In Msgr. Giussani's own words in the book's preface, "The book … exemplifies how one can adhere to Christianity consciously and reasonably according to an actual experience. Specifically, At the Origin of the Christian Claim, is the attempt to define the origin of the faith of Jesus' apostles." This work forms the second volume of a trilogy—together with The Religious Sense and Why the Church—which presents the core of Msgr. Giussani’s proposal, one that drew countless people around the world to the Catholic faith and led many to regard him, in Cardinal Ratzinger’s words at his funeral, as “a real father.” Speakers will offer essential insights into this work from different perspectives and illuminate how Msgr. Giussani’s pedagogical approach remains relevant to society’s common good.

New York Encounter 2026

A Fact in History

Event link: https://www.newyorkencounter.org/2026-a-fact-in-history

Time and the Temple is a collection of meditations on Christian vocation given by Fr. Luigi Giussani in the final decade of his life. The text, which has been pivotal in the vocational stories of countless men and women, is now available in English for the first time. Over several months, a group of Kansas high school students met weekly to discuss the book and contributed to this year’s Encounter exhibit about it. They will converse with the Abbot General of the Cistercian Order about topics from the text that they found especially relevant to their lives.

Msgr. Honcharuk and Fr. Stasiewicz have been living amid the war for four years. They chose to remain close to the people who suffer, trying to provide a true home for those who are mysteriously called to endure the unspeakable horrors of the conflict. They will share stories of Christian hope and offer their own witness to how it is possible to live a truly human life even in a war zone.

The event will introduce “The trunk is rooted where the truth lies,” an exhibit on the Self and the Other in the life and thought of the Servant of God Fr. Luigi Giussani.

The 2023 Encounter, explores how—amidst growing uncertainty about how to face life, and especially the mystery of evil—many of us yearn to be seen and affirmed by someone in flesh and blood who defeats our loneliness. We long to be accompanied in life by a father or a friend who is certain of its meaning, and to discover our identity within this relationship. Bishop Erik Varden has reflected deeply on the most profound dimensions of our humanity in the course of his journey, as he describes in his book The Shattering of Loneliness. Here is an excerpt from his introduction:

"I was close to 16 and I was developing an interest in Mahler. Having splashed my savings on a CD player, I bought a Bernstein recording of his Second Symphony, the Resurrection. The Christian significance of the theme was known to me but left me cold. Although I had been baptized, I had never affirmed belief. If anything, I was hostile. Christianity appeared to me a wishful flight away from the inner drama I was trying to negotiate, which was full of ambivalence, far distant from the studied certainties of preachers. Mahler, to me, was about harmonics and instrumentation. Nevertheless, as I listened to the symphony, I could not remain aloof. I had not expected to be so moved ... Before disbelief had time to configure, it was hushed by voices singing of a hope that must, in secret, have gestated in my depths, for I recognized it as mine:

Have faith, heart, have faith: nothing will be lost to you.

What you have longed for is yours, yes, yours; yours is what

you have loved and fought for. Have faith: you were not

born in vain. You have not lived or suffered in vain.

At these words, something burst. The repeated insistence, 'not in vain, not in vain', was irresistible. It was not just that I wanted to believe it. I knew it was true. It sounds trite, but at that moment, my consciousness changed. With a certainty born neither of overwrought emotion nor of cool analysis, I knew I carried something within me that reached beyond the limits of me. I was aware of not being alone. There was no special warmth, no ecstatic inner movement. There were no tears. But I could no more doubt the truth of what I had found than I could doubt that I existed. The sense of it has never left me. That this should be so amazes me still."

Bishop Varden will explore this year's Encounter theme in conversation with Archbishop Christophe Pierre, Papal Nuncio to the U.S. They will help the audience appreciate the meaning and relevance of being in a relationship with “someone who knows me and, inexplicably, cares for me.”

On this episode, Ken Hallenius from the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture interviews Dan Lipinski, who spoke at the 2022 Encounter in the event "Politics: a Zero-Sum Game?"

Ethics and Culture Cast Shownotes:

Dan Lipinski is the former US Representative for the 3rd Congressional District in Illinois from 2005 to 2021, a member of the Democratic Party. He was co-chair of the Bi-partisan Congressional Pro-life Caucus.

