SGR Lecture Series: Philosophy for Theology with Rev Dr John Martis SJ

A 7-lecture series, hosted by the School of Graduate Research at St Paschal Campus (Box Hill, VIC) and online.

From 6–7 pm AEDT/AEST on the following Tuesdays in 2026

• 24 March Introduction: Philosophy and Theology & Plato: An Ideal Beginning
• 21 April Aristotle: Coming Down to Earth
• 26 May Descartes: The Turn to Self
• 23 June Hume and Kant: The Self-made Sovereign
• 25 August Hegel: Spirit Unchained
• 22 September Heidegger: Being in the World
• 27 October Postmodernism: Meaning Set Free From Hegemony

This free lecture series is hosted by the School of Graduate Research and is open to all members of the University of Divinity community.

Presented by Rev Dr John Martis SJ, the Philosophy for Theology series explores the philosophical underpinnings of some key theological turns in Christian history. Plato gives us the background against which the Hellenistic elements in the New Testament can be interpreted, with subsequent developments informing Augustine’s thought, and thereby, much later, Luther’s. Plato’s successors set scenes for others: Aristotle, for Thomas Aquinas; Kant, for the approach prompting nineteenth century liberal theology; Hegel, in a different way, for Barth; Heidegger, for Bultmann and Rahner; Derrida, for Caputo and other poststructural thinkers.

The series offers an encounter with the philosophers concerned, and their backgrounding of scriptural and theological perspectives of contemporaries and successors. It aims to help the student and researcher to place, and pursue further if needed, assumptions and perspectives philosophically and theologically backgrounding their own work. In the process, it raises critical questions about how philosophies and theologies form to shape thinking, including beyond scholarship, in faith and ordinary life.

Rev Dr John Martis SJ is a Jesuit priest and academic, and is a senior lecturer in Philosophy and Spirituality at the University of Divinity, and the Loyola Institute at Australian Catholic University. He is also a Province Consultor for the Australian Jesuit Province. His research interest includes a focus on subjectivity, developed in his recent publication, Subjectivity as Radical Hospitality: Recasting the Self, with Augustine, Descartes, Marion, and Derrida (Lexington, 2017).