May 29-31, 2025

Steubenville, OH 43952

The fifth annual New Polity conference takes “the people” as its theme and object of wonder. Motivated by the apparent victory of populism in the United States’ 2024 election, and inspired by the Holy Roman Pontiff’s love for Latin America’s “theology of the people,” this meeting of theologians, philosophers (and, let’s face it, preachers) is devoted to thinking deeply about "the people."

What makes us a people? Is it blood? Is it language? Is it love? Violent assertion? A shared history? Is the United States "a people"? How do "a people" get formed out of a mass, a crowd, a mob, a family, a village? And where does God enter into all of this? Does the Church, the universal People of God, negate or embrace the particular peoples that it liberates and saves? Can nationalism be redeemed? What about folk music? All of this is up for discussion and debate, the subject of our good humor and great conversation at New Polity 2025: Our Kind of People.

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Conference Price: $195 $150 Early Bird

We hope you can attend in person! Digital access will not be offered this year.

Rocco Buttiglione is Professor of political science at Saint Pius V University in Rome, and member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. He has served as a Minister for European Affairs and as the vice president of the Italian Chamber of Deputies. He is the author of the 1997 book: Karol Wojtyla: The Thought of the Man Who Became Pope John Paul II. His book Modernity’s Alternative: How History is Formed in the Depths of the People is forthcoming from New Polity Press.

Michael Hanby is associate professor of religion and philosophy of science at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family at The Catholic University of America. He is the author of No God, No Science?: Theology, Cosmology, Biology and Augustine and Modernity. He has contributed chapters to a number of volumes and is also author of several articles appearing in Communio, First Things, New Polity, The Political Science Reviewer, Modern Theology, Pro Ecclesia, and Theology Today. He was a principal author of The St. Jerome Education Plan, a nationally recognized curriculum for Catholic elementary and middle schools and is a founding board member of the St. Jerome Institute, a Washington DC liberal arts high school in the Catholic tradition.

Nicholas Healy is associate professor of philosophy and culture at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family at The Catholic University of America. Dr. Healy received his doctorate from Oxford University, with a dissertation on the theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar. He teaches and writes in the area of metaphysics, theological anthropology, and sacramental theology. Since 2002 he has served as an editor of the North American edition of Communio: International Catholic Review. He is a founding member of the Academy of Catholic Theology.

Andrew Willard Jones holds a PhD in Medieval History from Saint Louis University with a focus on the Church of the High Middle Ages. Jones’s work is primarily concerned with historical political theology and with the reconciliation of the post-modern with the pre-modern. Methodologically, his work treats history as a theological discipline and not as a secular archaeology. Jones is the author of Before Church and State: A Study of Social Order in St. Louis IX’s Sacramental Kingdom and the one-volume history of the Catholic Church The Two Cities: A History of Christian Politics. His most recent book The Church Against the State is available now from New Polity Press

Michael Maria Waldstein is a professor of the theology at Franciscan University of Steubenville. He has previously taught at Ave Maria University and the University of Notre Dame and was the founding president of the International Theological Institute in Gaming, Austria. His published works include a translation of John Paul II’s Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body, as well as numerous articles on the Gospel of John, Gnosticism, St. Thomas Aquinas, John Paul II and Hans Urs von Balthasar in such journals as Nova et Vetera, Communio, and Journal of Early Christian Studies. He most recent book is Glory of the Logos in the Flesh: Saint John Paul's Theology of the Body published by CUA Press.

Marc Barnes is a father of three, the editor of New Polity magazine, and the president of the Harmonium Project, a nonprofit dedicated to urban revitalization and transformation in Steubenville, Ohio.

Reuben Slife is one of the editors of New Polity magazine. In addition to preparing several edited volumes for New Polity Press, he has an article forthcoming in Communio on David L. Schindler's Catholic understanding of America. He is also the president of the Poor Players of Steubenville, a theater company. Reuben lives in Steubenville, Ohio.

This New Polity Conference we are introducing our inaugural exhibition baseball game. This conference, it’s New Polity vs. The College of St. Joseph the Worker. The reasons are simple: We can’t have a conference on “the people” without engaging in baseball, the primary cultural expression of the American people. We want to eat hot dogs and drink root beer with our boys. International visitors will leave edified.

New Polity has needed a baseball team for quite some time. It has been difficult to engage in disputes with our philosophical and theological enemies without the ability to challenge them to a ball game. Marc Barnes striking out: gratifying to onlookers, good for the deflation of his ponderous ego. Andrew Willard Jones Grand Slam: a good omen concerning the dissemination of the One True Political Philosophy. The game will take place Thursday evening at a Steubenville ball field.

On Saturday evening, we will have our annual Gala dinner. This time, a full catered experience at the beautiful third floor of Leonardo's Coffeehouse in downtown Steubenville. Enjoy an evening full of sensational food and company: eat a delicious meal, sip some wine, and help keep our humble mission to proclaim Catholic Social Teaching afloat. You can add your seat at the Gala when you register: just click “Add Gala Option” at checkout. Or if you've already registered for the conference, you can register here.