Events to study life and works
of Stanley L. Jaki

2024

Hungary (Győr) — The horizon of science
100 years from the birth of Stanley Jaki

The Religion and Science Research Group of the István Széchenyi University in Győr and the the Szent Mór Bencés Perjelség organized a commemorative conference on the 100^th anniversary of the birth of Szaniszló László Jáki.
The Acts of the conference will be published in a volume.
The conference has been held in the hall of the Czuczor Gergely Bencés High School 9022 Győr, Széchenyi tér 8.
on February 9-10, 2024
As a conclusion of the session of February 9, the pianist Gergely Bogányi gave a concert to commemorate Father Jaki.
At the end of the conference, a visit to the Pannonhalma Archabbacy was organized, including a visit to the tomb of Father Jaki and a Mass said for him at the Archabbacy.

The program of the event may be found here.
A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

A report about the conference may be found here, and here.

Gergely Bogányi before the concert to commemorate Father Stanley Jaki.

2022

USA (Seton Hall University) — Online meeting “Follow the Science with G. K. Chesterton and Father Stanley L. Jaki” — March 31, 2022

The G. K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture at Seton Hall University and Inside the Vatican, have held an online conference on the theme

“Follow the Science with G. K. Chesterton and Father Stanley L. Jaki.”

A conversation with:
Robert Moynihan, Founder and Editor of Inside the Vatican
Geir Hasnes, Chesterton’s Bibliographer and Editor of the book Chesterton in Black and White
Dermot Quinn, professor of history and editor of The Chesterton Review.

The meeting has been moderated by:
Gloria Garafulich-Grabois, Director, G. K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture.

The event has been streamed online via ZOOM, and the recording is available here.

Report

A report referring to the event can be read in the Issue n. 48 of The Chesterton Review, at pages 266-281.

About the Event

We live in an age of science. So many of our achievements in healthcare, energy, communication, and industry, may be traced to the brilliant work of men and women in laboratories. But so many of our problems, too, seem to have a scientific root. We are slaves to our gadgets. We have phones that seem smarter than us. We can prolong life at its end but destroy it at its beginning. We can blow up the world. Everywhere, we are told, the answer to our problems is to “follow the science”—even if those problems were caused by science in the first place. All of the achievements of science—even which few of us would wish to relinquish—come at a cost.

This online conversation looks at two men who thought about science in powerful and penetrating ways. The English writer G.K. Chesterton, although not a scientist, had important things to say about the natural world and natural theology. In fact, according to Father Stanley Jaki, he was a Seer of Science a man with deeper insight into the nature of scientific knowledge than many scientists themselves. Father Jaki, himself a brilliant physicist and philosopher, was also an important and insightful thinker about science, religion, and the modern world. The author of over forty books and winner of the Templeton Prize for Religion in 1987, he was among the best-known priest-scientists of the twentieth century. The conference consisted of a set of reflections on the scientific thought of both men followed by conversation and questions and answers.

About the Speakers

Robert Moynihan, Ph.D., (Medieval Studies, Yale University, 1988) is founder and editor-in-chief of Inside the Vatican magazine, now in its thirtieth year of publication. He has appeared as a Vatican analyst on many major networks and is author of several books. His 2005 book, The Spiritual Vision of Pope Benedict XVI: Let God’s Light Shine Forth, was based on more than twenty-five interviews with Cardinal Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict, over many years. His other books include Pray for Me: The Life and Spiritual Vision of Pope Francis in 2013 and Finding Viganò: In Search of the Man Whose Testimony Shook the Church and the World in 2020. His “Moynihan Letters,” with timely news and commentary, arrive in the inboxes of more than 100,000 email readers.

Dermot Quinn, Ph.D., is Professor of History at Seton Hall University and Editor of The Chesterton Review. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin and New College, Oxford, where he was awarded a doctorate in 1986. He has written extensively on Chestertonian themes, has authored three books The Irish in New Jersey: Four Centuries of American Life (Rutgers University Press, 2004) (winner, New Jersey Studies Academic Alliance, Non-fiction Book of the Year, 2005); Patronage and Piety: The Politics of English Roman Catholicism, 1850-1900 (Stanford University Press/Macmillan, 1993) and Understanding Northern Ireland (Baseline Books, Manchester, UK, 1993) and many articles and reviews in the field of British and Irish history.

Geir Hasnes is Assistant professor of Engineering Cybernetics at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. Mr. Hasnes has been working on a comprehensive bibliography of G. K. Chesterton for which he was awarded the American Chesterton Society’s Chesterton Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006. He lives in Kongsberg, Norway.

