Since 1986, the American Cusanus Society, in cooperation with the International Seminar on Pre-Reformation Theology of the United Lutheran Seminary (formerly the Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary), has hosted regular (generally biennial) conferences on Nicholas of Cusa and his milieu.
THE Nineteenth BIENNIAL CONFERENCE OF THE AMERICAN CUSANUS SOCIETY AND THE INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR ON PRE-REFORMATION THEOLOGY (2023)
For a downloadable, searchable schedule of our 2023 Gettysburg conference, please click here.
29 September to 1 October, 2023
[In-person with hybrid options]
*Fortieth Anniversary of the American Cusanus Society*
War and Peace in the Late Middle Ages
Pre-Conference Lecture:
Jill Ogline Titus, Civil War Institute
Presented by the Seminary Ridge Museum & Education Center
and the American Cusanus Society
Plenary Lectures:
Anne Marie Wolf, University of Maine-Farmington
Phillip Stump, Lynchburg University
Banquet Program:
Cormorants Fancy, Irish-Scottish Band
Conference Theme
The American Cusanus Society, continuing its longstanding partnership with United Lutheran Seminary, will hold its nineteenth biennial conference in Gettysburg PA on Friday, 29 September to Sunday, 1 October 2023. Our focus will be on war, peace, and religious violence during the long late Middle Ages in Europe and the Middle East. While we will look closely at the life and works of Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464), we will also consider major events before, during, and after his career. Our goal is to reevaluate options and actions for war and peace during this crucible moment in history with an eye, as always, toward historical lessons for the contemporary world.
Thursday, September 28 (for early arrivals)
4:30 p.m. Social Hour Singmaster Center
5:00 p.m. Dinner (on our own) Appalachian Brewing Company
6:00 p.m. Museum Open House (no fee)
7:30 p.m. Pre-Conference Presentation Valentine Auditorium
Chair: Peter Miele, Executive Director, Seminary Ridge Museum and Education Center
Greeting: Teresa Smallwood, United Lutheran Seminary
“A New Birth of Freedom?: Civil Rights and Black History in 20th Century Gettysburg”
Jill Ogline Titus, Civil War Institute, Gettysburg College
Co-Sponsored by the American Cusanus Society
and the Seminary Ridge Museum and Education Center
Friday, September 29
8:30 a.m. Continental Breakfast Singmaster Center/Hotel
10:30 a.m. Optional: Battlefield Tour Valentine Hall Commons
Seminary Ridge Museum (fee)
12:15 p.m. Lunch Refectory
1:00 p.m. Registration and Refreshments Valentine Commons
3:00 p.m. Plenary. The Kyomi Koizumi Watanabe Lecture Valentine Auditorium
Greeting: Maria Erling, United Lutheran Seminary
Introduction to the Conference Theme
Christopher Bellitto, Kean University
“Learning about Peace from the Middle Ages: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Insights”
Anne Marie Wolf, University of Maine-Farmington
5:00 p.m. Social Hour Pioneer Room, Library
Hosted by Cody Swisher and Victoria Jesswine, Keepers of the Collection
Featuring New Additions to the Bond-Watanabe Collection
6:00 p.m. Dinner Refectory
7:45 p.m. Plenary: Morimichi Watanabe Lecture Valentine Auditorium
“The Intersection of Peace and Unity at the Council of Constance and Beyond”
Phillip Stump, Lynchburg University
9:00 p.m. Social Hour Singmaster Center
Saturday, September 30
7:30 a.m. Breakfast Singmaster Center/Hotel
9:00 a.m. Paper Panel I Library Lecture Room
Chair: Andrew LaZella, University of Scranton
“Nicholas of Cusa: Just War Ideas in His Later Years”
Marco Brösch, Institut für Cusanus-Forschung
“Nicholas of Cusa’s Theological and Philosophical Syncretism. On the Origins of the Modern Idea of Peace.” (virtual)
Valentina Zaffino, Pontifical Lateran University
“Cusanus as Peacekeeper and Warlord in Rome and The Papal States, 1459-1460”
Thomas Woelki, Humboldt-Universität
10:30 a.m. Coffee Break Rotunda
10:45 a.m. Workshop on Texts I Library Lecture Room
Chair: Samuel J. Dubbelman, Lutheran Theological Seminary, Hong Kong
Readings:
Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri, Reliance of the Traveller: A Classic Manual of Sacred Islamic Law, trans. Nuh Ha Mim Keller (Beltsville MD: Amana Publications, 1997), 599-609.
