Due to activities associated with the re-location of the Seminary’s campus, there will be no Symposium in 2024.
The next Symposium is tentatively scheduled for Thursday, May 22, 2025.
The theme for the upcoming World Communications Day (to be celebrated on May 12, 2024) is “Artificial Intelligence and Wisdom of the Heart: for a fully human communication.”
- The papal message about this theme was published on January 24, 2024 – the feast of St. Francis de Sales, patron saint of Catholic writers.
The annual symposium at Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary honors the legacy of Cardinal John Foley and his instrumental work in advancing communications in the Catholic Church as president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications from 1984 to 2007.
In particular, the symposium celebrates World Communications Day. The only global celebration called for by the Second Vatican Council, World Communications Day is celebrated on the Sunday before Pentecost (usually in May/June). The Cardinal Foley Symposium typically takes place on the fourth Thursday of May.
The symposium includes three components:
(1) a “town hall” focused on the papal message for World Communications Day … during which professional journalists and/or invited experts engage the public in a discussion of how the values expressed by the Holy Father can impact the contemporary world of mass media and social communications.
(2) a luncheon or social gathering for invited journalists and guests
(3) presentation of the Cardinal Foley Award … to a communications professional whose work exemplifies the positive potential of mass media to inform, instruct, and inspire others in the quest to build a more just world.
For information on previous celebrations, click on the links below:
- 2023 Foley Symposium – on the Future of Catholic Journalism
- 2022 Foley Symposium
- 2021 Foley Symposium (no program)
- 2020 Foley Symposium
- 2019 Foley Symposium
- 2018 Foley Symposium
- 2017 Foley Symposium
- 2016 Foley Symposium