Episode Links

• New York Encounter 2022: "Politics: A Zero-Sum Game?": Overcoming ideological divides in the political battlefield, with William Haslam, former Governor of Tennessee, and Dan Lipinski, former U.S. Congressman, moderated by Kimberly Shankman, Dean of Benedictine College, Atchison, KS. The Encounter 2022 will explore how seeking the truth in any human endeavor, and loving it more than one’s own preconceived opinions, is essential in order to overcome ideological divides and restore a much-needed trust in each other and our public institutions. An area where the opposite seems to apply is politics. This is why examples of seeking the truth more than winning an argument and bridging the sectarian divide that dominates the political arena, even to the point of sacrificing personal power, are so important. Both speakers have long careers on the political frontlines and will share stories of these attempts and their views about where to go from here.
• dCEC Fall Conference 2021: "The Catholic Answer Our Divided Nation Needs" — Précis: The divide in America today is best described as a sectarian partisan divide. This new type of partisanship, which is increasingly embraced by Americans on both sides, is a moralized identification with each party having an established set of beliefs and a strong focus on maintaining ideological purity and distinction from its counterpart. The potential triumph of the sectarian left’s replacement of the biblical view of humans with expressive individualism as a policy basis, poses an existential threat to America. But zero-sum sectarian partisanship on the right that negates the political process, embraces political messianism, and muddles temporal politics with Christianity is also a threat to our democratic republic. Our divided nation needs a Catholic answer - rejecting sectarian partisanship on both sides and being Catholic first.
• Author Page at First Things
• Author Page at Public Discourse
• Theme Song: "I Dunno," by grapes — I dunno by grapes (c) copyright 2008 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Ft: J Lang, Morusque

On this episode, Ken Hallenius from the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture interviews Abigail Favale, who spoke at the 2022 Encounter in the event "Body and Identity"

Ethics and Culture Cast Shownotes:

Abigail Favale, Ph.D., is a writer, professor, and speaker. She is Dean of the College of Humanities at George Fox University. Raised an evangelical Christian, she converted to the Catholic faith in 2014. Her newest book, The Genesis of Gender, is due to be released by Ignatius Press in May 2022.

Episode Links

• Abigail Favale's Homepage
• Dr. Favale at dCEC Fall Conference 2021
• Dr. Favale at New York Encounter 2022 - Body and Identity — A presentation on gender theory and its social implications, with Abigail Favale, Dean of the College of Humanities, George Fox University, and Helen Joyce, executive editor for events business of The Economist, moderated by Holly Peterson, Principal of Nativity: Faith and Reason School in Broomfield, CO.
• Dr. Favale on "What is Sex For?" at MICL Cultures of Formation Conference
• Book: "Into the Deep: An Unlikely Catholic Conversion"
• Book: "The Genesis of Gender: A Christian Theory"
• New York Encounter — NEW YORK ENCOUNTER IS AN ANNUAL THREE-DAY CULTURAL EVENT IN THE HEART OF NEW YORK CITY, OFFERING OPPORTUNITIES FOR EDUCATION, DIALOGUE, AND FRIENDSHIP.
• Communion and Liberation — Communion and Liberation is the lay Catholic movement which sponsors the New York Encounter.
• Theme Song: "I Dunno," by grapes — I dunno by grapes (c) copyright 2008 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Ft: J Lang, Morusque

The so-called gender theory has caused widespread confusion and bewilderment. Thus, its content needs to be known and carefully tested against reality to the benefit of young people, parents, and educators. This critical assessment is all the more needed because of a general inclination, nowadays, to stop thinking about complex issues and go with the flow of the group one identifies with. Speakers have dedicated several years of their careers to studying the origin, content, policy-making consequences, and larger societal implications of the gender theory.

“The individual is more than the worst act he/she committed.” This is one of Mr. Stevenson’s most famous and challenging statements. What journey brought him to this conclusion? Why would it be true and what implications would it have on the judicial system? What can facilitate a similar journey, especially for young people? What is the relationship between individual and structural or systemic changes in society? What comes first and why? These are some of the questions that will be addressed during the conversation.

Our Christian life, our faith, and our concrete morality, the set-up of our lives is determined either by current ideologies or by the factuality, the supremacy of our existence, of things as they happen, of things as we come across them, of things to which you react in a given way, of facts: facts as events.

~Fr. Luigi Giussani, To Give One’s Life for the Work of Another, MgGill-Queen University Press, 2022

Enjoy an uplifting evening of music ranging from spirituals to pop to jazz to originals, old and new, with the rich unique harmonies and arrangements brought to you by this exciting vocal ensemble

Chris Vath, piano and vocals

Molly Ronan, vocals

Valentina Patrick, vocals

Cas Patrick, vocals

Riro Maniscalco, guitar, percussion, vocals

Jonathan Fields, lead guitar, bass, vocals

Until recently science has been regarded as a human undertaking in which, to everybody’s benefit, an objective truth could be sought. Unfortunately, this is no longer the case. The erosion of trust, or its misplacement, has damaged the social standing, with the consequences we all know. This is why a renewed commitment to truth and reason is more necessary than ever. Dr. Collins has dedicated his entire life to scientific research, while Mr. Brooks has extensively studied the relevance of trust in the social fabric.