About the Sponsors

The G. K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture is located at Seton Hall University, South Orange, N.J. Founded in 1974 by Father Ian Boyd, C.S.B., its purpose is to promote the thought of G. K. Chesterton and his circle and more broadly, to explore the application of Chestertonian ideas in the contemporary world. The Institute’s work consists of conferences, lecture series, research, and writing. The Chesterton Review, founded in 1974, has been widely praised both for its scholarship and for the quality of its writing. The journal was founded by Father Ian Boyd, C.S.B., and is edited by Dr. Dermot Quinn, includes a wide range of articles not only on Chesterton himself, but on the issues close to his heart in the work of other writers and in the modern world. It has devoted special issues to C. S. Lewis, George Bernanos, Hilaire Belloc, Maurice Baring, Christopher Dawson, Cardinal Manning, the Modernist Crisis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Fantasy Literature, a Special Polish Issue, as well as recent special Croatian, Charles Dickens and Stanley L. Jaki issues. For information about the Institute or The Chesterton Review please contact chestertoninstitute@shu.edu or visit the website.

Inside the Vatican — Published six times a year, Inside the Vatican magazine provides comprehensive, independent reporting and thoughtful guest commentary on the “heart of the Church”—the Vatican. ITV’s international readership, predominantly Catholic, includes thousands of priests, religious leaders and lay people in eighty countries, and even non-Catholics and heads of state who are interested in our insightful analysis of events in the Catholic world. Our editor-in-chief, Dr. Robert Moynihan, is a veteran Vaticanist who founded the magazine nearly 30 years ago.

2021

USA (Seton Hall University) — Special Issue of The Chesterton Review dedicated to Stanley Jaki

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The Issue 3-4 of Volume XLVII (Fall-Winter 2021) of the Chesterton Review, has been devoted to Stanley Jaki. You can see the Cover of the Issue, and the Table of Contents.

This is the text of the announce of this Special Issue:

The Chesterton Review announces Special Stanley L. Jaki Issue

Thursday, December 9, 2021
By Chesterton Institute – South Orange, N.J. – December 2021

The G.K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture at Seton Hall University announces the publication of a Special Stanley L. Jaki Issue – volume 47, nos. 3 and 4, Fall/Winter 2021 – of its widely recognized journal The Chesterton Review.

Of the many descriptions that G.K. Chesterton has enjoyed over the years, one of the most intriguing is that he was a "seer of science." Chesterton was not a scientist, of course, but he had profound things to say about the way that modern scientists go about their business and about the outsized role they are sometimes allowed to play in contemporary civilization. As a critic of that exaggerated faith in science that goes by the name of 'scientism,' he knew that the best kind of science was aware of its own limitations. "The world has [not] increased in clarity and intelligibility and logical completeness," he wrote in 1930. "[It] has grown more bewildering, especially in the scientific spheres supposed to be ruled by law or explained by reason." A year later, Kurt Gödel stunned the mathematical world by saying the same thing.

It was Father Stanley Jaki who first called Chesterton a "seer of science" and so it is fitting that a special issue of The Chesterton Review be devoted to a priest and physicist who did much to promote Chesterton’s thought inside and outside the scientific community. A man who combined scintillating intellect with a certain polemical pugnacity, Jaki was awarded the Templeton Prize in 1987 "for his immense contribution to bridging the gap between science and religion"–words that could equally apply to Chesterton himself. At his death in 2009, Jaki was described by the New York Times as a "relentless scholar" with over forty books to his credit, one of them devoted to Chesterton.

The issue contains an Introduction by Dermot Quinn, an unpublished article by Jaki, along with memories of him by a former colleague, Monsignor Richard Liddy, and a former student, Dr. Bill Cheshire. Other articles include pieces by Dermot Quinn, Father Joseph Laracy, Geir Hasnes, Landon Loftin and Father Paul Haffner. As with all issues of the Review, there is also a good selection of Chesterton’s own writing, along with Book and Film Reviews, as well as many News and Comments items, quite a few of them scientific in nature as well as Letters, Photo Galleries, and an account of our work in 2021.

2019

Győr — Czuczor Gergely Bencés Gimnázium Széchenyi tér 8-9 — 10 December 2019
In the footsteps of a Templeton prize winner
Conference in remembrance of Stanley L. Jaki OSB

The program of the event may be found here.
A manifest of the event may (in Hungarian) be found here.
The Acts of the Conference (in Hungarian) may be found here.
A few images taken during the event may be found here.

