News

Movie Night!

Come see The Prince of Egypt on the big screen in Damen Cinema!! Thursday, November 13th, 4-6pm.

Undergraduate Religious Studies Conference at Knox College!

LUC Theology Undergraduates presented (award winning!) research at the Undergraduate Religious Studies Conference at Knox College on October 25. Munya Noman, Audrey Hogan, Jarilo Petrovic, Ana Rosaslanda, and Faith Mercer all gave well-received papers. Two of our students' papers won top prizes: first place, Audrey Hogan, "'He Who Saw the Deep': Self-Reference in Gilgamesh as Contention with History," and third place, Munya Noman, "Augustine's Paradox in Describing Joy." Congratulations, all!

Halloween Coffee Hour

Our coffee hours just keep getting better! For Halloween we dressed up, played a guessing game, and as usual, had too much caffeine. Come join us on Friday mornings at 10am in Crown Center 300! Bring your friends!

Our Alumni Event was a Success!

Dr. Mara Brecht gave a talk called, "The History of Mundelein at Loyola and the Future of Catholic Theological Education" in the Palm Court on Saturday October 18th. The event was right in the middle of alumni weekend so our guests had the chance to participate in the talk and gather afterwards in the Alumni Beer Garden. It was so wonderful to see so many people who love Loyola, Mundelein, and theology!

Alumni Coffee Hour: Peter Kobs!

We had a special coffee hour on October 17th with a visit from an alumnus: Peter Kobs! Peter is the Senior Vice President in Sales and Cybersecurity at Mastercard. He shared some wonderful insights on how his study of theology at Loyola continues to be a well of wisdom for his career.

New Club: Scholars and Skeptics!

We've got a new club up and running (officially)! This spring we had such good energy at our undergraduate coffee hours on Fridays (still happening every Friday, 10am Crown Center 300) that we decided to formalize our little group into a club we're calling "Scholars and Skeptics". The magic of coffee hour, and now our club, is its openness and informality. Come alone, bring friends, come every week or just once, no matter your major or minor, we want to hang out with you!! Join the club to get email updates about events even as a non-major or minor by contacting Katie Wojda at cwojda@luc.edu OR just show up on Friday!

Call for Papers!

The Religious Studies program at Knox College and the Knight Fund for Religion and Culture invite proposals for participation in our second Undergraduate Religious Studies Conference, “Religions In/and/Out/of Time” to be held Friday, October 24th and Saturday, October 25th, 2025 at Knox College in Galesburg, IL. Proposals must be submitted by October 3rd! For more information, please visit the conference website (https://www.knox.edu/academics/research-and-creative-work/undergraduate-religious-studiesconference-2025) or you can reach out to Dr. Stewart Lester or Dr. Lauren O'Connell.

Spring Courses Event!!

Come on down to Life Science Building Atrium room 142 for FREE PIZZA and a sneak peak at what the Theology Department is offering for spring semester! We've got some great classes coming up, come meet your future professors and get your dream theology class locked in and ready for registration!

Alumni Event Coming Up!

Join us for a reunion during alumni weekend, featuring a presentation by Dr. Mara Brecht! "The History of Mundelein at Loyola and the Future of Catholic Theological Education" Saturday, October 18th, 3-4pm Lakeshore Campus Palm Court, Mundelein

PhD Graduates!

We're so proud of our PhD students. They did it! Congratulations to Dr. Deogratias Mbonyumugenzi, Dr. Eric Zito, Dr. Megan Wines, Dr. Zac Haney, and Dr. John Loving!

Get ready for more coffee!

The Theology Department will continue hosting our Friday coffee hours this semester! Come join us for the very first, Friday, August 29th. 10:15am, Crown Center 300.

Remembering Dr. David Tracy

Dr. David Tracy--a teacher, mentor, and friend to a number of theology department faculty members—passed away on April 29th. Tracy received an honorary degree in Humane Letters from Loyola University Chicago in 2011, and is known as one of the most prominent Catholic Theologians of the past 50 years. He will be dearly missed.

Dr. Mark Lester Winner of the 2025 Lautenschlaeger Award for Theological Promise

The “Manfred Lautenschlaeger Award for Theological Promise” annually honors 10 young scholars from all over the world for outstanding dissertations or the first post-doctoral work in the thematic complex “God and Spirituality (broadly understood)”. Dr. Mark Lester was selected as one of those this year, for his work, "Deuteronomy and the Material Transmission of Tradition". Update: Dr. Lester recently went to Germany to be honored in a festive ceremony in the Old Auditorium of Heidelberg University on May 10th, 2025. The award ceremony was followed by a colloquium with the award winners at the International Science Forum Heidelberg (IWH), where they present their next research projects and discuss them with some evaluators and members of the FIIT.

2025 Sujack Master Researchers Award: Tracy Pintchman

Congratulations to Dr. Tracy Pintchman for receiving a 2025 Sujack Master Researcher award for her groundbreaking research on Hinduism and diaspora religious traditions! In 2024, she published Goddess Beyond Boundaries: Worshipping the Eternal Mother at a North American Hindu Temple with Oxford University Press, a milestone achievement reflecting two decades of ethnographic research. Beyond this monograph, Dr. Pintchman further enriched the field by contributing a chapter to A Cultural History of Hinduism and guest-editing a special issue of the International Journal of Hindu Studies.

"Does God Exist?" Debate!

The Debate on the Existence of God was electric! Our people showed up and showed out. The pizza was great, the debate was better. Dr. Molly Greening moderated like a pro, while Faith Mercer and Jack Jones, along with their teammates Dr. Aana Vigen and Dr. Colby Dickinson, presented some fiery, heartfelt arguments. And in the end…who won? As usual: curiosity and love. Thanks to everyone who came and participated! AND the event was covered by Loyola's Student paper, the Loyola Phoenix! Click the link for the article.

The Pleasures of Pseudepigraphy Conference

How should we understand fakes and forgeries, and what happens when they find their way into scripture? Beginning with a graduate student symposium (LUC and Notre Dame), the conference will welcome scholars of Ancient Mediterranean, Jewish, and Christian literature from Loyola and around the country to analyze fictional letters. Registration is free! March 30-31st, IC 4th Floor

Mary McAleese, President of Ireland from 1997 - 2011, to speak on the 1998 Good Friday Agreement

Dr. Mary McAleese, President of Ireland from 1997 to 2011, will speak at Loyola University Chicago on Friday, February 16, at 5:00 pm in Jo Ann Rooney Hall in the Mundelein Center on The 1998 Good Friday Agreement - the agreement between the political parties in Northern Ireland and the British and Irish Governments.

Lecture

Defining the Extraterritorial: Habermas and Ricoeur on Religion and Reason

Maureen Junker-Kenny of Trinity College Dublin will give the Fall 2023 Richard A. McCormick SJ Chair of Catholic Theology on Thursday, October 26, in Coffey Hall - McCormick Lounge from 4:00 - 5:30 pm. The title of her lecture is "Defining the Extraterritorial: Habermas and Ricoeur on Religion and Reason."