Spirituality & Reason" Subject of February 9 Lecture

SALISBURY, MD---Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete, professor of theology at St. Joseph's Seminary in New York, talks about "Spirituality and Reason" on Wednesday, February 9, at 7 p.m. at Salisbury State University.

His lecture, which opens the spring lecture series, "Broadening the Conversation: Listening to Spiritual Perspectives," is in the Wicomico Room in the Guerrieri University Center. Admission is free and the public is invited.

Formerly associate professor of theology at the John Paul II Institute for Studies in Marriage and Family in Washington, D.C., Albacete is an expert on the philosophical works of Luigi Giussani. Albacete presented a series of lecture on Giussani's The Religious Sense before the United Nations.

"The modern age separated religion from reason," said Albacete, "relegating the spiritual to the emotional or psychological. The result has been the post-modern distrust of both religion and reason. And yet, we are currently experiencing a revival of interest in the spiritual, especially in the United States, where the situation has been described as a ‘spiritual delicatessen.'

"All this," Albacete continued, "while scientists decry the abandonment of reasons, but insist that the religious experience is an evolutionary development to environmental needs. Must we choose between reason and spirituality? What exactly is a spiritual experience?"

A native of Puerto Rico, Albacete received his B.S. in aeronautical engineering and his M.S. in science and applied physics from Catholic University. He then earned his Sacred Theology Bachelor from Catholic University before receiving his Sacred Theology Licentiate and Sacred Theology Doctorate from Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome.

Albacete's presentation is sponsored by SSU's Ad Hoc Committee on Spiritual Life and Cultural Affairs Council. For more information on Albacete's presentation, or a complete listing of cultural events at SSU this spring, please call the Salisbury State Public Relations Office at 410-543-6030.