Events

A century ago, Max Weber declared that the modern Western world was disenchanted: gods and spirits were pushed aside by rationalizing forces, especially science and capitalism. But Weber also worried about a new type of enchantment, that people had become subjected to forces of our own making that were increasingly out of our control. This lecture explores disenchantment and enchantment in a world dominated by Amazon.com, the epitome of rationalization, and the purveyor of magical commodities.

Professor William T. Cavanaugh is currently Professor of Catholic Studies and the Director of the Centre for World Catholicism and Intercultural Theology at DePaul University in Chicago. He is one the world’s leading researchers working at the intersection of ethics, politics, and the Catholic intellectual and moral tradition. He is the author of The Myth of Religious Violence: Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict (Oxford University Press, 2009), Torture and the Eucharist: Theology, Politics, and the Body of Christ (Blackwell, 1998), Theopolitical Imagination (T&T Clark, 2003), Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire (Eerdmans, 2008), Field Hospital: The Church’s Engagement With a Wounded World (Eerdmans, 2016), and Migrations of the Holy (Eerdmans, 2011). He is the co-editor of three volumes, including The Blackwell Companion to Political Theology (Blackwell, 2003), and co-editor of the journal Modern Theology. His books have been published in 12 languages and have influenced an entire generation of scholars interested in using the resources of the Catholic tradition to develop fresh alternatives to moral and political reflection than those provided by secularism.