This lecture was given on October 23rd, 2025, at Indiana University.

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About the Speaker:

Paul Gondreau is professor of theology at Providence College, where he has taught for 28 years. He received his doctorate in theology from the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, doing his dissertation on Christ's full humanity (Christ's human passions/emotions) under the renowned Thomist scholar Jean-Pierre Torrell. He specializes in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas and has published widely in the areas of Christology (focusing on Christ’s full humanity and his maleness), Christian anthropology, the moral meaning and purpose of human sexuality and sexual difference, the biblical vision of Aquinas' theology, the theology of disability, the sacrament of the Eucharist and the priesthood, and the Catholic vision of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings.

Keywords: Body And Soul, Human Sexuality, Marriage, Natural Law, Procreation, Sacrament, Sexual Ethics, Thomistic Anthropology, Unitive Love

Fr. Thomas Pickett explores what Aquinas means by study and argues that study is not just academic work but a morally formative pursuit that shapes charity, virtue, and the Christian path to happiness.

This lecture was given on August 29th, 2025, at University of California Berkeley.

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About the Speaker:

Fr Thomas Aquinas Pickett is a son of Ellensburg, Washington and a member of the Western Dominican Province. Apart from running, board games, and coffee, he enjoys studying his namesake, St Thomas Aquinas. Having received his BA in Philosophy at Gonzaga University (where he was NOT a member of the basketball team), his MDiv and MA in theology from the DSPT, his STB from l’Institut Catholique de Toulouse, and his STL and STD from the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception, he is now a professor of theology at the DSPT, assigned to St Albert the Great Priory.

Baglow is the author of Faith, Science and Reason: Theology on the Cutting Edge (2nd edition, Midwest Theological Forum, 2019) and Creation: A Catholic’s Guide to God and the Universe (Ave Maria Press, 2021). He serves as theological advisor to the Board of Directors of the Society of Catholic Scientists. He authored the transcripts for Wonder: The Harmony of Faith and Science, a Word on Fire film series directed by Manny Marquez and narrated by Jonathan Roumie. His work has appeared in Church Life Journal, Culture and Evangelization, and Joie de Vivre Quarterly Journal.

Keywords: Aquinas, Beatitude, Charity, Christian Life, Moral Life, Studiousness, Study, Virtue, Wisdom

Prof. Michael Krom presents Aquinas’s account of charity and asks what it really means to love the sinner without affirming the sin, showing how true Christian love can require both mercy and moral clarity.

This lecture was given on August 18th, 2025, at Universidad Panamericana.

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

About the Speaker:

Michael Krom started reading Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae shortly after his conversion at the end of college. Upon learning about Flannery O’Connor’s “hillbilly Thomist” habit of reading Aquinas every night, he started studying two articles a day and completed the Summa while in graduate school at Emory University. As a professor at Saint Vincent College, he saw the urgent need for collegians and seminarians to receive a solid foundation in Aquinas’s philosophical theology. In 2020, he published Justice and Charity:  An Introduction to Aquinas’s Moral, Economic, and Political Thought (Baker Academic Press), and teaches a Thomistic philosophy course each fall. In addition to continuing work on the moral, economic, and political topics covered in the book, his current research is on the influence of monastic spirituality on Aquinas; he is working on a monograph tentatively entitled Aquinas Among the Benedictines.

Keywords: Aquinas, Charity, Christian Love, Common Good, Limits Of Charity, Sin, Tough Love, Virtue

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.

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

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.

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

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

Prof. James Felak argues that John Paul II used Polish saints as powerful symbols of faith, moral courage, and national identity to inspire resistance against communism and affirm the Church’s role in Poland’s history.

This lecture was given on October 31st, 2026, at St. Albert's Priory.

