Dr. Christopher de Vinck, a winner of two Christopher Awards celebrating authors examining the highest values of the human spirit, will present a free, public talk entitled “Things that Matter Most: Home, Friendship and Love,” when he visits Salve Regina University on Monday, February 13.
The Christopher Awards are given to authors who examine the highest values of the human spirit. Past winners of the Christopher Awards include Mary Higgins Clark, Art Linkletter, Robert Coles, Dave Brubeck, David McCullough, Mother Dolores Hart, Ernie Anastos, and Ken Burns.
De Vinck will present the spring 2023 Atwood Lecture in the Humanities at 4:30 p.m. in the Young Building, 508 Bellevue Ave. No advance registration is required.
De Vinck’s book “The Power of the Powerless: A Brother’s Legacy of Love” was selected by Christianity Today as one of the ten best biographies or autobiographies of the 20th century, a list that includes the works of C.S. Lewis, Thomas Merton, and Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn. The book tells the story of de Vinck’s brother Oliver, who had a severe intellectual disability, and Oliver’s life’s impact upon those who surrounded him.
De Vinck is the author of eleven books, and his essays on everyday life have been published in the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, Reader’s Digest, Good Housekeeping, The Chicago Tribune, The Dallas Morning News, The National Catholic Reporter, and used in high school and college textbooks as samples of good writing.
He delivers speeches on faith, disabilities, fatherhood, and writing and has been invited to speak at the Vatican. He is the father of three and lives in New Jersey with his wife.
Marjorie Atwood and the Donaldson Charitable Trust established the Atwood Lecture Series in 1981 as a tribute to her Salve Regina mentor and friend, Dr. Lubomir Gleiman in the philosophy department. Specifically, Atwood intended to bring inspirational speakers to campus who could speak about the intersection of faith and reason but do so with the flair of narrative and in a way that exemplifies the beauty of the written word.