Jesuit Cybernetics Culture Research Unit (JCCRU)

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This panel of the 2026 Patristics, Medieval, and Renaissance Conference seeks to explore and develop a new Jesuit Cybernetic critique of the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit (CCRU) (c. 1995–2000) for the purpose of renewing the hidden theological tradition of cybernetic theory in light of Trinitarian Ontology.

While the CCRU approached cybernetics as a secular and inhuman acceleration beyond the “end of philosophy,” the JCCRU seeks to recover a vision and style of the Church that is spiritually engaged with computing across the Jesuit tradition — from Athanasius Kircher to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin — and to reframe cybernetics' reciprocating feedback loops as radically centered upon Christ, the “divine pilot”. 

This panel aims to recollect the lost theological ancestry of cybernetics from Plato to the present, and particularly its most advanced religious formation in the Jesuit lineage from the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola and the combinatorial calculators of Athanasius Kircher to the “theo-dramatics” of Hans Urs von Balthasar and the “hyper-personal” apocalyptics of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. 

By contrasting this Jesuit lineage with post-Heideggerian cybernetics from Gilbert Simondon and Bernard Stiegler to Nick Land, Sadie Plant, Mark Fisher, and Reza Negarestani, we will discover whether this “cybernetic crisis” leads to the “end of philosophy” or heralds a new religious turn in cybernetics.

• Neo-Llullist Computing: The hidden theological lineage of computing from Ramon Llull and Athanasius Kircher to the post-Leibnizian hyperdigital grammar of computers.

• Ignatian Spirituality & Spiritual Organology: The Spiritual Exercises as a cybernetic practice of automating reflection, and its implications for a jesuitical “spiritual organology”.

• Teilhardian Christogenesis Beyond the Omega-Point: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s pneumatic evolution contrasted with inhuman varieties of teleoplexic accelerationism.

• Critiques of Post-Heideggerian and Post-Deleuzian Cybernetics: Re-evaluating Bernard Stiegler, Yuk Hui, Sadie Plant, Mark Fisher, Nick Land, & Reza Negarestani with the aid of  Ressourcement theologians such as Erich Przywara, Henri de Lubac, and Hans Urs von Balthasar.

• Trinitarian Ontologies of Computers: Formulating a “hyperdigital” grammar, a “digital analogy of being”, and the theological foundations for a Trinitarian Ontology of computers.

• The Cybernetic Crisis & The Future of Philosophy: Exploring whether computational automation seals the demise of philosophy or invites a new religious turn in cybernetic theory.

• Abstract Length: 200–300 words.

• Accompanying Materials: Curriculum vitae and or a biographical note.

• Submission Deadline: Sunday, September 13th, 2026 (Notice by 09/19/2026).

• Inquiries & Submissions: Please direct inquiries and submit abstracts to
  Dr. Ryan Haecker: rhaecker@methexisinstitute.org / www.methexisinstitute.com