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

About the Speaker:

James Felak is a Professor of History and current holder of the Newman Center Term Professorship in Catholic Christianity at the University of Washington. He specializes in Catholicism in East Central Europe and has authored two books on Catholic politics in Slovakia, and a book on Pope John Paul II and his visits to his native Poland during and after Communist rule there. This latter work is based on hundreds of pages of papal speeches and sermons, and the records of the Communist government and secret police as they monitored the Pope during his visits.  Besides courses on modern Europe, Felak teaches “The History of Christianity” and “Catholic Classics in Historical Context.” The latter course covers the major Catholic writers and thinkers from St. Augustine and St. Benedict through G. K. Chesterton and Flannery O’Connor. Felak is from southwestern Pennsylvania, received his doctorate from Indiana University, and has resided in Seattle since 1989.

Keywords: Catholic Identity, Communion Of Saints, Communism, John Paul II, Poland, Sacred Space, Saints, Soviet Bloc, St Maximilian Kolbe

Prof. Jennifer Frey explores Flannery O’Connor’s bold claim that art can reveal truth in a way philosophy cannot, and shows how her fiction turns beauty, form, and imagination into a distinctive kind of knowledge.

This lecture was given on February 7th, 2026, at Dominican House of Studies.

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

About the Speaker:

Jennifer A. Frey is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tulsa. She previously served as the inaugural Dean of the Honors College. Before coming to Oklahoma, she was an Associate Professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina, where she was also a Peter and Bonnie McCausland Faculty Fellow in the College of Arts and Sciences. Prior to her tenure at Carolina, she was a Collegiate Assistant Professor the Humanities at the University of Chicago, and a junior fellow of the Society for the Liberal Arts. She earned her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh and her B.A. in philosophy and medieval studies (with a classics minor) at Indiana University-Bloomington. In 2015, she was awarded a multi-million dollar grant from the John Templeton Foundation, titled “Virtue, Happiness, and the Meaning of Life.” She has published widely on virtue and moral psychology, and she has edited three academic volumes on virtue and human action: Self Transcendence and Virtue: Perspectives from Philosophy, Psychology, and Theology; Practical Truth; and Practical Wisdom (OUP, forthcoming 2025). Her writing has been featured in Breaking Ground, First Things, Image, Law and Liberty, The NewYork Times, The Point, USA Today, and the Wall Street Journal.  She lives with her husband and six children in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Keywords: Art, Aesthetic Cognitivism, Flannery O’Connor, Fiction, Imagination, Literary Form, Parker’s Back, Practical Truth, Truth, Virtue

Fr. Brad Elliott argues that human beings are naturally social and are meant to flourish through the distinct but related societies of family, polity, and Church, with the Church uniquely ordering people to grace and the common good.

This lecture was given on November 1st, 2025, at St. Albert's Priory.

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

About the Speaker:

Fr. Brad Elliott was raised in Dayton Ohio and studied Jazz percussion at the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music. After being raised as a Missouri Synod Lutheran he entered the Catholic Church in 2002.

After moving to California, Fr. Brad became an active, performing musician, with a reputation as a highly sought after drummer on the international scene. Working in Los Angeles, CA, he performed and recorded various styles of modern music from Rock to jazz and big band. During his time in Los Angeles he performed and toured extensively with artists such as Annie Stela and Brie Larson.

After ten years as a professional drum set player and feeling a call to commit himself entirely to Jesus Christ, Fr. Brad chose to leave the music industry and become a Dominican friar within Western Dominican Province. After completing theological studies, he was ordained to the priesthood of Jesus Christ on June, 22nd 2018 at St. Dominic’s Church in San Francisco, CA.

In 2014 Fr. Brad received an MA in philosophy from the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley CA. In 2021 he received a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC. In 2025 he completed a Doctorate in Sacred Theology at the Catholic University of America in Washington DC focusing on the role of human craft and participatory governance in the social doctrine of the Church. He is currently a professor of Moral Theology at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, California. He authored the book The Shape of the Artistic Mind published by Pontifex University Press in 2023.

Keywords: Catholic Social Teaching, Church, Common Good, Cosmopolitanism, Family, Friendship, Polity, Society, Solidarity, State