Plenary Speaker Dr. Denis McNamara will speak to the Church Music Association at Colloquium XXIV at 11 a.m. July 2 with an address entitled Liturgical Art and Architecture: The Essential Questions.
McNamara is assistant director and faculty member at the Liturgical Institute of the University of Saint Mary of the Lake, a graduate program in Liturgical Studies founded by Cardinal Francis George of Chicago in the year 2000, where he teaches courses on the Liturgical Movement, Liturgical Art and Architecture, Liturgical Inculturation, and Sacramental Aesthetics. He holds a BA in the History of Art from Yale University and a Ph.D. in Architectural History from the University of Virginia, where he concentrated his research on the study of ecclesiastical architecture of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Dr. McNamara makes a specialty of bridging the gap between the Church’s great artistic tradition and the documents of the Second Vatican Council. He has also done groundbreaking research on the sacramental meaning of the classical architectural tradition.
He has served on the Art and Architecture Commission of the Archdiocese of Chicago and works frequently with architects and pastors in church renovations and new design.
He has appeared on Catholic and secular television and radio and is a frequent presenter in academic as well as parish settings. His YouTube videos on Catholic art and architecture have received over 30,000 views.
Dr. McNamara is the author of numerous articles on art and architecture in Communio, Rite, Chicago Studies, Sacred Architecture, Environment and Art Letter, Assembly, The Priest, Homiletic and Pastoral Review, Letter and Spirit, The Classicist and Arris: Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians.
His book Heavenly City: The Architectural Tradition of Catholic Chicago (Liturgy Training Publications, 2005) appeared on the Catholic Bestseller List and won a Benjamin Franklin Award from the Independent Booksellers Association as well as two first place awards from the Midwest Independent Publishers Association. His 2009 book Catholic Church Architecture and the Spirit of the Liturgy (Hillenbrand Books), was honored in two categories by the Catholic Press Association and his newest title, How to Read Churches: A Crash Course In Christian Architecture (Rizzoli, 2011) and was published in English, German, Spanish, Romanian, Italian and French.
In August of 2013 he was invited to the Diocese of Christchurch, New Zealand, to educate clergy and laity and consult on the reconstruction of the diocese’s cathedral and parishes after two major earthquakes severely damaged the city’s historic buildings.
For more information about the Colloquium, the schedule of events and how to register, visit our webpage. If you have questions, write to us.