How learning the art of memory and anticipation changes Advent…and can change the world.

Joel Barstad
St. John Vianney Theological Seminary

About the Event

Even for unbelievers, Advent is a time of nostalgia, filled with echoes of the Paradise for which we were made–a Paradise lost, but one we desperately long to regain. This isn’t an accident–these echoes were given to us by our ancestors in the faith, to stir the desires of our hearts.

The Christian art of imagining paradise is the art of expressing both bittersweet memory (the incarnation) and piercing sweet anticipation (the life that is yet to come)…that encounters God’s “Yes” in the Babe of Bethlehem. This talk will explore how we can better learn this art, and how it can change the world.

About the Speaker

Joel I. Barstad received his PhD from the University of Notre Dame. He currently teaches and is the Chair of the Theology department at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary, Denver, Colorado.

He and his wife, Leslie, have seven children.