America, we believe, is the land of opportunity, a country where people of diverse backgrounds have the opportunity to make the most of their talents. But is this narrative true today?  Do we truly offer equality of opportunity?  Income and wealth inequality are the worst they have been in nearly a century. Indeed, the deepening unease across the political spectrum and the increasing distrust of our institutions are perhaps largely a consequence of an erosion of the American dream.  These trends are similar in many advanced economies. How does America once again offer the promise of shared prosperity?

The changing role of the U.S. in global affairs and its impact on world peace and stability, with Andrew Bacevich, Professor Emeritus of International Relations and History, Boston University, and Michael Desch, Founding Director of the Notre Dame International Security Center, moderated by Paolo Carozza, Professor of Law and Director of the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, the University of Notre Dame

Since World War II, the U.S. has played a key role in the global defense of freedom, stability, and peace. Several events in the past few years indicate that this role is rapidly changing. Getting to the real truth of things is more necessary than ever, especially in light of convenient falsehoods that have been sometimes used in the past to bolster support for misguided foreign policies. Are we at the end of the Pax Americana? What is the status of U.S. foreign policy, its priorities, and future direction? How can American families’ everyday lives be affected by these changes? These are some questions that will be addressed during the event.

Faithfulness to facts and truths has always represented the highest ideal of journalism. But in recent years market pressure and increasing politicization have undermined this ideal and damaged the social standing of journalism. Is restoring this ideal still possible? What is the future of journalism? What will it look like? Panelists will address these questions and present examples of professional journalism where factual truth was pursued even when it was inconvenient to one’s career.

The Encounter 2022 will explore how seeking the truth in any human endeavor, and loving it more than one’s own preconceived opinions, is essential in order to overcome ideological divides and restore a much-needed trust in each other and our public institutions. An area where the opposite seems to apply is politics. This is why examples of seeking the truth more than winning an argument and bridging the sectarian divide that dominates the political arena, even to the point of sacrificing personal power, are so important. Both speakers have long careers on the political frontlines and will share stories of these attempts and their views about where to go from here.

Our being—what the Bible calls “heart,” that is, courage, tenacity, shrewdness, effort—is a thirst for truth and happiness. There is no work, from the humble one of the housewife to the brilliant one of the designer, that can escape this reference in search of full satisfaction, of human fulfillment: thirst for truth, which starts from curiosity to delve into the mysterious enigma of search and thirst for happiness, which starts from instinct and expands to that dignified concreteness that alone saves instinct from being corrupted into a false and ephemeral breath. It is this heart that mobilizes anyone, whatever business they carry out. All life is obligated by this logic: there is no other source of energy that obliges and enables more than this one to look after the work in which one is committed, in its even more minute aspects.

Desire is like the spark that starts the engine. All human movements arise from this phenomenon, from this constitutive dynamism of the person. Desire turns on the engine of the person. And then one starts to look for a job, to look for a woman or a man, starts to look for a more comfortable chair and a more decent residence. One gets interested in why some have and some others do not have, why some are treated in a certain way and this person is not. All of this happens precisely by virtue of the enlargement, the widening, the ripening of these stimuli that one has within and the Bible globally calls "heart" - and that I would also call "reason". And, in some way, there is no reason without affection being awakened.

~ Fr. Luigi Giussani, excerpt from L'io, il potere e le opere

Is it reasonable to hope when we look back at 2020, with all its hardships, uncertainty, injustice, divisions? Yes, if we recognize that the radical neediness we experienced revealed an expectancy, which expresses itself as the desire to keep walking. Even in the worst suffering, even in deepest pain, something in us looks forward. Deep inside us, there is inscribed the promise of a better future. Fr. Giussani once said, “Reality, as it emerges in experience, is so positive that it presents itself as inexorably appealing. Instead of appealing, we might use another word … promising.” Speakers in our last event share stories of new beginnings.

Education has been probably the single area where the pandemic was felt the most by the great majority of people. Basically, nobody escaped the impact of Covid -19: students, parents (and their employers), teachers, administrators, politicians. But the new challenges also made everybody rethink the goals and methods of schooling, and the relevance of the family in education. What were the lessons learned in 2020? What changes will be worth preserving after the pandemic? A parent and teacher, a university student, a high school administrator, and a college professor share their experiences and address these questions.

