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2026: But Where Can She Be Found? Wisdom From Age to Age

2026: But Where Can She Be Found? Wisdom From Age to Age

But Where Can She Be Found?
Wisdom from Age to Age

The de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture's 26th Fall Conference
October 1–3, 2026 | University of Notre Dame

The Hebrew Scriptures characterize the nature of wisdom simultaneously as a sublimely personified reality that reflects God’s glory, power, eternality, and goodness, ordering “all things well” (c.f. Wisdom 7:22–8:1), and as something concrete, related to practical expertise, and constitutive of a good and virtuous life, as in the Book of Proverbs. The Catholic tradition likewise speaks of both uncreated Wisdom—identified with the Logos or Son of God incarnate in Jesus Christ—as well as created Wisdom, which renders the cosmos and reality intelligible. And ancient philosophical traditions, which have deeply shaped Christianity and the Western intellectual tradition, similarly preserve understandings of wisdom that include the more contemplative (sophia, theoria) and the more pragmatic or practical (phronesis).

In the current age and culture, however, the hegemony of mastery, technique, and mere information threatens to displace wisdom in both its supernatural and natural senses. This loss is perhaps only exacerbated by a growing incapacity to attend to what poet Gerard Manley Hopkins has called “the dearest freshness deep down things,” or to cultivate a rich interior life that might encourage what St. John Henry Newman praised as the “clear, calm, accurate vision, and comprehension of the whole course, the whole work of God.”

The de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture’s 26th annual Fall Conference will feature presentations on wisdom that draw on traditions across the disciplines—including philosophy, theology, ethics, law, history, and the natural and social sciences, as well as the creative domains of literature, music, film, theater, and the visual arts—and engage a wide range of questions and themes, including:

Phronesis, Prudence, and Judgment
Contemplative Wisdom
Understanding in a Technological Age
Art, Beauty, and Aesthetics
Wisdom in/as the Word of God
Education, Formation, and Communities of Practice
Wisdom in Nature and the Cosmos
Practical Wisdom in Governance, Citizenship, Law, and Polis/Polity

Register to Attend the Conference

Registration has ended, but walk-up guests are welcome. Visit the registration desk on the 2nd floor of the McKenna Conference Center during conference hours.

Conference Locations and Getting Around

Conference sessions will take place in McKenna Hall and the Morris Inn, located on Notre Dame Avenue. Locations for individual presentations are noted in the schedule and will be posted on signs throughout the conference center and Morris Inn. Conference check-in is located at the registration desk on the second floor of McKenna Hall. Evening keynotes will be held in the Downes Club
of Corbett Family Hall, located on the east side of Notre Dame Stadium. Please take designated elevators to the 7th floor. Doors for the keynote will open approximately 15-30 minutes prior. Please follow the instructions of the attendants.

In addition to the conference sessions, McKenna 204 will be furnished as a family room throughout the weekend to welcome parents with small children for family-friendly activities and space to take a break from conference sessions. Please feel free to visit at your leisure.

Lastly, for visitors with mobility issues, golf carts will be available to offer courtesy rides between conference locations. Please look for these carts outside the conference buildings, or ask a dCEC staff member or volunteer for assistance.

Parking

Visitor parking is available by permit during regular business hours on Thursday and Friday in the visitor lot south of the stadium. No permit is required outside of regular business hours and on weekends, when parking is available in any of the open lots. A campus shuttle runs along Holy Cross Drive, next to the visitor lot, with a drop-off point at McKenna Hall. Please be aware that sporting events in the Joyce Athletic Center and the Compton Family Ice Arena may affect the flow of traffic on campus.

Dining Around Campus

Due to construction on Notre Dame’s South Dining Hall, no communal conference meals will be available Thursday, Friday, or Saturday. Visit Notre Dame Dining for details about on-campus dining options and hours. Several restaurants are also located immediately south of campus, at Eddy Street Commons (external link to Google Maps).

Questions?

Please contact Brooke Tranten (btranten@nd.edu).

Past Conferences

Find information regarding past conferences and lecture videos at the links below.