Colleagues from across the University of Toronto and beyond reflect on the relationships among art, justice, theology, and the sacred.
This course will be delivered in a hybrid format (in-person at Regis College and online via Zoom). Online participants will receive a Zoom conferencing link before the course begins.
Presenters and Topics
Timothy Schmalz is a Canadian sculptor based out of St. Jacobs, Ontario, Canada. He focuses on religious figures and has other public sculptures, including Angels Unawares recently installed in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City. He is best known for his Homeless Jesus, first installed at Regis College.
September 27 – Sean Mulrooney, Visio Divina in the 21st Century.
Sean Mulrooney, Ph.D is a Sessional Lecturer at Regis College and teaches in the areas of philosophy and art appreciation.
October 4 – Walter Deller, A Splendid Fragment: J.S. Bach’s opening Chorus for BWV 50, Cantata for the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels.
Walter Deller is Assistant Professor and Director of Field Education in the Trinity College Faculty of Divinity. He spent many years as a church musician.
October 11 – Lesley Higgins, But Where Does Hopkins Take Us?
Lesley Higgins is Professor of English at York University. She has edited the essays, diaries, and “Dublin Notebook” of Gerard Manley Hopkins, the Victorian poet and Jesuit. She studies the personal, aesthetic, cultural, and theological “conditions” that inform Hopkins’s writings.
October 18 – Gilles Mongeau, S.J., Recovering the Body as Sacrament: Aquinas at the Roots of Modern Dance.
Gilles Mongeau SJ is Socius (Assistant Provincial) of the Jesuits of Canada and Associate Professor of Systematic Theology. Gilles explores the theology and spirituality of the beautiful in modern art and architecture.
October 25 – James Bird, Language and Shape in the Dene Language (tentative).
James K. Bird is pursuing doctoral studies in architecture at the University of Toronto and is a member of the Dënesųłiné Nation. James has received the Prideaux Award for Science and Architecture, the University College Merit Award, the Gordon Cressy Award, the Dr. Lillian McGregor Indigenous Award for Excellence, the President’s Award, and the Irving Gross Prize for thesis work and has been made a Clarkson Laureate.
November 1 – Katharine Lochnan, The Sublime, The Beautiful and the Industrial Revolution: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Pollution.
Katharine Lochnan, Ph.D., M.T.S. is a Sessional Lecturer at Regis College and Senior Curator Emeritus, Art Gallery of Ontario. Katharine explores historical intersections between theology, spirituality, and the arts.
November 8 – John Dadosky, Bringing Beauty Back into Art.
John Dadosky is Professor of Theology and Philosophy at the Regis St. Michael’s Faculty of Theology.
November 15 – Gordon Rixon, S.J., Agency, Providence, and Beauty: Makoto Fujimura’s Nihonga Slow Art.
Gordon Rixon, S.J. is President of Regis College and Associate Professor of Systematic Theology at the Regis St. Michael’s Faculty of Theology. His work cultivates spiritual agency and its contribution to journeys in social reconciliation through art appreciation and theological reflection.
