January 29, 2021
Dear colleagues,
As we all know, the pandemic remains with us. The development of vaccines had given us hope that we could gather, as planned, this coming July. The uncertainty and uneven vaccine distribution combined with uncertainty about travel restrictions over the summer and current insecurity of funding for research travel and conferences have led us to make the decision to postpone the 16th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law for one more year.
With the approval of the university administration and ICMAC board, Saint Louis University will be pleased and honored to host the Congress July 17-23, 2022. Our intention is to keep the program as much the same as possible. Please be in contact with us in the coming months if you desire to remove your name from the program, add your name to the program (if you withdrew in 2020), or have a strong desire to change your paper topic.
In light of the sad but necessary decision to postpone the Congress in St Louis for a further year, the ICMAC Board has nonetheless agreed that we should still look to hold the 17th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law in summer 2024 in Europe (or beyond). Although we already received expressions of interest, these colleagues may wish to change their minds and we thought it prudent to issue a further call in the interests of transparency. At this stage, only an expression of interest (with institutional awareness and agreement) is required. It is likely that prospective hosts will be asked to make a fuller presentation to the Board in April 2021. Any interested individuals or groups are asked to contact Kate Cushing at k.g.cushing@keele.ac.uk by 15 March 2021 at the latest.
We will be delayed in experiencing our in-person community of scholarship and collegiality for one year longer, but we are indeed still a community of scholars. To that end, we are pleased to announce the addition to our website of a list of book publications by our participants since 2016. You may find the page here. If you would like to have a publication (books only) added to the page, please email us at icmcl2020@gmail.com.
This decision is in many ways disheartening for us, as we know it will be for many of you, but we are convinced it is the right decision under the circumstances. We look forward immensely to when we can gather in person and wish you well-being and flourishing in the meantime.
Sincerely,
Atria Larson and Steve Schoenig, SJ, Co-organizers, 16th ICMCL
Kathleen G. Cushing, President, ICMAC
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April 30, 2020
Dear colleagues,
We are pleased to be able to announce our new dates for the 16th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law. They are July 18-24, 2021. As announced previously, we intend to keep the program the same. We will re-invite those who had removed their name because of scheduling conflicts and/or lack of access to funding for July 2020. We will keep your name in the program unless you request that it be removed. In due time, we will release the updated program with the correct dates on each day.
We are grateful to the administration of Saint Louis University for supporting us and our scholarly community and for helping us secure these new dates.
We hope you all remain healthy and well, and it will surely be a great pleasure to see everyone when we gather, deo volente, in July 2021.
With all best wishes,
Atria Larson and Steve Schoenig, S.J.
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April 17, 2020
Dear colleagues,
We have made the difficult but necessary decision to postpone the 16th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law. We have the support of Saint Louis University to host the Congress next summer, 2021.
Refunds of registration and housing fees already paid are in process, and you may have already received a refund on your credit card.
New dates in summer 2021 have not yet been finalized, but we will communicate the new dates by the end of April. Our goal is to schedule the Congress in July 2021, as close as possible to the originally intended dates this summer.
We also intend to keep the program as close as possible to what it was planned to be. Your accepted paper or poster remains in the schedule for summer 2021 and will continue to do so unless we hear from you that you cannot attend in summer 2021.
Thank you for your patience as we navigate the changes to our plans. Please reach out with any questions, and we wish you all safety and health.
Atria Larson and Steve Schoenig, S.J.
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April 9, 2020
Dear colleagues,
This is a brief update, as we continue to gather advice and information about the feasibility of the Congress in light of the pandemic.
We are exploring the possibility of postponing the Congress to the summer of 2021 (ideally in late July). Our expectation is that a decision will be made, and any new dates will be announced, by the end of April.
We thank you for your patience, and we hope that you and your loved ones are staying healthy and hopeful. We wish you a blessed Easter, a season that celebrates the power of life over death.
Sincerely,
Atria Larson and Steve Schoenig, S.J.
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March 16, 2020
Dear colleagues,
We all have the coronavirus on our minds. The two of us and the ICMAC Board of Directors are in conversation about what impact this situation might have on the 16th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law. No decision has been made yet for any change to the program, but we are constantly reviewing the information available and the policies being put in place by Saint Louis University and the United States government. We will let you know immediately if a major decision is made. For now, we are hopeful that, by late July, circumstances will be such that the Congress can occur as planned.
At this time, we have made one change. We realize that many who have not yet registered will want to wait and see how this situation develops world-wide and in your own home countries, as well as in St. Louis, Missouri. As a result, we have postponed the deadline for registration. There will be no late registration fee until July 1.
We have also made the decision to delay the announcement of bursary recipients, so that no awardee feels pressured to make a decision at this time. All bursary applicants will receive an email shortly from Kate Cushing, president of ICMAC, with further explanation.
Thank you for your commitment to the Congress, and let’s hope that we can all still see each other in July.
Sincerely,
Atria Larson and Steve Schoenig, S.J.