Beatrice Institute Podcast

“Language and values and concepts come packaged together, don't they?” asks Peter Ramey, recent translator of The Word-Hoard Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Indeed, his opus reflects just this and resolves the distance between culture and language in a uniquely faithful yet readable translation.  Join Peter and Ryan as they delve into Beowulf, asking: What is the value of a word? Who was Beowulf? Is Beowulf pre-Christian, Christian by overlay, Christian by accident, or Christian in essence?  

The modern debate on gender elucidates some apparent contradictions: Is gender essential, something we know within us? Or is gender a social construct? Is sex real or not? Does Christianity affirm or deny the body? Abigail Favale, Professor of the Practice at Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute for Church Life, has traced the evolutions of sex, gender, and feminism from Genesis to Tumblr. Join in this episode to hear Grant and Abigail discuss the gender paradigm, capitalism, fertility, and the question “What is a woman, essentially?”  

AI gives us information. It furnishes facts. It prompts us with news headlines. But could AI also answer our religious questions?  When Shanen Boettcher paused his tech career and completed a master's degree in world religions, he began to ask himself this question. Recently, he conducted a study to put it to the test. In this episode, Shanen and Gretchen discuss his findings and explore the previously widely-ignored intersection of technology and faith. They ask: Do people feel they have more privacy speaking about spirituality with AI? What kind of authority do AI-generated answers evoke? How will the religious realm, a realm of mystery and prayer, be incorporated into the factual, statistical world of technology?

Health care workers are essential yet underappreciated. Janette Dill, Associate Professor in the Division of Health Policy & Management at the University of Minnesota, is researching why. Her work studies racial and gender disparities, the rewards for professional certification, and the realities of unionization in the health care workforce. Join Janette and Grant as they ask: Why is social mobility difficult in direct care positions? What unique challenges do men, women, and minorities face in this field? How have the constitution and appreciation of working-class jobs changed since the 1970s? How do we achieve justice in the health care sector?

How do we differentiate between Christian action and the action of the Church? Anne Carpenter and the Genealogy and Tradition Reading Group delve into the relationship of the Church and its people in Part Two of their interview with Anne Carpenter, author of “Nothing Gained is Eternal.” Anne offers a Catholic theology of tradition that is critical yet hopeful. Continue the conversation with Anne, Ryan and the Reading Group as they discuss the Catholic imagination, poetry and questions such as: How do we adopt tradition without being duped by misinterpretation? How do we be Church for the present world?  

“What is history?” is the opening query of Anne Carpenter’s new book, Nothing Gained is Eternal: A Theology of Tradition. Anne’s answer: history is what humans do. The following chapters consider the consequences of this definition: that tradition must be renewed, not just preserved, and sins, from racism to colonialism, must be dealt with. In this episode, the Genealogy and Tradition reading group join in conversation with Anne to discuss her recent work. In this question-and-answer session, the group asks Anne: How would you rebuild Notre Dame Cathedral? Are we justified in putting humans at the center of history? and, most importantly, How can we best love tradition, and can we love it too much?  

Plato said that craft, or techne, “answers to a genuine human need and solves it.” Does our abstract, postindustrial work fulfill this criteria? Dr. Jeffrey Hanson, Anglican priest and senior philosopher at Harvard’s Human Flourishing Program, has dealt with these questions in his most recent book, Philosophies of Work in the Platonic Tradition: A History of Labor in Human Flourishing.  In this episode, Jeffrey and Grant weigh the Platonic and postmodern ideas of work, asking: How do we find meaning in “meaningless” work? What is the proper place of work among the other values in our life? And, is work directed toward changing reality, or changing ourselves?  

What enables a being to create? Generative AI appears to approach human capabilities; is it only a matter of time until it surpasses them? Joanna Ng, formerly the head of research and the director of the Center for Advanced Studies at IBM Canada, knows these questions from the inside. Joanna is not only a patented inventor and author, but a leader in the integration of Christianity and technology. In this episode, she and Gretchen ask: Why is it important to distinguish between AI and ASI? What does being a Christian 2.0 mean? What is Church? And, who is caring for the Christians in tech?   

The Genealogies of Modernity project is organizing a reading group around Thomas Pfau’s new book, Incomprehensible Certainty: Metaphysics and Hermeneutics of the Image. By way of advertisement, we are re-running this episode with art historian and theorist Matthew Milliner, where he talks about the book and the wider context of image theory. Milliner also recently published a review of Incomprehensible Certainty in “The Hedgehog Review.” His new book on Our Lady of Perpetual Help, discussed in the episode, is now available. If this episode and that review entice you, join the reading group! It will begin meeting Thursday, February 23, 7-8:30 pm, in person in Pittsburgh as well as on Zoom, and it will run through much of the summer. If you are interested, send an email to admin@beatriceinstitute.org and we’ll put you in touch with the group organizers and get you on the mailing list. For now, please enjoy Matthew and Ryan’s discussion on how the past can erupt into the present; why cultivating these temporal possibilities must be an ecumenical project; the way images reveal timeless truths that underlie our visible surroundings; and how the ideas of thinkers like Chesterton can converse with, and be informed by, ancient Indigenous mythology.

Do men need equal opportunity? Dr. Richard Reeves answers with an emphatic “yes.” His work as senior fellow at the Brookings Institute and director of the Future of the Middle Class Initiative has encouraged him to author the book Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It.  In this conversation, Grant and Dr. Reeves respond to the fact that men are underrepresented in higher education and struggling in the professional world, asking: What does affirmative action for men look like? How does child education harm or empower boys, and is the academic world donning a feminine identity? Should we celebrate “toxic” masculinity? Modernity calls for a new contract between men and women. What is the fate of the post-industrial man?