São Paulo — Seminário Maria Mater Ecclesiae — 26 September 2019
Ciência e fé, é possivel una interação?

One of the talks of the day was given by Father Rafael Pascual, and had for title:
“‘Lo que Dios ha separado...’. El modelo de la relación Ciência-fé en el pensamiento del P. Stanley Jaki”.
The program of the event may be found here.
A few images taken during the event may be found here.

Roma — Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum — 4-5 April 2019
L’eredità di padre Stanley L. Jaki, a dieci anni della sua scomparsa
The legacy of Fr. Stanley L. Jaki, ten years after his death

Information about the location and the program of the commemoration may be found here.
The announcement of the event may be found here.
The detailed program of the event may be found here.

The Conference was hosted at the Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum. It was followed by a quick tour in Rome, including a Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica. Participants came from the USA, Mexico, UK, Spain, Croatia, and Italy. Jacques Vauthier (from France) was unable to be present, but his talk on “Eternal returns in Fr Jaki’s works” is available here.
A number of pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.
The book of the Acts (with essays in English, Italian and French) has been published in 2022 and is described here.
A recording of the whole event is available online:
4 April - Part 1;
4 April - Part 2;
4 April - Part 3;
4 April - Part 4;
5 April - Part 1;
5 April - Part 2.

Roma — Casa Santa Maria — Piazza della Pilotta, 1 — 15 March 2019
Celebration of the tenth anniversary of the passing of Fr. Stanley L. Jaki OSB

The Department of Catholic Studies of the Seton Hall University and the Stanley Jaki Foundation in occasion of the 10th anniversary of the death of Father Stanley L. Jaki, OSB, STD, Ph.D, Seton Hall University physics professor from 1965-2009, met in Rome for a Memorial Mass and scholarly exchange on the legacy of Father Jaki.
The announcement of the meeting may be found here.
Information about the program of the Celebration may be found here.

Father Joseph R. Laracy, who first began teaching in Catholic Studies in 2016, has been the principal celebrant of the Mass. His recent doctoral research in fundamental theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University has utilized the insights of Father Jaki.
Dr. Ines A. Murzaku, Professor of Ecclesiastical History and Director of Catholic Studies spoke about Fr. Jaki’s living legacy at Seton Hall University.
The President of the Stanley Jaki Foundation, Father Paul Haffner, the first biographer of Fr. Jaki, spoke on the intellectual legacy of Father Jaki.
The text of his intervention may be found here.
A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

2017

USA — Catholic Answers Live — 17 February 2017
Stacy Trasancos on Does Science Need Christ?

The second part of this TV program (from minute 57 onward) is devoted to the Science and Faith relationship.
The video of the talk may be found here.

2016

Bowie (MA) — Commemoration of the centennial of the death of Pierre Duhem

On 14 September 1916 Pierre Duhem died in Cabrespine (France). On the centennial day (14 September 2016) a Meeting, organized by CAS+E, the Catholic Association of Scientists and Engineers. was held in Bowie (Maryland). The notice of the meeting can be seen here.
There were three contribution that evening.
The video of the first one, a talk of Antonio Colombo titled Pierre Duhem, Stanley Jaki, and the Birth of Science, can be seen here. The String Quartet exhibition that starts the video was actually played at the end of the meeting.
The text of the second communication, the one of Donald De Marco, titled Pro-Life Model: The Tenacity of Pierre Duhem, was read by Gregory Rozanski, and may be found here.
The text of the third communication, the one of Peter Floriani, titled Newman, Chesterton, Jaki, and the Founding of the Ambrosian University, was read by David Rajnes, and may be found here.
A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.
One of the pieces played by the String Quartet may be found here.
The Catholic Association of Scientists and Engineers can be contacted at the following address:

CAS+E
P. O. Box 72
Glenn Dale, Maryland 20769

Rome — Talk during the Master in Science and Faith about
Stanley Jaki, a life devoted to the Science and Faith relation

As part of the Master in Science and Faith, organized by the Science and Faith Institute of the Pontifical Athaeneum Regina Apostolorum in Rome, a talk has been given on 8 November 2016, by Antonio Colombo, on: Stanley Jaki, a life devoted to the Science and Faith relation. The same talk was offered again, in the same context, on 16 October 2018. The text of the talk (in Italian) may be found here. A video of the talk (in Italian) may be found here.

