archive

Catholic Thought and the Professional Life: A Contemplative in Action: Is It Really Possible?

Wednesday, 8 April 2015
3:00p.m.–6:00p.m.
Regents Hall, Lewis Towers
Water Tower Campus, LUC

The Hank Center for the Catholic Intellectual Heritage hosted a panel discussion on Loyola’s Water Tower Campus as part of its Catholic Thought and the Professional Life Series. This series, which takes place each spring semester, seeks to connect faculty from across Loyola’s Professional Schools in conversation about the role of Catholicism in their disciplines today.

This panel—A Contemplative in Action: Is It Really Possible?—featured guest speaker Mr. Mark Kennedy Shriver. Mr. Shriver's recent book, A Good Man: Rediscovering My Father, Sargent Shriver (St. Martin's Griffin, 2012), looks back at the life of his father, Sargent Shriver, and the example he provides of a real-life contemplative in action. Not only did Sargent Shriver count among his professional accomplishments the founding of the Peace Corps and the invaluable contributions he made to President Johnson's War on Poverty, but his personal accomplishments of living a public life of faith, hope, and love—even while he struggled with Alzheimer's—speak to the question of what it means to be both a contemplative person—and a good person—in the world today.

In conversation with to Mr. Shriver, six members of Loyola’s faculty participateed in our panel discussion: Stacey Platt (School of Law); Clifford J. Shultz (Quinlan School of Business); Ann Marie Ryan (School of Education); Elizabeth Coffman (School of Communication); Dean Darrell Wheeler (School of Social Work); and Marian Diaz (Institute of Pastoral Studies).