"How to Think Like a Westerner" - Lecture Series Wrap-Up

The first lecture series hosted by the St Thomas More Trust wrapped up last week. It was an ambitious topic – “How to Think Like A Westerner” – an historical survey of the influence of philosophy and religion, and especially the work of some key scholars, on the shaping of today’s culture.

Lecture 1: Religion is the Key to Culture

We started with an overview from Stephen Woodnutt: “Religion is the key to culture,” which included insights from Pope St John Paul II’s encyclical Faith and Reason. Discussion focused on the effect on modern culture of recent philosophical systems which attempted to sever the link between faith and reason.

Lecture 2: Plato

Lecture 2 was from Dr Robert Loretz on Plato. We looked at what it means to start thinking philosophically, to “wake up” to the real world, through Plato’s Analogy of the Cave, and we explored the theme of love and friendship with readings from Lysis and Symposium.

Lecture 3: Augustine

Lecture 3 was from Stephen Woodnutt on Augustine, considering both his historical situation living through the decline of the Roman Empire, and his thought about the progression of history as a linear narrative guided by God’s providence. Our readings were brief excerpts from Confessions and City of God.

Lecture 4: Newman

Lecture 4 was from Stephen and focused on St John Henry Newman as he reflected on the legacy of Enlightenment thinking, and on how people come to believe in truths that go beyond what can be demonstrated logically or scientifically. Our reading here was from his An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent. Also relevant to our project with the St Thomas More Trust was Newman’s take on what a good educational framework should look like.

Lecture 5: Aristotle

After a break for the school holidays, we returned with Lecture 5 from Dr Loretz on Aristotle. We learned about Aristotle’s love of wisdom, his analysis of things in terms of their four causes, and some of his thinking on virtue, friendship, and happiness. Our reading was from his Nicomachean Ethics.

Lecture 6: Aquinas

In Lecture 6 from Dr Loretz, we were treated to a passionate talk about St Thomas Aquinas and how his careful manner of philosophical enquiry can shed light on almost anything, especially mysteries of the Faith. Our readings came from John Paul II’s Faith and Reason where St Thomas was presented as a model of how to do theology; and from part of St Thomas’s analysis of the relationship between friendship and charity in the Summa Theologica.

Lecture 7: Dawson

Lecture 7 was from Stephen and introduced us to Christopher Dawson, a 20^th century Catholic historian. Stephen gave a quick history of early to medieval Western Europe to provide context, then shared Dawson’s summary of the influence of Catholic monasticism on the preservation of classical learning and the shaping of Western culture. This was from Dawson’s Religion and the Rise of Western Culture.

Lecture 8: Return to Aquinas

Our final lecture was from Dr Loretz and was a return to Aquinas, looking at his view of the relationship between the passions, the virtues, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. We ended, appropriately enough, on the virtue of Hope, and how that relates to our own personal destiny: we are made for union with God.

Conclusion

We hope that participants in the lecture series have come away with a deeper appreciation of the depth of our philosophical heritage and a sense of where we have come from as a culture, and perhaps where we are headed personally as thinking and loving creatures made in the image of God. We might also have an awareness that we have just scratched the surface! As a Trust, we have been encouraged by the participation and feedback from those who joined us, and are motivated to provide a similar forum going forward. This won’t be our last lecture series!