2015

Mexico City — International Conference

An International conference was held in Mexico City, on March 18-20, 2015, at the Universidad Anáhuac México Norte, on
The Relation of Science and Religion in the Light of the Thinking of Stanley L. Jaki
The program of the conference may be found here.
The Acts of this conference are in preparation.
A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

Seton Hall — Fr Stanley Jaki Foundation International Conference

An International conference was held at the Seton Hall University on April 14-15 2015.
The conference has been organized and cosponsored by the Department of Catholic Studies and the Department of Physics of the Seton Hall University. The main organizers of the event have been Jose Lopez (Department of Physics), Ines Murzaku (Department of Catholic Studies, Father Joseph Laracy and Father Paul Haffner (who could not attend for family reasons).

The program of the conference may be found here.

A book with the Acts of the Conference has been published. It contains contributions of: Anthony L. Troha, Joseph R. Laracy, Richard M. Liddy, Peter J. Floriani, Stacy A. Trasancos, Paul Haffner, Antonio Colombo.
More information about the Acts may be found here.

A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

2014

Rome — Summer Course at the Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum

A Summer Course devoted to the study of Fr. Jaki was held in Rome on July 2014. The program of the Course may be found here.
A report on the Summer Course (in Italian) may be found here.
A picture taken at the end of the course may be found here. A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

USA — Special Issue of St Austin Review dedicated to Stanley Jaki

The May-June 2014 Issue of the St. Austin Review, prepared with the collaboration of John Beaumont, has been devoted to Stanley Jaki. You can see the Cover of the Issue, and the Table of Contents.

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A drawing of the young Father Jaki, with symbols of Christian faith and science, decorated the Issue. It is reproduced here.
The picture that inspired it may be found here.

Győr (Hungary) — A plaque was placed in Zrinyi str. 6, Győr (Hungary) on a wall of the house where the three Jaki brothers were born.

The plaque has been consecrated by H.E. Bishop László Bíró.
A TV reportage in Hungarian about the event may be found here.
This is the text that details the video (in Hungarian):
Emléktábla avatással és konferenciával emlékezett a Bencés Diákok Győri Egyesülete a Győri születésu bencés szerzetes Jáki testvérekre. Jáki Zénó, Jáki Szaniszló és Jáki Teodóz maradandó és szép emlékeket hagytak több ezer bencés diákban, ezért gondolták úgy a szervezok, hogy Győri szüloi házuk falán márványtábla orizze emléküket. A három Jáki testvérre emlékezve konferenciát is tartottak Győrben, ahol eloadások keretében idézték fel tevékenységüket és szellemiségüket.

The announcement of the event is contained in the message from Sylvester Vizi (Former President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences) to Fr Paul Haffner (President of the Stanley Jaki Foundation) that may be found here. The text of the speech of Sylvester Vizi about Stanley Jaki (in Hungarian) may be found here.

2012

Seton Hall — Distinguished Lecture of the Department of Physics

Father George Coyne. S.J., Ph.D. the McDevitt Chair of Religious Philosophy at the McDevitt Center for Creativity and Innovation of Le Moyne College in Syracuse, New York presented the annual Fr. Stanley L. Jaki, O.S.B. Distinguished Lecture of the Department of Physics at Seton Hall University on Tuesday, November 20, 2012 at 6 p.m. The special lecture has been held in the Jubilee Hall Auditorium in Jubilee Hall on Seton Hall’s South Orange campus and is part of the President’s Advisory Council Distinguished Guest Lecturer Series sponsored by the President’s Advisory Council members.

A video of the lecture has been put online by the Seton Hall University. It may be found here.

George Coyne is a Catholic priest, member of the Society of Jesus or Jesuits, and a world renowned astronomer. Father Coyne served as the Director of the Vatican Observatory from 1978 to 2006, and is currently President of the Vatican Observatory Foundation. He is considered to be one of the leading intellectuals on the topics of the interaction between science and religion.

Fr. Coyne’s lecture entitled The Dance of the Fertile Universe: Chance and Destiny Embrace explores the immense quantity and variety in the universe which contains about 100 billion galaxies each of which contain on the average 200 billion stars. The lectures focus is on the scientific explanation of how the life and death of stars have provided the building blocks necessary for the evolution of life. There is then a reflection on the question, if human life came about by chance or by necessity? The lecture further reflects on the vast "fertility" of the universe surveyed from the aspect of the best of modern scientific understanding. A final reflection is provided on the question: Did God do it? In his attempt to answer this question Father Coyne discusses how important it is to respect the richness of both religious faith and of scientific research.

