Keynote Speakers & Sessions


Joseph Hollcraft - edited copyDr. Joseph Hollcraft

Thursday, April 10 at 3:00 PM Central

Saturday, April 12 at 9 AM Central 

Dr. Joseph Hollcraft has taught at the middle school, high school, and university levels. He was also a Catholic radio host and apologist for fifteen years. Currently, Joseph Hollcraft is a Professor and Director of the High Calling Program at the Avila Institute.

Dr. Hollcraft is the author of A Heart for Evangelizing (Emmaus Road, 2016) and Unleashing the Power of Intercessory Prayer (Sophia Institute, 2020). Joseph has been seen on EWTN Live with Fr Mitch Pacwa, SJ, and Women of Grace with Johnette Williams. Dr. Hollcraft regularly contributes to multiple Catholic online journals and is frequently heard on Catholic radio airwaves discussing spiritual theology.

Joseph earned his B.A. and M.A. from the Franciscan University of Steubenville and received his Ph.D. from Graduate Theological Foundation with studies completed at Oxford University.

Most importantly, Joseph is a devoted husband and father. He lives in Canal Fulton, OH, with his beautiful wife Jackie and their four children: Kolbe, Avila, Isaac, and Siena.


Sakowski photoFr. Derek Sakowski

Thursday, April 10 at 5:00 PM Central

Friday, April 11 at 5:00 PM Central

Saturday, April 12 at 5:00 PM Central

Fr. Derek Sakowski spent four years in Rome getting his doctorate in Ecclesiology, and then eleven years as Pastor of St. Mary’s and St. Raymond’s parishes. Since 2017, he's been on quite a journey of spiritual and emotional healing. He discovered that he has a story, and began exploring it with curiosity and no small amount of grieving. He realized how much he has been engaging in “spiritual bypass” and shame-fueled perfectionism – putting lots of pressure on himself and even praying a lot, but avoiding some of the places of deepest heartache in his story.

Since 2020, he's undergone and continue to undergo trainings in the area of addictions and trauma – all of which emphasize the principle that you cannot lead anyone else where you yourself have not been willing to go. The more fully, courageously, and truthfully that he has engaged his own story, the more he has been astounded at how much Jesus opens up a safe space for others to seek and find meaning amidst their own pain and struggles.

Fr. Derek is now Director of the “Rebuild My Church” Initiative for the Diocese of La Crosse. The first couple of years have prioritized the renewal of their priests, beginning with their own human growth. It is incredibly exciting that several priests in our Diocese as well as in other places are eager and interested in engaging their story and becoming brave shepherds who, like Jesus, have gone there first. In due time, he hopes to expand the renewal to all the faithful and institutions in their diocese.

He enjoy hiking, nature, nerdy board games, and deep conversations. Middle Earth and Narnia feel like second homes to him. He is a sucker for 80’s nostalgia, and absolutely love the TV series Psych


Ralph Headshot 6 plain background 2019-1-2Dr. Ralph Martin

Thursday, April 10 at 7:00 PM Central

Ralph is the president of Renewal Ministries (www.renewalministries.net), an organization devoted to Catholic renewal and evangelization. Renewal Ministries is the sponsor of “The Choices We Face” a widely viewed weekly Catholic television and radio program distributed throughout the world and engages in a wide variety of mission work in more than 30 countries.
 
He is also the Director of Graduate Theology Programs in Evangelization and a professor of theology at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in the Archdiocese of Detroit (www.shms.edu). He holds a doctorate in theology from the Angelicum University in Rome.
 
Pope Benedict XVI appointed Ralph as a Consultor to the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization where he served a 12-year term. He was also appointed as a theological expert for the Synod on the New Evangelization.
 
He is the author of the widely read The Fulfillment of All Desire: A Guidebook for the Journey to God Based on the Wisdom of the Saints, and many books on spirituality and evangelization as well as many articles in scholarly and popular publications.. His latest book is A Church in Crisis: Pathways Forward.
 
He and his wife Anne reside in Ann Arbor, Michigan and are parents of six and grandparents of nineteen.
 

Fr Chris ClayFr. Chris Clay

Friday, April 11 at 9:00 AM Central

Father Chris Clay is chaplain of Legatus’ Lexington Chapter and pastor of St. Leo Church in Versailles, KY.

He grew up in the Lexington suburb of Paris, the fifth of eight children. His father was part of the family business of breeding thoroughbreds for the horse racing industry. The family practiced their Catholic faith, and an aunt and an uncle were part of religious communities.
 
Father Clay was managing editor of a horse race industry publication before entering the seminary. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Lexington in 2007 and is now in his fourth parish assignment. The Lexington Diocese serves 50,000 Catholics with 50 priests.
 

