbs received a Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame and has served as tutor at Thomas Aquinas College, Full Professor and Department Chair of Philosophy at Boston College, and President of the University of Dallas. Hibbs works in the areas of medieval philosophy, especially Thomas Aquinas, contemporary virtue ethics, and aesthetics. He has published more than thirty scholarly articles and seven books, as well as 100 reviews and discussion articles on film, theater, art, and higher education in a variety of venues.

Oct 21, 2022 • 56min
The Big Bang to Humans: Purpose & Meaning in an Expanding and Evolving Universe | Prof. Karin Öberg
This talk was given on September 14, 2022 at Iowa State University.
For more information please visit thomisticinstitute.org
About the Speaker:
Karin Öberg is Professor of Astronomy at Harvard University. Her specialty is astrochemistry and her research aims to uncover how chemical processes affect the outcome of planet formation, especially the chemical habitability of nascent planets. Dr. Öberg obtained her B.Sc. in chemistry at Caltech in 2005, and her Ph.D. in astronomy, with a thesis focused on laboratory astrochemistry, from Leiden University in 2009. She did postdoctoral work at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics as a NASA Hubble fellow, focusing on millimeter observations of planet-forming disks around young stars. In 2013 she joined the Harvard astronomy faculty as an assistant professor. She was promoted and named the Thomas D. Cabot Associate Professor in Astronomy in 2016, and promoted to full professor with tenure in 2017. Dr. Öberg’s research in astrochemistry has been recognized with a Sloan fellowship, a Packard fellowship, the Newton Lacy Pierce Award from the American Astronomical Society, and a Simons fellowship. Her recent TED talk explaining some of her research can be found here https://www.ted.com/talks/karin_oberg_the_galactic_recipe_for_a_living_planet

Oct 20, 2022 • 40min
Off-Campus Conversations, Ep. 007 | Prof. Gina Noia on Bioethics & End of Life Decisions
Are quality of life judgments ethical? Join Fr. Gregory Pine, O.P. of Aquinas 101, Godsplaining, and Pints with Aquinas for an off-campus conversation with bioethicist Prof. Gina Noia about her latest Thomistic Institute lecture, "Are Quality of Life Judgments Ethical?”
Bioethics and End of Life Decisions w/ Fr. Gregory Pine (Off-Campus Conversations)
You can listen to the original lecture here: https://soundcloud.com/thomisticinstitute/are-quality-of-life-judgements-ethical-prof-gina-noia-1
For more information on upcoming events, please visit our website at www.thomisticinstitute.org
About the Speaker:
Gina Maria Noia is an Assistant Professor of Theology and Resident Bioethicist at Belmont Abbey College. She received her Ph.D. in Theology and Health Care Ethics from Saint Louis University. She has served as a clinical ethicist for OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, IL and St. Alexius Hospital in St. Louis, MO, and she is published in Christian Bioethics and the Journal of Moral Theology.

Oct 19, 2022 • 54min
What is a Soul? | Prof. Marie George
This lecture was given at Cornell University on September 14, 2022.
For more information on upcoming events, visit our website at thomisticinstitute.org
About the speaker:
Marie George has been a member of the St. John’s University Philosophy Department since 1988. Professor George is an Aristotelian-Thomist whose interests lie primarily in the areas of philosophy of nature and philosophy of science. She has received several awards from the John Templeton foundation for her work in science and religion, and in 2007 she received a grant from the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences (CTNS) for an interdisciplinary project entitled: “The Evolution of Sympathy and Morality.” Professor George has authored over 50 peer-reviewed articles and two books: Christianity and Extraterrestrials? A Catholic Perspective(2005) and Stewardship of Creation (2009). She is currently working on Aquinas’s “Fifth Way,” and also on a variety of questions concerning living things (self-motion, consciousness, evolution, etc.). Professor George is a member of ten philosophical societies, including the American Catholic Philosophical Association, the Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy, and the Society for Aristotelian Studies.

