What if life's greatest mysteries were familiar topics of conversation? What if perennial folk songs and dances were community pastimes? What if you could walk to work and church? What if it were easy to find a job that contributes to the actual common good? What if your food came from the soil of your own community?
This is our goal: the establishment or restoration of communities truly living Western Culture.
We believe this objective is within our reach. In an age when the construction of cathedrals took centuries, a town of fewer than 10,000 built the cathedral of Chartres in only 25 years. Even secular historians have admitted that the secret to this speed was that the community's love and resources belonged entirely to the Blessed Virgin. Plato summarizes it this way:
"If therefore there were some means of creating a city or an army of lovers and their loved ones, . . . such a force, even though few in number, would, so to speak, conquer all mankind."
According to Plato, the most perfect lover is none other than the student of a liberal education: stricken with wonder, he yearns madly for the Good Itself and stops at nothing until he ascends the steps of education and glimpses it himself.
We need you!
We are calling the mad lovers of the True, Good, and Beautiful to assemble and form an army. The liberal artist has inherited the skills and responsibility to lead others to culture. Having contemplated man's nature, glimpsed his end, and lived Western Culture, he knows where to go. Having fallen madly in love with the Truth through wonder, he has the will to overcome anything.
We want to enable these guides of culture to accomplish their work with as little difficulty as possible. What if there were a map showing the easiest path to take? What if there were a playbook of the best strategies to overcome obstacles? And what if we coordinated our efforts as a single force?
Through a symposium of lectures, discussions, song, dance, feasting, friendship, and liturgy with some of the greatest minds of the past and present, we will establish culture once again in our midst, renew our zeal for it, scheme the concrete steps and strategies for restoring it, and learn to coordinate our forces as a unit. Ultimately, we will return home confident, bold, armed and ready to take the world by storm with all the force behind us of an army of lovers.
We will take as guides for our conference the veterans who have already begun charting the unfamiliar path of the restoration of culture. Each lecture and seminar will revolve around readings from authors including the following:
We have reserved a block of rooms at the Inn at Lander with about a 30% discount for July 8-12th. There are three configurations to choose from (with limited availability):
We strongly encourage everyone to book a room in the Main Lodge in order to fully participate in the culture of the week. It will be easiest to guarantee one of these rooms, as well as the discount, if booking by phone.
Simply say you are with the Incola Conference, and ask for a room in the Main Lodge.
You may also book online: request the Main Lodge on the booking page, and use our group code, INCCONF26, to apply the discount.
Incola is a weeklong conference for professors, alumni, and lovers of the liberal arts. The substance of the conference will be lectures and discussions with distinguished speakers on texts asking what culture is and what are the steps to build or restore it. We will explore these questions also through panels, a call for papers, and conversations. This will all be situated in a convivial setting of feasts, song, dance, and liturgy, through which we will not only discuss the restoration of culture, but live it.
See the schedule below for more specific information.
Cost includes full access to all conference events and covers all meals for the duration of the conference.
Nursing babies and children 12 and older (if parents deem it prudent) may attend lectures and seminars.
Yes! There will be childcare available for all lectures.
To apply for a need-based scholarship, please write an email to incolaconference@gmail.com, and let us know a little more about your situation:
(1) Why do you wish to attend Incola, and what do you hope to gain?
(2) Are there any circumstances that make a scholarship especially necessary for you?
(3) How much of the total cost are you able to pay?
Once we have this information, we'll evaluate the circumstances and do what we can to make it possible for you to attend.
Feel free to email Nick and Catherine King and Kolya Sidloski at IncolaConference@gmail.com
Conference Organizer
Conference Organizer
Conference Organizer
Assistant Organizer
Assistant
Cook