Fr Jacob Powell-1Fr. Jacob Powell

Friday, April 11 at 11:00 AM Central

Father Powell is a native Texan who grew up in a Roman Catholic family. He is one of four children who attended a non-denominational school with very few Catholics. He began learning and loving his Faith through numerous faith-based discussions with friends and teachers. Through prayer and study, he discerned a call to the priesthood. After a year of college at Texas Tech University, he joined the Conventual Franciscans in the St. Bonaventure Province. After nearly two years of further discernment, he left the order and returned to Texas Tech University for another year of education. By the end of that year, he decided to join the Diocese of Lubbock, Texas. He was sent to St. Charles Borromeo Seminary for two years to finish his degree in Philosophy. His bishop sent him to St. Mary's Seminary in Houston, Texas to complete his formation and Theological studies. In 2017 he was ordained a Catholic priest for the Diocese of Lubbock. He served as a parochial vicar for two years before being made a pastor. He has served 10 parishes in his diocese as priest. He continues to serve as pastor within his diocese.


lillesDr. Anthony Lilles

Friday, April 11 at 1:00 PM Central

Saturday, April 12 at 1:00 PM Central

The son of a California farmer, I am married with three young adult children. This is where I have learned to pray - in the real trials and joys of family life. Life is wild that way. I find myself needing to write this blog on prayer because every day it is as if I must, by God's grace, make a new beginning in my own life of prayer.


Over the years, these efforts to begin to pray have unfolded into a journey, a search for God who discloses Himself to us in the hiddenness of faith. In this quest, I have found that the Lord not only encourages and consoles, but He also questions and even admonishes - all of this because He yearns for a real friendship with each of us.  This friendship requires faithfulness and dedication, an ongoing struggle through all kinds of trials and difficulties.

God is bringing to perfection his work in us, but not really in a way that is easy to talk about.  Instead, failure and a sense of inadequacy are our frequent companions. But this does not surprise me.

What constantly surprises me is the remarkable ways God's love turns even our weakness into avenues of deeper communion with Him.  Beginning to pray is a spiritual pilgrimage which has made all the difference in my own life.  It is a response to the Lord's loving presence. Even a spark of desire for God begins a great spiritual pilgrimage - and these reflections are meant to be a little simple encouragement from one pilgrim to another.

After walking El Camino de Compostela in 2014, we moved to California where I serve as Academic Dean at Saint John's in Camarillo and Academic Adviser for the men at Juan Diego House.  I also teach spiritual theology in the graduate program of at the Avila Institute of Spiritual Formation.


Sr Deirdre ByrneSr. Deirdre Byrne

Friday, April 11 at 3:00 PM Central

Sister Deirdre Byrne is an active missionary sister and superior of her community in Washington, DC. She is double board-certified in family medicine and general surgery. A native of the Washington, D.C. area, Sister Deirdre (known to many as Sister DeDe) is one of eight siblings, attended Langley High School, and graduated from Virginia Tech. After college, Sister DeDe followed in her thoracic surgeon father’s footsteps and entered medical school at Georgetown University, where she eventually completed a surgical residency. During that time she also joined the Army. After a life of medical and military service in far ranging areas, she was led to the Little Workers of the Sacred Hearts community, whose charism involves sisters placing each and every person they care for between the Heart of Jesus and Mary. Her apostolate has been performing overseas medical missionary surgery and providing free medical care for the poor and uninsured. The over 125-year-old community includes 400-500 members. By 2000, the board-certified Dr. Byrne made her commitment to the Little Workers and began her novitiate training in earnest.

Sister DeDe retired with the rank of Colonel from the United States Army in 2009 after 29 years of service in the military. Over the years, Sister Deirdre has found it easy to integrate her medical and military service into her religious vocation. Though comfortable in scrubs, she wears a full black or a white working habit when she can and is grateful for the impact it has on those to whom she ministers. Currently, she is the superior of the D.C. Little Workers of the Sacred Hearts house near Catholic University, where the sisters run a pro-bono physical therapy clinic and diabetic eye clinic, retirement home for her elderly sisters as well as a music school pre-school children.


Bishop Liam CaryBishop Liam Stephen Cary

Friday, April 11 at 7:00 PM Central

Early Life and Family
Liam Cary was born in Portland, Oregon, in 1947, the first of John and Patricia Cary's four children. In 1950 the family moved to Prineville, where John Cary took up the practice of dentistry and Liam attended Ochoco Grade School and Prineville Junior High School.

Academics
He entered Mount Angel Seminary in 1961, graduating from high school there in 1965 and from college in 1969.  After a year of theology at St. Patrick's Seminary in Menlo Park, California, in 1970 he took a leave of absence that lasted eighteen years.  In that time he spent three years in a Chicago legal aid office as a VISTA volunteer, studied Spanish for a summer in Mexico, worked at a farm-worker medical clinic in California, and painted houses in Portland and Eugene.  Involvement in parish ministry at St. Mary's in Eugene led him back to the seminary in 1988.

