Professor Mark Shiffman and Professor James Matthew Wilson on May 2, 2024 at the University Club of Chicago.

In his new book, "What is Ideology?", political theorist Mark Shiffman has studied the history of the concept and identified it as a distinctly modern phenomenon. Shiffman argues that ideological thinking attempts to subject all reality to a narrow and reductive schema in order to produce a redemptive social-political order and engineer a new type of human being. Moreover, he explains how our own imprecise use of the term makes us even more susceptible to ideological control.

Shiffman discussed these topics with poet and cultural critic James Matthew Wilson. They traced the history of the term ideology, discuss its deforming effects on political life and the soul, and suggest how “non-ideological thinking” can be restored by drawing on resources from the classical and Christian traditions of philosophy, theology, art, and literature.

What is Ideology? A Conversation with Mark Shiffman and James Matthew Wilson

Judges (Episode 5/7)

Ezekial and Daniel (Episode 1/1)

Elijah (Episode 1/1)

Judges (Episode 6/7)

Judges (Episode 7/7)

Amos and Hosea (Episode 1/1)

Isaiah (Episode 1/2)

Isaiah (Episode 2/2)

Jeremiah (Episode 1/1)

Author Paul Kingsnorth and Professor James Matthew Wilson on September 25, 2025 at the University Club of Chicago.

“Our culture is not in danger of dying; it is already dead, and we are in denial.  This, now, is the reality we have to wrestle with—and transcend.”

We all experience how the rapid advance of technology, especially AI, has affected the way we live, think, and experience the world. But has it also changed who we are? In his new book, "Against the Machine: on the Unmaking of Humanity," Paul Kingsnorth explores the consequences of hyper-technologized society. With the deftness of an essayist who is also a poet, Kingsnorth takes us through the historical and theological roots of post-Industrial Revolution advancement. He ultimately suggests that the dangers we face have a spiritual cause, and spiritual consequences. “If you knock out the pillars of a sacred order,” he writes, “the universe itself will change shape.” This technological reshaping will lead man to become the machine—unless we can learn to transcend it.

A Spiritual Manual for the Technological Age: A Discussion of Paul Kingsnorth's Against the Machine

The Lumen Christi Institute for Catholic Thought was founded by Catholic scholars at the University of Chicago in 1997 to bring the light of Christ and the Catholic intellectual and spiritual tradition to the secular academy and the general public. On this station we make available our many lectures and programs, as well as interviews with visiting scholars.

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What is Ideology? A Conversation with Mark Shiffman and James Matthew Wilson

The Lumen Christi Institute

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