Christine de Pizan, selections from The Book of Deeds of Arms and of Chivalry, trans Sumner Willard, ed. Charity Cannon Willard (University Park: Penn State University Press, 1990): I.1-5; III.7, 18, 21-24: mostly dealing with non-combatants and ius in bello.
Régine Pernoud and Marie Véronique Clin, Joan of Arc: Her Story, trans. Jeremy duQuesnay Adams (NY: St. Martin’s Press, 1998): especially letters to the English, Philip the Good, and Reims.
12:15 p.m. Lunch
1:15 p.m. Paper Panel II
“The Wars of the Great Western Schism (1378-1417). Peace-Making and the Dinner Table.”
Joëlle Rollo-Koster, University of Rhode Island
“Strategies of Social Persuasion against Hussitism. The Case of Peter of Pirchenwart in Vienna.”
Matteo Esu, Institut de Recherche et d’Histoire des Textes, Paris
“Pius II, Nicholas of Cusa, and the Crusade to Retake Constantinople and Jerusalem” (virtual)
Nathan Ron, Haifa University
3:00 p.m. Free Time
Battlefield Tour
Tour of the Seminary Ridge Museum and Education Center (fee)
“The Future of Cusanus Studies: an Open-Invitation Virtual Roundtable”
Hosted by Sean Hannan, MacEwan University
4:30 p.m. ACS Business Meeting Singmaster Center
6:00 p.m. Reception Lewars House
7:30 p.m. Candlelight Banquet Refectory
Grace: Rabbi Brooks Susman
Christopher Bellitto, Remembering John O’Malley
Toasts: The American Cusanus Society at Forty
Entertainment: Cormorants Fancy, Irish-Scottish Band
Sunday, October 1
7:00 a.m. Mass
7:30 a.m. Continental Breakfast Singmaster Center/Hotel
8:00 a.m. Ecumenical Service Chapel
Sermon by Nicholas of Cusa
Remembrance of Those Who Have Departed Since 2021
9:15 a.m. Paper Panel III Library Lecture Room
“Cardinalis, qui Polonos odisset: Nicholas of Cusa’s Learned Ignorance on Poland”
Rafał Wilkołek, Pontifical University of John Paul II, Krakow
“Nicholas of Cusa and the Delegitimation of Religious Violence” (virtual)
Markus Riedenauer, Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
“From Mysticism to Reformation to Political Theology: Nicholas of Cusa and Martin Luther on Ecclesiastical Purity and Political Peace”
Nathan Pederson, Fordham University
10:30 a.m. Coffee Break Rotunda
10:45 a.m. Workshop on Texts II:
Capstone Conversation: “Whither Just War?”
Facilitators: Christopher Bellitto, Kean University; D. Zachariah Flanagin, Saint Mary’s College of California
Readings:
An Appeal to the Catholic Church to Re-Commit to the Centrality of Gospel Nonviolence: April, 2016.
Mark J. Allman and Tobias Winwright. “Protect Thy Neighbor: Why Just-War Tradition is Still Indispensable.” Commonweal, June 2, 2016: a critique of the Appeal.
Lisa Sowle Cahill, “A Church for Peace?” Commonweal, July 11, 2016: a Critique of the Critique.
12:15 p.m. Close of the Conference
12:30 p.m. Departures Begin
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Program committee: Christopher Bellitto and Anne Marie Wolf, co-chairs; Thomas Izbicki
Arrangements Committee: Vincent Evener, chair; Gerald Christianson
Registrar: Andrew Taminger, Hannah Tonn
**Thank you for thirty-seven years of collegial dialogue and productive scholarship.**
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THE EIGHTEENTH BIENNIAL CONFERENCE OF THE AMERICAN CUSANUS SOCIETY AND THE INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR ON PRE-REFORMATION THEOLOGY (2021)
For a downloadable, searchable schedule of our 2021 Gettysburg conference, please click here.
Below, you’ll find a series of screenshots & some linked text outlining the conference program itself.
