The Roman Forum 2004 Symposium

Gardone Riviera (June 30 - July 10, 2004)

• Accommodations and the Setting
• Daily Program
• Topics to Be Addressed
• Faculty
• Transportation
• Cost
• Scholarships
• Application and Payment

Accommodations and the Setting

Accommodation and lectures are at the Trattoria Agli Angeli, on Lake Garda, in the foothills of the Alps in northern Italy. Rooms are mostly doubles, with bath. A limited number of singles is available. The Trattoria is located in Gardone Sopra, a ten minute walk from the lakefront. Special arrangements, at different prices, can be made for those who wish to stay and take their meals in one of the many higher quality hotels in Gardone or Salò. Arrangements to arrive earlier or stay later, at additional cost, may be made through the director.

Gardone is within easy traveling distance of Verona, Venice, Trent, Brescia, Milan, Ravenna, Pavia and Padua. In years past, participants have rented cars to tour the area, taken boat trips on the lake and attended the opera in Verona. The region offers opportunities for swimming, hiking, biking, boating and scenic walks. The lectures are scheduled in such a way as to allow time for recreation and sightseeing.
 

Daily Program

The daily program consists of four lectures and Holy Mass, according to the 1962 missal (the Tridentine Mass). No lectures on Sundays.
 

Topics to Be Addressed

When the Salt Loses Its Savor:
The Apology That Dares Not Speak Its Name

Christ’s mission was one of saving individual souls, but that salvific goal is achieved in a way that raises the entire world to the service of the greater glory of God. The primary requirement for the success of this secular transformation is an acceptance of the reality of a good Creation flawed by sin, and the intervention in that damaged universe of a superior, supernatural, active Deity, working through God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, and the Church directed by them.

The modern conciliar Church, for a variety of reasons, has retreated from clear acceptance of this basic underlying principle. One of the inevitable secular side effects of that retreat has been embarrassment over past Christian attempts to guide nature from a supernatural standpoint, and apology for their practical consequences.

Despite contemporary discomfiture over Catholic influence in history, an unprejudiced study of western civilization reveals the enormous blessing bestowed upon it by its transformation into Christendom.This blessing has been sacrificed as the Church has abandoned its supernatural teaching role; as the salt has lost its savor, with dreadful repercussions not only for the West but for all of human civilization.The task of the 2004 Gardone Summer Symposium is to illustrate this loss, and to offer the one apology that is missing in a sea of self-recriminations: that which is owed for committing suicide and being an agent of dreadful cultural destruction while doing so.

• The Apologetic Mentality: An Assault on the Saints

• The Effects on Reason: Philosophy, Science, History

• The Effects on Human Freedom

• The Effects on The State

• The International Order

• The Nation-State

• The Effects on Subsidiary Society

• The Economic Order

• The Family

• The Individual

• The Artistic World: The Spoken and Written Language, Theater, Music, Painting and Sculpture, Architecture

• The Effects on Human Mental Health

• The Catholic: Proud But Not Prideful

Faculty

Transportation

Cost

Scholarships

Application and Payment