Many people in the US today are seeking ways to heal the wounds of racism and move forward. However, this requires traveling a narrow road between two cliffs. On the one side, there is the danger of denying or ignoring both the past and present racial injustice in our country. On the other side, there is the temptation of reducing all our human experience to a matter of power, which inevitably perpetuates violence. Speakers shared their experience of traveling this narrow road, and also of opening the way for others.

The pandemic did not only fill our days with uncertainty and discomfort, helplessness and fear. It also brought a dramatic increase of mental health issues. But what is, and what is not, mental illness? Is it possible to cope with it? How? Why does it carry a stigma? Covid-19 also worsened the horrific epidemic of suicide, especially among young people. How can it be addressed? Is "how to fix it" actually the right question? Are there other more fundamental questions that need to be answered?

Watch the episode on YouTube.

How can we joke about anything after 2020, a year that contained so much suffering and frustration? What does it mean to laugh in the face of hardship?

Living through 2020, we experienced life as dramatic, intense, and often heartbreaking. Yet at certain points—while donning a mask before walking into a convenience store, gazing adoringly at our stockpile of toilet paper, or scrambling to re-learn algebra one day ahead of a struggling 8th grader—we realized that life could also be absurd.

Saturday night of the Encounter featured a roast of 2020, a moment to revel in the absurdity of certain situations and take joy in the glimmers of light of a difficult year.

Watch this episode on YouTube.

The events of the past months have shattered our illusion of control and humbled pride. Have they also revealed something of value in our humanity which we were neglecting? And, as Stephanie Zacharek asked in her article in the special issue of Time dedicated to the year 2020, "After a year of so many changes, will we change radically too? We learned a lot in 2020–but what, exactly, did we learn?"

Paolo Carozza dialogues on these questions, and delve into the Encounter 2021 theme, with world renowned philosopher Charles Taylor.

Watch the event on YouTube.

(00:00) Introduction

(01:43) Community and individual identity in the pandemic

(07:07) Resisting the urge of "tribalism"

(11:30) Shoring up social bonds

(16:00) Humans: Self-interpreting animals?

(20:36) Secularism and the "Secular Age": problem, or opportunity?

(28:09) Educating the young to live in a "Secular Age"

(30:30) Inter-religious dialogue

(35:53) A new "Social Imaginary?"

(39:58) The role of Christianity now

(45:07) "Incarnation" and "excarnation"

(49:42) Understanding human desire

(53:33) Construction of the common good

(55:42) Politics as the locus of reason and dialogue?

Which are the lessons to be learned from the pandemic for economists, financial operators, international institutions, and small and big businesses? What to expect in the short and long term in the job market and in the economy? How should the economy change in the wake of COVID and what can bring about that change? Do we need new economic models or a new vision? Speakers will discuss the above questions.

Watch this episode on YouTube.

What happened in 2020 changed and is still changing us. What is the nature of this change? Can this change be a milestone in the journey of life?

Archbishop Pizzaballa has been living for decades in the Holy Land, which has not been spared by the pandemic and where social unrest and divisions between people are common. He will address the above questions by sharing his own experience. Then, the music of Beethoven, performed by Ms. Morkoski, will introduce us to the journey of the 2021 Encounter.

Watch on YouTube.

The Parents Circle – Families Forum ("PCFF") is the only association in the world that does not wish to welcome any new members into its fold. The bloody conflict between the Israeli and Palestinian societies has taken a heavy toll on each of its members. Each of them, in fact, has lost an immediate family member to the ongoing conflict. It is through this pain that all of the PCFF members have chosen to exchange their feelings of rage and revenge, helplessness, despair and the void, with activities of hope for reconciliation.

Speakers will show that when attention is paid to a shared human experience rather than to abstract ideas and preconceptions, seemingly unbridgeable distances between people are discovered to be, in reality, paper-thin.

John Cardinal O’Connor founded the Sisters of Life because he understood that the Christian response to the culture of death is more than correct arguments; what is needed are lives offered to Christ to witness to the sacredness of every person. Sr. Agnus Dei and Sr. Virginia Joy will speak about their work and their friendship with women who need help to welcome their children to life, and with women who seek healing from the violence of abortion.

An African American blues musician who engages with members of the Ku Klux Klan. The former leader of a white-supremacist skinhead group who has left hate behind. A surprising dialogue on crossing the divide from opposite sides of a seemingly unbridgeable chasm.