Plenary Lectures
Clyde Lee Miller, Stony Brook University (SUNY)
Valery Rees, School of Philosophy & Economic Science, London
Pre-Conference Presentation
Christopher Bellitto, Kean University
Banquet Program
Tribute to Donald Duclow, Gwynedd Mercy University
with Performances of Selections from ‘The American Songbook’
Thursday, Sept. 23
4:00 p.m. Social Hour at the Singmaster Center
5:30 p.m. Dinner at the Appalachian Brewing Co.
7:30 p.m. Public Lecture in the Valentine Auditorium
Session Chair: Vincent Evener, United Lutheran Seminary
Greeting: Guy Erwin, President, United Lutheran Seminary
“Pope Benedict XVI’s Resignation & Post-Papacy: Medieval Lessons for Next Time”
Christopher Bellitto, Kean University
Friday, Sept. 24
8:00 a.m. Continental Breakfast at the Singmaster Center
10:30 a.m. Battlefield Tour or Museum Visit
12:00 p.m. Lunch in the Refectory
1:00 p.m. Registration & Refreshments in the Valentine Commons
3:00 p.m. Plenary Lecture I: the Kiyomi Koizumi Watanabe Lecture
Library Lecture Room
Session Chair: Vincent Evener, United Lutheran Seminary
Welcome: Guy Erwin, President, United Lutheran Seminary
Introduction: Joshua Hollmann, Concordia University, St. Paul
“Pilgrimage and Seeing the Icon in De visione Dei”
Clyde Lee Miller, Stony Brook University (SUNY)
4:30 p.m. Social Hour in the Pioneer Room, Library
Host: Evan Boyd, Librarian, United Lutheran Seminary
Presentation of Recent Acquisitions, Bond-Watanabe Collection
6:00 p.m. Dinner in the Refectory
7:45 p.m. Paper Session I: Deleuze in the Wake of Nicholas of Cusa
Library Lecture Room
Session Chair: Jeremiah Hackett, University of South Carolina
“Genealogy of the Fold: Deleuze & Renaissance Platonism”
David Albertson, University of Southern California
9:00 p.m. Social Hour at the Singmaster Center
Saturday, Sept. 25
7:30 a.m. Breakfast at the Singmaster Center
9:00 a.m. Plenary Lecture II: the Morimichi Watanabe Lecture
Valentine Auditorium
Session Chair: Jason Aleksander, San José State University
“Reflected Light: the Pervasive Influence of Dionysius between Florence & Germanic Lands in the Later Fifteenth Century”
Valery Rees, School of Philosophy & Economic Science, London
10:30 a.m. Coffee Break in the Library Rotunda
10:45 a.m. Paper Session II: Cusan Contemporaries
Library Lecture Room
Session Chair: William Collinge, Mount St. Mary’s University
“Jean Gerson’s Annotatio & the Contours of Mystical Theology”
Sam Dubbelman, Boston University
“Vincent of Aggsbach’s Attack on Jean Gerson”
Thomas Izbicki, Rutgers University
“Vincent of Aggsbach as Letter Writer: Themes, Objectives, & Communicative Strategies”
Thomas Woelki, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin
12:15 p.m. Lunch
1:15 p.m. Working Session I: “Desire and Love in Cusanus’ Mystical Theology”
Library Lecture Room
Session Chair: Richard Hunter, Gwynedd Mercy University
Donald Duclow, Gwynedd Mercy University
Bernard McGinn, University of Chicago
Paula Pico Estrada, Universidad del Salvador
Readings: Bernard McGinn, Harvest of Mysticism, 448-456;
Paula Pico Estrada, “From Affectus to Caritas,” American Cusanus Society Newsletter 33 (2016), 15-21;
Donald Duclow, “Intellect & Mystical Theology in Nicholas of Cusa,” 321-325.
