THE STENO LECTURES: The Society of Catholic Scientists has teamed up with the McGrath Institute for Church Life (MICL) at the University of Nore Dame to present a series of zoom lectures named in honor of Blessed Nicolas Steno, whose work inaugurated the science of geology.  More about the Steno Lectures can be found HERE.

The October 20 and Nov 14 Steno Lectures were a great success, with hundreds of people watching live and very lively and stimulating Q&A sessions.  If you missed those talks, you are in luck, because they can now be watched (including the Q&A sessions) on youtube.  (See below.)

The October 20 talk (viewable HERE) was “Christ the True Origin of Humanity“, given by SCS Board member Christopher Baglow, a theologian at Univ. of Notre Dame, Director of the Science and Religion Initiative of MICL, and author of the first-ever textbook on science and religion for Catholic schools, Faith, Science and Reason: Theology on the Cutting Edge (2nd edition, 2019).  His talk is a rich theological reflection on the origin of the human race in the light of Christ, who is both our Creator and the one in whose image we are created. 

The Nov 14 talks (viewable HERE) were on “Extraterrestrials: the Science and the Theology”.  The talk on the science of extraterrestrial life was given by SCS Vice President Jonathan Lunine of Cornell University, author of the books Astrobiology: A Multidisciplinary Approach (2004) and Earth: Evolution of a Habitable World  (2013).  The talk on the theology of extraterrestrial lfe was given by Chris Baglow. 

The next Steno Lecture “The Impact of Asteroids” will be given on February 24 by Br. Guy Consolmagno, S.J., astronomer, Director of the Vatican Observatory, and author of the books God’s Mechanics: How Scientists and Engineers Make Sense of Religion (2009), Brother Astronomer: Adventures of a Vatican Astronomer (2001), and, most recently, Would You Baptize an Extraterrestrial? and Other Questions from the Astronomers’ In-Box at the Vatican Observatory  (2018).  Information about and Registration for the Feb 24 talk (which is free) is HERE.

Information about the Feb 24 Steno Lecture: 

“The Impact of Asteroids”
As the human race increasingly covers planet Earth, we are providing an ever-growing target for the regular impacts of near-Earth objects. What are the odds that impactors from space will do major damage to human life on Earth? What’s the underlying science? And what are the larger implications for  our place in the universe?