A picture taken after the Lecture may be found here.

Portsmouth, RI — Kevin O’Brien impersonates Father Jaki at a theological conference

The Portsmouth Institute (RI) asked Kevin O’Brien to impersonate Father Jaki, during their 2012 (June 22-24) Conference on Modern Science / Ancient Faith. Kevin prepared his talk reading a lot of books of Father Jaki, and looking at the talks of him in the Internet. The result is truly impressive. The text which Kevin used as a basis for his talk is mostly made of quotes from various books of Father Jaki. It is available here. Kevin O’Brien, founder and directore of Theater of the Word Inc., started a project named Grunky. The term Grunky comes from Chesterton: "A word I invented at the age of five to express my religious sentiments". About Kevin O’Brien activity, in his own words: "My wife and I run two theatrical companies, Upstage Productions, in which we perform comedy murder mysteries around the country—that’s how we make our money; and The Theater of the Word Incorporated, in which we travel the country evangelizing through drama—that’s how we lose our money." The video of the event can be seen here.

2011

Madrid — Summer Course
Science and Faith in Stanley Jaki

A 3-Day Course about Science and Faith in Stanley Jaki", has been held in Madrid as one of the the San Pablo CEU University Summer Courses from July 11 to July 13 2011.

The program of the course may be found here.
A book with the Acts of the Summer Course has been published. It contains contributions of: Lucía Guerra Menéndez, Antonio Colombo, Rafael Pascual, John Beaumont, Paul Haffner, Jacques Vauthier, Leopoldo José Prieto López, Juan Arana, Beniamino Danese, Manuel Carreira, Angelo Bottone, Julio A. Gonzalo.
More information about the Acts may be found here.

A picture taken at the end of the course may be found here. A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

Seton Hall — First Distinguished Lecture of the Department of Physics

Professor Freeman Dyson of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey has been the inaugural lecturer of the Fr. Stanley L. Jaki, O.S.B. Distinguished Lecture of the Department of Physics at Seton Hall University on Monday, November 14, 2011 at 6 p.m. The special lecture has been held in the Helen Lerner Amphitheatre (SC 101) in McNulty Hall and is part of the President’s Advisory Council Distinguished Guest Lecturer Series sponsored by the President’s Advisory Council members.

A video of the lecture has been put online by the Seton Hall University. It may be found here.

Freeman Dyson is considered to be one of the greatest living thinkers and intellectuals on the topics of science and technology. His ideas have had a profound and widely regarded impact on many fields — physics, biology, history, philosophy, and theology.

Professor Dyson’s lecture entitled "Living through Four Revolutions" provides a first-hand witness reflection on the history of science and technology over the last half century. In particular, his contemplation is about the four modern scientific and technological revolutions which were space, nuclear energy, genomics, and electronic computing. He looks at how these revolutions started, how they slowly transformed the world during the past half century, and how they are still transforming it today.

The announce of the Lecture may be found here.

2010

Rome — Commemoration of Fr. Stanley L. Jaki OSB
On the first anniversary of his death

An International Meeting was held at the Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum
in Rome, on 13 April 2010.
English program of the Meeting
Programma del Convegno in italiano

Fr. Téodoz Jaki (brother of Fr. Stanley Jaki) attended the Meeting.

The Acts of the Meeting contain contributions by Rafael Pascual, Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, Antonio Colombo, John Beaumont, Jacques Vauthier, Lucía Guerra Menéndez, Hrvoje Relja, Jason Mitchell, Alexandra von Teuffenbach, Pedro Barrajon, Paul Haffner, Alessandro Giostra.
Some of the essays are written in English or French.

The original Italian text of the impromptu speech of Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, Chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, may be found here. An English translation of the same speech may be found here.

More information about the Acts may be found here.
A review of the event from the June 2010 Issue of Inside the Vatican may be found here.
The Hungarian translation of the same review may be found here.

A review (in Italian) may be found here.
A few pictures taken on that occasion may be found here.

2009

USA — Special Issue of the Gilbert magazine

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A special Issue of Gilbert, the magazine of the American Chesterton Society. has been devoted to Father Jaki a few months after his death. Here you can see the Cover and the Table of Contents.

A TV reportage in Hungarian about Stanley Jaki

The reportage (part of a Múlt-kor emission of 29 November 2009) may be found here.
The complete Múlt-kor emission may be found here.

Contact: For any remark about this page, please contact Antonio Colombo (azc100 at gmail dot com)

Events to study life and works of Stanley L. Jaki