Priestly Life
He was sent to the North American College in Rome, where he received a Licentiate in Moral Theology from the Gregorian University in 1992, the year he was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon on September 5.  He served at St. Joseph's in Salem from 1992 to 1994, when he was named Vocations Director for the Archdiocese of Portland and chaplain to the Sisters of St. Mary of Oregon in Beaverton. He was sent to Medford in 1998 and served as pastor of Sacred Heart Parish until July 2011, when he was appointed pastor of St. Mary's in Eugene.  Throughout his priesthood Bishop Cary has been involved in Hispanic ministry.

Episcopacy
Pope Benedict XVI named Father Cary, pastor of St. Mary Church in Eugene, Oregon, as Bishop of the Diocese of Baker on May 18, 2012. The Baker Diocese includes over 68,000 square miles in Oregon and has a population of 526,760 people, of whom 34,375, or seven percent, are Catholic. There are 36 parishes and 23 missions in the Diocese of Baker.


Dr Mark Miravalle-1Dr. Mark Miravalle

Saturday, April 12 at 11:00 AM Central

Dr. Mark Miravalle earned his Sacred Theological Doctorate at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. He holds the Saint John Paul II Chair of Mariology at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, where he has been teaching since 1986. 

Dr. Miravalle is the founder and senior editor of Ecce Mater Tua, an international journal of Mariology research. He is also president of the International Marian Association, comprising more than 130 theologians, bishops, clergy, and laity worldwide who seek to promote Marian devotion and doctrine.

Well-known worldwide for his lectures on Mariology, Dr. Miravalle has addressed several episcopal conferences, including those of South India, Nigeria, Venezuela, and Costa Rica. He has also assisted bishops with preliminary investigations into reported apparitions.

Dr. Miravalle has spoken at numerous international conferences and has appeared on EWTN, National Public Radio, BBC, and Fox News.

Dr. Miravalle is the author and editor of over 20 books in Mariology and Spiritual Theology, including his most recent works, Meet Your Mother: An Introduction to MaryMeet Your Spiritual FatherAn Introduction to St. JosephTime to Meet the Angels, and Jesus In You: The Indwelling Trinity in the Souls of the Just.


Dr Margaret Turek2Dr. Margaret Turek

Saturday, April 12 at 3:00 PM Central

Dr. Margaret Turek is Department Chair and Professor of Dogmatic Theology at St. Patrick's Seminary & University in Menlo Park, CA. She received spiritual formation as a Carmelite for six years before undertaking graduate studies in Theology at the Dominican School of Philosophy & Theology and the University of Fribourg (Switzerland). Her most recent book is Atonement: Soundings in Biblical, Trinitarian, and Spiritual Theology (published by Ignatius Press). She is a sought-after speaker and teacher on topics that include the mystery of God the Father, Theologies of the Cross, and evangelization through fiction and film. She serves on the Editorial Board of Communio: International Catholic Review and the Advisory Board of The New Ressourcement Journal of Theology and Philosophy.


Bishop John Barres-2Bishop John Oliver Barres

Saturday, April 12 at 7:00 PM Central

The Most Reverend John O. Barres, STD, JCL is the fifth Bishop of the Diocese of Rockville Centre (Long Island, NY).  Previously, he served as the Bishop of the Diocese of Allentown (PA) from 2009 to 2016.  He is a graduate of Phillips Academy (Andover), Princeton University and the New York University Graduate School of Business, and holds advanced theological degrees from the Catholic University of America and the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome.   Bishop Barres serves on the Board of Trustees of the Catholic University of America.  His Episcopal motto “Holiness and Mission” is taken from Pope St. John Paul II’s encyclical Redemptoris Missio which emphasizes the universal call to holiness and mission in the Catholic Church.  It also expresses Bishop Barres’ commitment to Pope Francis’ emphasis on global Catholic missiology and evangelization and the call for a “missionary transformation” of Catholic parishes and every dimension of Catholic life and witness to the world.


Dan-Burke-lg copy-1Dan Burke

Saturday, April 12 at 8:00 PM Central

Dan Burke is the past President and C.O.O. of EWTN’s worldwide news network. He is presently the founder and President of the Avila Institute for Spiritual Formation, which offers graduate and personal enrichment studies in spiritual theology to priests, deacons, religious, and laity in 90 countries and prepares men for seminary in over 100 dioceses and priestly formation in three seminaries.

Dan is a best-selling author and editor of numerous books on authentic Catholic spirituality and hosts the Divine Intimacy Radio show with his wife, Stephanie, broadcast weekly on EWTN Radio. Past episodes can be found, along with thousands of articles on the interior life, at SpiritualDirection.com.

In his deep commitment to the advancement of faithful Catholic spirituality, he is also the founder of Apostoli Viae, a world-wide, private association of the faithful dedicated to living and advancing the authentic spiritual patrimony of the Church.

Most importantly, Dan is a blessed husband, father of four, grandfather of one—and grateful to be Catholic.


Breakout Speakers


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