Over the past year, CPN has worked with the Laudato Si' Research Institute (LSRI), Campion Hall, University of Oxford on a series of consultations on the Catholic Church and mining, including a conference in Bogotá, Colombia in June 2025. That process will result in the upcoming publication of the report "Catholic Approaches to Mining: A Framework for Reflection, Planning, and Action." The report is a collaboration between CPN, LSRI, Notre Dame's Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, part of the Keough School of Global Affairs, the Holy See Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, and Caritas Internationalis. A virtual launch event will be held October 21, at 3:00 pm CEST / 1:00 pm GMT / 9:00 am EDT. The panel will feature speakers from the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, the Caritas International Federation, CPN, LSRI, and others. The event will be in English, but will include simultaneous translation in Spanish and French. The event will include:Cardinal Michael Czerny, SJ, Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human DevelopmentElena Sofia Fanciulli, Caritas InternationalisJing Rey Henderson, Caritas PhilippinesLiliana Zamudio Vaquiro, Caritas ColombiaRev. Rigobert Minani, SJ, Centre d'Etudes pour l'Action Sociale (DRC) Séverine Deneulin, Laudato Si' Research Institute, Campion Hall, University of OxfordCaesar A. Montevecchio (moderator), Catholic Peacebuilding Network, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, Keough School of Global Affairs, University of Notre DameRegistration Required Originally published at cpn.nd.edu.

This year’s Dialogues on Nonviolence, Religion, and Peace, one of the Kroc Institute’s annual signature events, features John Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker from the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology. Their talk -- "Integral Ecology for a Flourishing Earth Community" --  will highlight the inspiration of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Thomas Berry, linking it to the integral ecology of Pope Francis’ encyclical, Laudato si'. Drawing on Teilhard’s evolutionary spirituality and Berry’s insight, Grim and Tucker will describe how there can be no lasting peace without peace with the Earth. The Dialogues on Nonviolence, Religion, and Peace, which began in 1999, were established through a gift to the Kroc Institute from Mrs. Anne Marie Yoder and her family. Each year, the Kroc Institute invites a leading thinker, writer, scholar, and/or peace advocate to deliver a lecture related to nonviolence, religion, and peace. Following the lecture, audience members join in informal dialogue and discussion with the speaker and with each other. Speakers/Panelists:John Grim, Yale Forum on Religion and EcologyMary Evelyn Tucker, Yale Forum on Religion and EcologyOriginally published at kroc.nd.edu.

Christopher J. Fettweis is a professor of political science at Tulane University. His most recent book is The Pursuit of Dominance: 2000 Years of Superpower Grand Strategy (Oxford UP, 2022).   Download the event flyer. Join us via Zoom. Originally published at ondisc.nd.edu.

"The Vanquished, The Office for the Dead," by Vasily Vereshchagin (1842-1904). Tretyakov Gallery. Image from artlib.ru via Wikimedia Commons.Save the date for the fifth annual Mathews Byzantine Lecture with Prof. Zachary Chitwood of The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Prof. Chitwood will be speaking on "The Invention of Prayer for the Dead in the Byzantine Tradition." About the Talk Far from being a primitive Christian practice, prayer for the dead and, just as importantly, the belief that such prayer could better the postmortal fate of the deceased, was not uncontested, and attracted critique as early as Late Antiquity. This story of the development of the commemoration of the dead in Byzantium is one full of surprising twists and turns. Studying the development of commemorative prayer in Byzantium not only allows us to glimpse a truly medieval innovation, it also offers a way of examining Byzantine history via a particular concept and its manifold interactions with politics, religion, law and culture, very much in the sense of a Maussian “total social phenomenon.” About the Speaker Zachary Chitwood is professor of Byzantine studies at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. His research interests include Roman and Byzantine law, the history of monasticism (especially Mount Athos) and the use of digital humanities (databases and AI-assisted text recognition). He is editor of the journals Byzantinische Zeitschrift and Endowment Studies. About the Series The Mathews Byzantine Lectures, begun in the 2021–22 academic year, bring a distinguished scholar of Byzantine studies to campus each year to deliver a talk, supported by the Rev. Constantine Mathews Endowment for Excellence in Byzantine Christianity in the Medieval Institute. Originally published at medieval.nd.edu.