Oct 18, 2022 • 53min
Are Quality of Life Judgments Ethical? | Prof. Gina Noia
This lecture was given for John Hopkins University on April 11, 2022.
For more information on upcoming events, please visit our website: www.thomisticinstitute.org
About the speaker:
Gina Maria Noia is an Assistant Professor of Theology and Resident Bioethicist at Belmont Abbey College. She received her Ph.D. in Theology and Health Care Ethics from Saint Louis University. She has served as a clinical ethicist for OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, IL and St. Alexius Hospital in St. Louis, MO, and she is published in Christian Bioethics and the Journal of Moral Theology

Oct 17, 2022 • 48min
TI in DC 'Resting in the Real: St. Thomas Aquinas on Contemplation' Sr. Anna Wray
This talk was given on September 27, 2022 for the DC Young Professionals chapter of the Thomistic Institute.
For more information please visit, thomisticinstitute.org.
About the speaker:
Sr. Anna Wray is a native of Connecticut and a member of the Dominican Sisters of Saint Cecilia. Sister received her PhD in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, having written her dissertation on Aristotle’s account of the activity of contemplation. Sister is on faculty in CUA's School of Philosophy.

Oct 14, 2022 • 1h 14min
Is Free Will an Illusion? | Fr. Stephen Brock
This lecture was given on September 15, 2022 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
For information on upcoming events, please visit our website at www.thomisticinstitute.org.
About the speaker:
Stephen L. Brock is a priest of the Prelature of Opus Dei (ordained 1992). He is Ordinary Professor of Medieval Philosophy at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, where he has taught since 1990. He received a BA from the University of Chicago and a PhD in Medieval Studies from the University of Toronto. In 1999 he was a visiting professor in the School of Philosophy of The Catholic University of America. In 2017 he is a visiting scholar at the University of Chicago, collaborating in the Templeton Foundation project “Virtue, Happiness, and Meaning in Life,” directed by Candace Vogler and Jennifer Frey; his collaboration has included teaching a course in the Philosophy Department at the University of Chicago, giving two public lectures, directing a reading group, and leading sessions in a summer seminar for graduate students. Since 2008 he has been an Ordinary Member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. He is the author of Action & Conduct: Thomas Aquinas and the Theory of Action (T&T Clark, 1998); articles on various aspects of Aquinas’s thought; and most recently, The Philosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas: A Sketch (Wipf & Stock, 2015).

Oct 13, 2022 • 52min
Science and the Theology of Extraterrestrials | Prof. Karin Öberg
This lecture was given at Baylor University on September 13, 2022.
For more information on upcoming events, please visit our website: www.thomisticinstitute.org
About the speaker:
Karin Öberg is Professor of Astronomy at Harvard University. Her specialty is astrochemistry and her research aims to uncover how chemical processes affect the outcome of planet formation, especially the chemical habitability of nascent planets. Dr. Öberg obtained her B.Sc. in chemistry at Caltech in 2005, and her Ph.D. in astronomy, with a thesis focused on laboratory astrochemistry, from Leiden University in 2009. She did postdoctoral work at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics as a NASA Hubble fellow, focusing on millimeter observations of planet-forming disks around young stars. In 2013 she joined the Harvard astronomy faculty as an assistant professor. She was promoted and named the Thomas D. Cabot Associate Professor in Astronomy in 2016, and promoted to full professor with tenure in 2017. Dr. Öberg’s research in astrochemistry has been recognized with a Sloan fellowship, a Packard fellowship, the Newton Lacy Pierce Award from the American Astronomical Society, and a Simons fellowship. Her recent TED talk explaining some of her research can be found here:
https://www.ted.com/talks/karin_oberg_the_galactic_recipe_for_a_living_planet

Oct 12, 2022 • 1h 4min
Thomistic Underpinnings of the Theology of the Body | Fr. Thomas Petri, O.P.
This talk was given on September 8, 2022 at The University of Texas at Austin
For more information please visit thomisticinstitute.org
About the Speaker:
Father Thomas Petri, O.P. is the President of the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies, where he also serves as an assistant professor of moral theology and pastoral studies. Ordained a priest in 2009, he holds a Doctorate in Sacred Theology from The Catholic University of America.

Oct 11, 2022 • 1h 7min
Four Kinds of Happiness & Four Kinds of Friendship | Prof. Christopher Kaczor
This lecture was given on May 11, 2022 at the University of Oregon.
For more information on upcoming events, please visit our website at www.thomisticinstitute.org.
About the speaker:
Dr. Christopher Kaczor (rhymes with razor) is Professor of Philosophy at Loyola Marymount University and a member of the James Madison Society of Princeton University. In 2015, he was appointed to the Pontifical Academy for Life of Vatican City, and he serves as a Consultor to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He 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. He is an award winning author of twelve books including 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.


