COR UNUM ET ANIMA UNA IN DEUM
ON LOVE, COMMUNION, AND THE COMMON GOOD
June 10 - 12, 2027
Green Bay, Wisconsin
A Conference of the Sacra Doctrina Project
Co-Sponsored and Hosted by St. Norbert College
Featuring
Fr. Robert Dodaro, O.S.A.
Sr. Albert Marie Surmanski, O.P.
Fr. Sebastian Walshe, O.Praem.
Photo c/o Ninacomm
Conference Description
In his religious rule of life, St. Augustine famously exhorts his brethren to be “one heart and one soul unto God.” That Augustinian motto is just one example of a much greater Christian truth: the power of love to unite, to bring into community, to draw together in affection toward a good that is shared in common.
For the seventh annual academic conference of The Sacra Doctrina Project, we invite scholars and graduate students in theology, philosophy, and related disciplines to explore the theme of love, communion, and the common good.
Applicable topics include, but are not limited to: goodness and love as divine attributes; the Love that is the Holy Spirit; the communion among the divine persons; the good of creation; angelic love and society; the political common good; love as a passion; the virtue of charity; the religious vocation; the common life of the clergy; the unity of Christ’s mystical body; the Eucharist as sacramentum caritatis; and the communion of saints. An emphasis on the Augustinian and Norbertine tradition is welcome, though not required.
All SDP conferences hope to attract theologians from various theological schools and sub-disciplines.
Keynote Speakers
Fr. Robert Dodaro, O.S.A.
​​Fr. Dodaro is the former president of the Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum in Rome, where he was also a professor of theology. He was in addition a professor of patristic theology at the Pontifical Lateran University. He is a specialist in the writings of St. Augustine of Hippo. He also serves as the co-editor-in-chief of the Augustinus-Lexikon and on the editorial advisory council of Dionysius. His Christ and the Just Society in the Thought of Augustine was published by Cambridge University Press in 2004; additionally, he was co-editor of Augustine: Political Writings and also of Augustine and His Critics, a collection of essays in honour of Gerald Bonner. In 2023, he contributed to The Faith Once and for All Delievered: Doctrinal Authority in Catholic Theology (Emmaus Academic). He is profoundly convinced of the contemporary importance of the great patristic writers and is tireless in his efforts to ensure that they are studied as widely as possible.
Sr. Albert Marie Surmanski, O.P.
​Sr. Albert Marie Surmanski, OP, is a member of the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist. She is professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, where she also teaches at St. Mary’s Seminary. Her main area of research is medieval sacramental theology with a focus on Sts. Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas. She has published a translation of Albert the Great’s work, On the Body of the Lord, in the CUA Fathers of the Church Medieval Continuation series as well as a translation of Aquinas’s Commentary on the Psalms for the Aquinas Institute. She has also published articles in various journals, including: Logos, Antiphon, Nova et Vetera, and Franciscan Studies.
Fr. Sebastian Walshe, O.Praem.
Originally from Pasadena, Fr. Sebastian Walshe is a Norbertine Canon of the Abbey of St. Michael in the Diocese of Orange, California, where he is a professor of philosophy for the seminary program. After completing his studies at Thomas Aquinas College in California, he continued studies at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., receiving a license in philosophy. Later, he attended the Pontifical University of St. Thomas at Rome (the Angelicum) where he received a masters in sacred theology and a doctorate in philosophy. His thesis was entitled: “The Primacy of the Common Good as the Root of Personal Dignity in the Doctrine of St. Thomas Aquinas.” From 2003-2005, Fr. Sebastian was also a visiting professor in the philosophy department at the Angelicum.
.jpg)