JP II INSTITUTE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION  C/O MARTIN DALY AVONDALE AMANA ESTATE BALLINA CO MAYO Phone 00 353 96 70222       E mail:

FRIDAY July 11th 

Registration:  6.00 pm  Ridgepool Hotel, Conference area.

Welcome:     7.15 pm   Martin Daly. Conference Co-ordinator

Keynote  address:

‘The New Evangelization, Catholic Moral Life in Light of Veritatis Splendor, and the Family’

7.30 pm       Professor William May

8.15 pm       Open discussion session 

8.55 pm       Session ends

SATURDAY July 12th
 
Session One: 

‘The Making and Sustaining of a Family as a Practice: A Sociological Response to Defamilialization’ 
 
9.30 am        Maria O’Shea, John Paul II Institute, Student.
 
9.45 am        Elizabeth Holmes
 
10.30 am      Open discussion 

11.00 am      Coffee/tea break 

Session Two 

‘Marriage and the Family in Cultural Renewal’ 

11.15 am       Augustine Des Mennu, JP II Institute, Student
 
11.30 am       Dr Joseph Atkinson
   
12.20 pm       Open discussion 

BREAK FOR LUNCH  1.00 – 2.15

Session Three 

‘Human Nature: What Human Nature?’ 

2.30 pm         Brian Harrington, John Paul II Institute, Student 
 
2.45 pm         Dr Gerard Casey.

3.30 pm         Open Session 
 
4.00 pm         Coffee/tea 

Session Four 

‘How Science Answers the Call in Humanae Vitae’ 

4.15 pm          Jane Campbell, John Paul II Institute, Graduate 
 
4.30 pm          Dr Philip Boyle and Jacqi Ascough

5.15 pm          Open discussion 
 
5.45 pm          Coffee/tea 

Final Session 

‘Evangelising the Culture’

6.00 pm        The Angelus. 

6.05 pm        Martin Daly, John Paul II Institute,Graduate
 
6.15 pm        Peter Garrett
 
7.00 pm        Open Discussion 

7.30 pm        Conference ends. Concluding Prayers

BIOGRAPHY OF SPEAKERS

JACLYN ASCOUGH

Jaclyn Ascough studied Communications in the University of North Texas.  She has lived in Ireland for the last eight years.  She holds a certificate in family planning from St. Joseph Healthcare and is a qualified Fertility Care Practitioner. She sits on the board of the Fertility Care Centres of Europe.  She is a lecturer on Child Development at the Nurture Institute, and also writes a monthly column for the Alive! newspaper. Mrs Ascough lives in Dublin with her husband and four children.

JOSEPH ATKINSON

Dr Atkinson is Assistant Professor of Scripture at the John Paul II Institute in Washington D.C. He has done extensive work in researching the concept of the domestic church. His most recent engagements have included a five-part lecture series on Scriptural Exegesis and Symbolic Reality at Seton Hall’s International Institute for Clergy Formation and the Research Report Theological Meaning of Water in the Old Testament. Dr Atkinson is an invited participant in a consultation on the Pontifical Biblical Commission document, The Jewish People and Their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible. He is the author of many works. He is married and has six children.

PHILIP BOYLE

Dr Philip Boyle studied medicine at University College Galway and has had extensive and varied postgraduate professional training in areas ranging from psychiatry to paediatrics. In October 1995 he travelled to America and studied the medical applications of Natural Family Planning under Dr Thomas Hilgers. He has since played a pivotal role in introducing this new science of Natural Reproductive Technology into Ireland, setting up his own practice in 1998, and further training 27 other practitioners. Dr Boyle has helped over 400 couples achieve pregnancy. He lectures in the Newman Institute in Ballina in anatomy and physiology and in the Theories and Methods of Natural Family Planning. He recently married. 

GERARD CASEY

Dr Gerard Casey is a lecturer in philosophy at University College Dublin, where he is also Department Head. His work has focused on a wide range of areas, from Thomistic philosophy to artificial intelligence. His many published works include: ‘Hopkins: Poetry and Philosophy’, ‘Human Rights and Natural Law’ and ‘Wittgenstein: World, Reality and States of Affairs.’ Dr Casey has been the recipient of many fellowships and is a founder member of the Fellowship for Irish Scholars. He is also a member of the American Philosophical Association, the American Catholic Philosophical Association, the Irish Philosophical Society and the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars. He is married with four children.

BERNADETTE FLANAGAN

Dr Bernadette Flanagan obtained her doctorate in psychology from the University of Ulster. Her thesis was on ‘Individualism and Attitudes to Love and Intimate Relationships among Irish Roman Catholic Teenagers in Northern and Southern Ireland.’ She also holds primary and master’s degrees in Sociology and Education. Dr Flanagan lectures in psychology at the Newman Institute in Ballina. She ran pre-marriage courses and conducted parenting courses in the Derry diocese, and also worked as a Crisis Pregnancy Counsellor with LIFE in Derry for two and a half years. She is married and has five children and three grandchildren.

PETER GARRETT

Peter Garrett was educated at Oxford and has been Director of Research and Education at Life UK since 1993. He also studied theological ethics for four years in London, focusing on the areas of bioethics and the new reproductive technologies. He lectures widely and has published a number of works on these and related issues. Mr Garrett is the founder of the Movement Against the Cloning of Humans and a member of National Association of Catholic Families. He is a visiting lecturer at the Newman Institute in Ballina, where he lectures on bioethics. He is married and has five children, and they are currently expecting a sixth.

ELIZABETH HOLMES

Elizabeth Holmes studied English Language and Literature at University College, Dublin and then worked with a Catholic publishing company in London. The desire to participate in the wider community led her back to further studies at UCD, this time focusing on how social thinkers understand and interpret the modern world. As a visiting lecturer to the Newman Institute in Ballina she taught a course on Sociology. Now living in France Mrs Holmes, in addition to running a family business, is currently reading for a doctoral thesis, which will focus on Alasdair MacIntyre's philosophical and sociological argument that social thinkers (and the policy makers they influence) articulate and promote a way of life that, while defended as rational and just, is often not conducive to the common good. She is married with four sons. 

WILLIAM MAY

Dr William May is the Michael J. McGivney Professor of Moral Theology at the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family in Washington D.C.  He is an internationally renowned theologian and ethicist and is the author of many books. He has spent his life studying the moral teachings of the Catholic Church, and has devoted his considerable expertise to articulating and transmitting the vision of Pope John Paul II regarding the human person and the institutions in which he flourishes, marriage and the family. To this end, Dr May frequently lectures in these areas around the world. He is married with seven children, and ten grandchildren.