Global experience of past 25 years shows that while mass movements succeed in toppling dictators, most countries do not succeed in establishing a democratic system. The vexing question is will Bangladesh, which has embarked on a democratic journey after experiencing sixteen years of Sheikh Hasina’s personalistic autocracy, succeed? Hasina was toppled in a popular uprising in July–August 2024 and fled the country. The country experienced unprecedented atrocities perpetrated by the members of the law enforcement agencies and the activists of the ruling Bangladesh Awami League in the wake of the movement. More than 1,400 people were killed and thousands have been injured. The country is currently being governed by an interim government, and an election is scheduled for February 2026. This presentation examines the challenges for the country drawing on the lessons of democratic transition and the country’s political dynamics involving a wide array of political forces and weak institutions.  Ali Riaz is a distinguished professor of political science at Illinois State University, a non-resident fellow of the Atlantic Council and the president of the American Institute of Bangladesh Studies (AIBS). He has served as the head of the Constitution Reform Commission in Bangladesh appointed by the Bangladesh’s interim government and is currently serving as the vice-chair of the National Consensus Commission. His recent publications include Charade: Bangladesh’s 2024 Election (2024), and Pathways of Autocratization: The Tumultuous Journey of Bangladeshi Politics (2023). He also co-authored How Autocrats Rise: Sequences of Democratic Backsliding (2023). Presented by the Liu Institute's South Asia Working Group and cosponsored with the McKenna Center for Human Development and Global Business, the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, and the Kellogg Institute for International Studies.Lunch Provided - Please Bring Beverages In support of the Liu Institute’s growing commitment to sustainability, we will no longer be offering drinks at our public lectures and panels. We encourage audience members to bring their water bottles or to drink from nearby water fountains.  Originally published at asia.nd.edu.

Please join the Keough-Naughton Institute for Irish Studies and its Clingen Center for the Study of Modern Ireland for a lecture and public conversation with the Honorable Geraldine Byrne Nason, Ambassador of Ireland to the United States. This event will be the inaugural lecture that will launch the Keough-Naughton Institute's annual Jim Kelly Diplomacy Speaker Series.  On Wednesday, October 29, Ambassador Byrne Nason will deliver a public lecture that addresses Ireland’s foreign policy, Ireland-US relations and Ireland’s plans for marking the Irish dimensions of the 250th anniversary of foundation of the US. She will also be joined in conversation with the Honorable Claire Cronin, former U.S. Ambassador to Ireland. A reception will follow the event in the McKenna Hall auditorium gallery. About Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason Ambassador Geraldine Byrne Nason assumed her role as Ireland’s 19th Ambassador to the United States in August 2022. Geraldine was Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Ireland to the United Nations in New York (2017–22). Previously, she served as Ambassador to France (2014–17), Second Secretary General in the Department of the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) (2011–14), Ambassador and Ireland’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the EU (2005–11)), and Director of the National Forum on Europe (2004–05). During her career, Ambassador Byrne Nason has served in Brussels, New York, Paris, Vienna and Helsinki. As Second Secretary-General in the Department of the Taoiseach from 2011–14, she was the highest ranking female public servant in Ireland. During that period, she also was Secretary General of Ireland’s Economic Management Council. On her arrival in New York, Ambassador Byrne Nason led Ireland’s successful campaign for a seat on the United Nations Security Council, and led the New York Security Council team for the 2021–22 term. Geraldine was Chair of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) for 2018 and 2019. She has also co-chaired high-level political negotiations on the hundredth anniversary of the birth of Nelson Mandela and on the ‘Samoa pathway’ for Small Island Developing States. A native of County Louth, in 2020 Ambassador Byrne Nason was awarded the Freedom of Drogheda, the town’s highest honour and was the third woman to receive the award of its 35 recipients. In 2014, Geraldine was elected a Member of the Royal Irish Academy, Ireland’s highest academic honour. Ambassador Byrne Nason holds an honorary doctorate of Law from Maynooth University as well as master’s and bachelor’s degrees in literature from Saint Patrick’s College in Maynooth (NUIM). Ambassador Byrne Nason is married and has one son. About the Jim Kelly Diplomacy Speaker Series Named in memory of Ireland’s former deputy permanent representative to the UN and ambassador to Canada, the Speaker Series will bring to Notre Dame members of the diplomatic corps of Ireland who have served in ambassadorial roles around the world. The late Ambassador Jim Kelly was serving as Ireland’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations on his untimely death in March 2022. Among other roles he had served as Ireland’s Ambassador to Canada from 2016 to 2020. Read more here: Statement by Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney on the passing of Ambassador Jim Kelly.    Originally published at irishstudies.nd.edu.