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Kresta in the Afternoon – July 20, 2021 – Hour 2

Why should we study the classics? We talk with Robert Kirkendall, and Fr. David Meconi looks at the first 500 years of Christ’s life.


Why Study the Classics?

Will classic literature be the next victim of the “Woke Culture” mob? Last year the University of Lancester proposed that authors prior to the year 1500 be dropped from the English curriculum in favor of “a selection of modules on race, ethnicity, sexuality and diversity” and a “decolonized curriculum.” What makes the Classics worth studying? Robert Kirkendall joins us.

Links for this Segment

“Spokesmen and Prophets of the Human Family:” St. John Henry Newman’s Defense

He Wants to Save Classics From Whiteness. Can the Field Survive?

What Makes the Classics Worth Studying

Cancelling the Classics? The Woke Crowd Comes for Homer’s “Odyssey”

Canceling the classics

Robert Kirkendall is an instructor in the Humanities at St Thomas More Academy in Raleigh, NC. He is inspired by a notion theologians call the “Divine Pedagogy,” the way God educates mankind throughout Salvation History. Visit stmacademy.org.

The First 500 (?) Years of Christ’s Life

We’ll be looking with Fr. David Meconi at the first 500 Years of Christ’s Life. But wait – didn’t Jesus’ time on earth only last 33 years? Well, the early Christians understood the Church not as a set of teachings but as an extension of Christ Himself. Fr Meconi has more.

Father David Meconi, S.J., is the author most recently of Christ Unfurled: The First 500 Years of Jesus’ Life. He holds a Doctorate in Philosophy from Oxford University, England and the Pontifical Licentiate in Greek and Latin Patristic Theology from University of Innsbruck, Austria. He currently teaches as Assistant Professor of Patristic Studies at Saint Louis University. He is the editor of Homiletic and Pastoral Review, and his articles have appeared in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Augustinian Studies, International Philosophical Quarterly, and New Oxford Review.
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