Professor Sullivan called Frank's story “a parable for our age” plagued by racism, drug addiction, and an epidemic of suicides where Frank Simmonds comes like the figure of Virgil in Dante’s Divine Comedy – he walks through that Inferno with us, and emerges on the other side to ascend to a marvelous light, turning back to tell us: “Suffering has meaning. Come and see!”

This event is sponsored by Human Adventure Books.

Can we meet God in our “liquid,” contemporary society? And how does one communicate the Christian faith in a social context characterized by pervasive secularization and creeping and widespread relativism? Fr. Julián Carrón, president of Communion and Liberation, answers these and other interwoven questions in Where is God?, a new book-length interview with veteran Vatican analyst Andrea Tornielli. In the current situation, Christianity can contribute to the re-humanization of society only if it is witnessed in its true nature and proposed in its originality as an event of life, a fascinating and concrete presence of a new humanity. Only then can Christianity free people from ideology. If, instead, Christianity is presented as just another system of ideas and moral practices, it can easily become an ideology, making it part of the problem and not the solution.

Music is the coin. Jazz and classical are brother and sister, they have more than something in common but they also have their own identity. A “live experience” with Radoslava Jasik and Andrea Domenici.

As founder and creative director of Facing Homelessness, Rex is reshaping the sense of community in Seattle, WA with The BLOCK Project by providing shelter for the homeless in residential backyards. In giving up his successful architecture firm to dedicate himself to Facing Homelessness and The BLOCK Project, Rex builds more than tiny homes: he builds community, awareness, and the compassion to reach out and connect with one another, homeless or otherwise.

Join us for a conversation on homelessness to find out what is there for you.

———

Facing Homelessness Facebook Page

#JustSayHello

#FacingHomelessness

#TheBLOCKProject

Poetry, good poetry, when it vibrates with the ultimate mystery of human experience, brings the reader to cross into a deeper level of awareness. It gives voice to the desire to reach for what lies beyond what we see, feel, and touch, crossing the divide between time and eternity.

Politics, instead of reflecting shared ideals and the desire for the common good, has become prey to ideologies that relentlessly fuel divisions. Recognizing the difference between “ideologies”—both on the right and on the left—and “ideals,” and being open to the impact of real events, seem critical in America today

SOMOS is a physician-led network of more than 2,500 physicians and 800 community health providers responsible for the health of more than 650,000 Medicaid patients living in New York City—particularly members of the Asian, African-American and Latino communities.

In a great many cases, SOMOS doctors work and live in the same neighborhoods as their patients, often sharing their linguistic and ethnic backgrounds. Indeed, cultural sensibility and compatibility between provider and patient is of the utmost importance. It is one of the remedies for the traditional labyrinthine, impersonal, hospital-based health-care system in which poor and vulnerable patients—especially recent and new immigrants—have a hard time making their way, let alone feeling comfortable, cared for or understood.

Since doctors are neighborhood-based, they get to know their patients, in turn making the patients feel understood, listened to and cared for. SOMOS workers visit patients at home as necessary, assess their living conditions, and make sure medical regimens and appointments are kept. This approach is at the heart of SOMOS’ traditional yet revolutionary mission and method. Speakers will recount the origins of SOMOS and share stories of doctors having crossed the divide between excellent health care and poverty.

———

There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Hamlet (1.5.167-8)

Once a Wall Street banker, Chris Arnade spent three years crisscrossing the United States to visit “the places you were told not to go to.” His travels took him from the Bronx to the Ozarks to East Los Angeles. He will share, in conversation with Dr. Patrick Deneen, why he started his journey, what he discovered, and why what he learned is so relevant in today's America.

A public defender reconciling with the man who murdered her sister, un-born child, and brother-in-law and a chaplain serving in a seemingly hopeless place of death row will share their experience of going over apparently un-crossable divides.

An important area in our fragmented society that can easily become prey of ideologies and either facilitate divisions or help to overcome them is the economy. Pope Francis is very passionate about this issue and has recently sent an open letter to young men and women studying economics to "change today’s economy and to give a soul to the economy of tomorrow." A different kind of economy "one that brings life not death, one that is inclusive and not exclusive, humane and not dehumanizing, one that cares for the environment and does not despoil it." What does Pope Francis mean by this "different kind of economy"? Can its features be really relevant in the business world? How can they impact and change the everyday working experience of workers and entrepreneurs? Speakers will discuss these questions in a dialogue with young workers and entrepreneurs.