Join the Institute for Social Concerns on Friday afternoons on select home football weekends for MVP Fridays: lectures by national leaders, journalists, and writers on questions of meaning, values, and purpose. Reception and book signing to follow! For the weekend of the NC State game, we welcome Elizabeth Oldfield, author of Fully Alive. Introduction by Paul Blaschko, director, Sheedy Family Program in Economy, Enterprise, and Society; assistant teaching professor of philosophy. Co-sponsored by the Department of Theology and the Nanovic Institute for European Studies.Elizabeth Oldfield is the author of Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times, exploring how we can build spiritual core strength for an unstable age. She is also the host of The Sacred podcast, interviewing those who shape our common life about their deepest values. She is an experienced broadcaster, writer and lecturer on themes related to public ethics, spirituality, wisdom and our common life, including on the BBC and in The Times, FT, The Economist, Prospect, and UnHerd, among others. For ten years she was director of Theos, the UK’s leading religion and society think tank, building a healthy and human team culture alongside a commitment to excellence. She is the chair of the board of directors of Larger Us, an organization working to help change-makers bridge divides rather than deepening them.

Saturdays with the Saints has established itself as a popular Notre Dame football pregame ritual that combines the University’s rich traditions of Catholic faith and spirited game days. In this lecture, Cyril O’Regan, the Catherine F. Huisking Professor of Theology, will present on "To Remind of the God Who is With Us: Newman on the Sacred Heart." The lectures take place in the Andrews Auditorium, located on the lower level of Geddes Hall, adjacent to the Hesburgh Library. The talks are free and open to the public. Attendees are encouraged to arrive early as the events tend to fill to capacity.Originally published at mcgrath.nd.edu.

In the Papal Bull for the Jubilee Year of Hope, Spes non Confundit, Pope Francis urged Christian believers to unite in opposition to the death penalty, which is “a provision at odds with the Christian faith and one that eliminates all hope of forgiveness and rehabilitation” (SC, 10). This fall’s "Conversations That Matter" series explores the state of the death penalty in the United States, in light of the Church's teaching on the intrinsic dignity of human life, and highlights stories of hope, restoration, and reconciliation from death row. Featured PanelistsHerman Lindsey, Witness to InnocenceEmmjolee Mendoza Waters, Catholic Mobilizing Network The Most Reverend William A. Wack, C.S.C., Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee. Learn more and register for this webinar.  Originally published at mcgrath.nd.edu.

Learning Beyond the Classics: Voicing Intergenerational Trauma in Postwar Korea and Japan through Contemporary Cinema Directed by Hirokazu Kore-edaWith Lily Franky, Sakura Ando, Mayu Matsuoka Rated R, 121 minutesIn Japanese with English subtitles Winner of the Palme d'Or at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival and nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar, Hirokazu Kore-eda's film full of contemplation and compassion furthers his career's comparisons to Yasujiro Ozu. On the margins of Tokyo, a dysfunctional band of outsiders are united by fierce loyalty, a penchant for petty theft and playful grifting. When the young son is arrested, secrets are exposed that upend their tenuous, below-the-radar existence and test their quietly radical belief that it is love—not blood—that defines a family. GET TICKETS *Free for ND, SMC, HC, and IUSB students. **Co-presented by the David A. Heskin and Marilou Brill Endowment for Excellence, Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, Franco Family Institute for Liberal Arts and the Public Good, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Navari Family Center for Digital Scholarship/Hesburgh Libraries.

Get a one-hour sampling of the power of a Notre Dame liberal arts education with the College of Arts & Letters' Crash Course series on home football Fridays! Each event features an A&L professor leading a class session pulled directly from some of the most popular and riveting courses on campus."Space Ethics" with David Clairmont (Theology) and Heather Foucault-Camm (McGrath Institute for Church Life)  The human journey into space has captivated the imagination but has also raised significant ethical issues. As the human presence in space for research, recreation, commerce, and possible future habitation draws closer, the urgency of addressing the ethical issues surrounding the human presence in space has also increased. In this session, attendees will get a sense of how this course considers the theological and cultural understandings of the origin and meaning of the cosmos, reviews the various ways that human beings have approached their presence in space, and contemplates the ethical issues associated with space commerce.  Alumni, friends, prospective students and their parents, and anyone else on campus are welcome.   Visit Crash Course for a complete listing of courses this season.Originally published at al.nd.edu.

Saturdays with the Saints has established itself as a popular Notre Dame football pregame ritual that combines the University’s rich traditions of Catholic faith and spirited game days. In this lecture, Michael Baxter, associate professor of the practice, McGrath Institute for Church Life, will present on "Julia Greeley of Denver: A Black Woman, A White Angel, and a Red Wagon for the Works of Mercy on Wheels." The lectures take place in the Andrews Auditorium, located on the lower level of Geddes Hall, adjacent to the Hesburgh Library. The talks are free and open to the public. Attendees are encouraged to arrive early as the events tend to fill to capacity.Originally published at mcgrath.nd.edu.