Mission Statement

The mission of the Bernard J. Lonergan Institute at Seton Hall University is to make known the work of the Canadian philosopher-theologian Bernard J. Lonergan, S.J., and its implications for contemporary culture. Besides being a research center with all the significant holdings of the primary and secondary literature on Bernard Lonergan, the center will also serve to implement Lonergan’s vision of Catholic theology integrating all of modern culture through programs in the natural and human sciences, historical scholarship, and the professions. It will serve as a locus of cultural healing, helping to implement Lonergan’s vision of “cosmopolis,” that is, a culture liberated from bias:

What is necessary is a cosmopolis that is neither class nor state, that stands above all their claims, that cuts them down to size, that is founded on the native detachment and disinterestedness of every intelligence, that commands man’s first allegiance, that is too universal to be bribed, too impalpable to be forced, too effective to be ignored.  (Lonergan, Insight)

Such a cosmopolis will be effective through a critical culture that is able to address human problems through the heart as well as through the mind.

It invites the vast potentialities and pent-up energies of our time to contribute to their solution by developing an art and a literature, a theater and a broadcasting, a journalism and a history, a school and a university, a personal depth and a public opinion, that through appreciation and criticism give men of common sense the opportunity and help they need and desire to correct the general bias of their common sense. (Insight)

 

Mission Statement by Msgr. Richard M. Liddy, Director