Compass Speakers
Compass arranges for speakers and preachers to come to campus in order to present appropriately the Gospel in an academic environment. Speakers include:
Professor Scott Hahn - "First Comes Love: A Catholic Theology of Marriage and the Family"
Friday April 8th is the date for the long-awaited "First Comes Love: A Catholic Theology of Marriage and the Family" lecture by internationally renowned Catholic author and lecturer Dr. Scott Hahn of Franciscan University. Sponsored by Compass Catholic Fellowship at the University of Toronto, the talk will present Pope John Paul II's theology of the body, marriage, and the family in layman's language, and will no doubt prove to be a Catholic cultural event of the first order at our nation's premier academic institution. We believe that this lecture is especially timely given the widespread confusion regarding marriage and the family in Canadian society today and the paucity of convincing Catholic presentations to serve as a corrective to this trend. Dr. Hahn has a remarkable ability to communicate Catholic truths with breathtaking erudition and pastoral sensitivity, so we hope that as many as possible, Catholic and non, will have a chance to hear and be enriched by his words. The event is being co-sponsored by Salt and Light Media, the Knights of Columbus, the Catholic Civil Rights League, and Youth Teams of Our Lady. The lecture is free, and a question and answer session will follow.
The lecture will be Friday, April 8th, 2005 at 3 P.M. at Sorbara Auditorium, in Brennan Hall, Saint Michael's College
Fr. William Slattery, L.C. - "The Da Vinci Code: Truth or Hoax"
Vinci Code, Dan Brown’s best selling novel, purports to be more than
fiction: it claims to be based on fact and scholarly research. Brown wants
his readers to believe that he is revealing the long-concealed truth about
Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and early Christianity, a truth that he says has
been suppressed by the malevolent and conspiratorial forces of the
Catholic Church. The novel alleges that there has been throughout history
a secret group of true followers of a Gnostic Jesus and his wife, Mary
Magdalene,
the true “Holy Grail”. Almost everything most Christians and
non-Christians think they know about Jesus, according to Dan Brown, is
completely wrong, the result of Catholic propaganda designed to hide the
truth from the world.
But are The Da Vinci Code’s claims fact or just plain fiction? Is the novel
well-researched as claimed? What is the truth about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and
the early Church? Has the Catholic Church distorted the real Jesus? Why is the
novel so popular? What about the anti-Catholic, anti-Christian agenda behind the
novel?
The lecture will be Thursday, November 4th, 2004 at 7 P.M. in the Debates Room of Hart House.
Professor Janine Langan - "Cries of the Heart: God and the Mystery of Suffering"
The heartrending and seemingly inexplicable mystery of Creation made out of love but filled to the brim with evil and suffering – from Nazi death camps to local cancers - is a question that affects us all, leading so often to sadness or to wrath. Join Dr. Janine Langan, founder of the Christianity and Culture program at St. Michael’s College, who will address the tears of suffering mankind, from Job’s cry on the dungheap, to Christ’s blood on the Cross, in order to make spiritual sense of what appears to be the cruelly senseless. Dr. Langan has taught a course on the Book of Job as the all-time classic of suffering for many years at the University of Toronto, using the works of saints and artists from John of the Cross to Fyodor Dostoevsky to illuminate and enter into the mystery of Job’s great question: “Why do the innocent suffer?” A question and answer period will follow, and refreshments will be provided.Fr. Tom Rosica, C.S.B. - "The Catholic Church and the Secular Media:
Lessons from World Youth Day 2002"
From the beginning of his Pontificate, World Youth Days have been at the
heart of the New Evangelization spoken of so frequently by Pope John Paul
II. For three years the Church in Canada prepared for World Youth Day
2002. It has been the most ambitious pastoral project of the Canadian
Church and the preparation for July 2002 and the event itself have taught
us much about who we are as a Church and how we relate to the world,
especially through the media. One of the major successes of World Youth
Day in Canada was the extraordinary media coverage of the event,
throughout its preparation, the event itself, and the follow up in the
Canadian media. Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B., who served as the National
Director and Chief Executive Officer of World Youth Day 2002 will share
his experience of working with the media during World Youth Day 2002 and
speak of the messages learned and challenges to meet after World Youth Day
2002.
The lecture will be held on Tuesday, November 25th, 2003 at Hart House East
Common Room, 3:00 P.M.
Fr. Martin Hilbert, C.O. - "The Church: Midwife of Science"
Did medieval Christians think that the world was flat? Is the Galileo
case a typical example of the way that the Church treats new scientific
ideas? Is the Catholic Faith irreconcilable with scientific progress? If
one answers "yes" to any of these questions, that is the result of
nineteenth-century anti-Catholic prejudice. Pierre Duhem (1861-1916),
an eminent physicist, philosopher of science, and historian of science
argued that not only did the Church not impede the development of
science, but that orthodox Catholic theology actually made science
possible. Posterous? COMPASS invites you to listen to "The Church:
Midwife of Science" to learn the details of Duhem's historical thesis
along with some further ruminations on the subject by Fr Martin Hilbert
of the Oratory.
The lecture will be held on Wednesday, October 15th, 2003 at St.
Michael's College Carr Hall Rm 405, 4:10 P.M.