3:00 p.m. Battlefield Tour with Colonel Izbicki of the Bernkastel Battalion, Museum Visit,
or Virtual Roundtable on the ‘Future of Cusanus Studies’ hosted by Sean Hannan, MacEwan University
4:30 p.m. ACS Business Meeting in the Singmaster Center
6:00 p.m. Reception hosted by Guy Erwin, President, United Lutheran Seminary, in the Lewars House
7:15 p.m. Candlelight Banquet & Tribute to Donald Duclow in the Refectory
Master of Ceremonies: Gerald Christianson, United Lutheran Seminary
“The American Songbook”
Wayne Hill, baritone
Susan Homiller, soprano
Michael Matsinko, pianist
9:00 p.m. Social Hour in the Singmaster Center
SUNDAY, SEPT. 26
7:00 a.m. Mass at St. Francis Xavier
7:30 a.m. Breakfast at the Singmaster Center
8:15 a.m. Ecumenical Service in the Chapel
9:15 a.m. Paper Session III: Cusan Themes
Session Chair: Christopher Bellitto, Kean University
“Form, Space, and a Symbolism of Color: Transformations through Cusan Perspectivism”
Nathan Pederson, Loyola University of Chicago
“Incorruptible Time: Cusanus on the Perfection of Time in the Intellect”
Elizabeth Brient, University of Georgia
“Nicholas of Cusa’s Theory of the Peace of Religions Based on His De visione Dei & De pace fidei”
Pooya Heybatollahi, Independent Scholar, Iran
10:30 a.m. Coffee Break
10:45 a.m. Working Session II: Selected Primary Sources
Session Chairs: Jason Aleksander, San José State University; Maarten Halff, Independent Scholar
Readings: Eckhart, Sermons 32b & 43; Nicholas of Cusa, Sermon 285; Hadewijch, Vision VII;
Marguerite Porete, Mirror of Simple Souls, Ch. 58-80; Hildegard of Bingen, Selections from Scivias.
12:15 p.m. Closure of Conference
The Program Committee for the 2021 Gettysburg Conference:
Joshua Hollmann, chair, Sean Hannan, Jason Aleksander, Michael Moore, Christopher Bellitto.
Arrangements Committee: Vincent Evener, Chair, Gerald Christianson. Registrars: Andrew Taminger, Charles Frekot.
** Thank you for 35 years of collegial dialogue and productive scholarship. **
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PAST CONFERENCES:
The Seventeenth Gettysburg Conference
Sept. 29-30, 2018
The Watanabe Lecture and Symposium on Cusanus, the Qur’an, and the Cribratio Alkorani
Download the Conference Brochure
The Sixteenth Gettysburg Conference
Sept. 23-24, 2017
The Watanabe Lecture and Celebration of Kiyomi Koizumi Watanabe
Download the Conference Schedule and Report on the Conference
The Fifteenth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
Sept. 30-Oct. 2, 2016
Lutherans and Catholics, Then and Now: 500 Years (and More) of Religious Reform
The Fourteenth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 10-12, 2014
Nicholas of Cusa's Legacy in the Renaissance and Reformation
The Thirteenth Biennial Gettysburg Conference (25th Anniversary Year)
October 12-14, 2012
Christian-Muslim Dialogue in the Late Middle Ages
Download the Conference Brochure
The Twelfth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 8-10, 2010
The Bible at the End of the Middle Ages: The Exegesis of Reform (Dedicated to the Memory of H. Lawrence Bond)
Download the Conference Brochure
The Eleventh Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 10-12, 2008
Reassessing Reform: Medieval Models of Change. Celebrating Gerhart Ladner’s The Idea of Reform After Fifty Years
Download the Conference Brochure
The Tenth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 13-15, 2006
Conforming to Christ in Learned Ignorance: Doing Penance and Knowing God at the Dawn of the Reformation
Download the Conference Brochure
The Ninth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 8-10, 2004
Reform and Obedience: The Authority of Church, Council, and pope from the Great Schism to the Council of Trent
Download the Conference Brochure
The Eighth Biennial American Cusanus Society Conference*
October 4-7, 2001
Celebrating the Sixth Centenary of the Birth of Nicholas of Cusa
* This Symposium was held at The Catholic University of America
The Seventh Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 28-November 1, 1998
Spirituality in the Late Middle Ages and Reformation: Nicholas of Cusa and Martin Luther
The Sixth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 18-20, 1996
The Sermons: An Introduction
The Fifth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 21-23, 1994
Nicholas of Cusa’s De coniecturis
The Fourth Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 16-18, 1992
Nicholas of Cusa on Church and Society: the De concordantia catholica
The Third Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 19-21, 1990
Nicholas of Cusa’s De vision Dei
The Second Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 21-23, 1988
Nicholas of Cusa’s De ludo globi
The First Biennial Gettysburg Conference
October 24-26, 1986
Nicholas of Cusa’s De pace fidei