UPDATE: After the publication of this article, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles gave the following statement to LifeSiteNews: “Events at St. John Seminary are arranged by the seminary administration and staff. Any decision regarding the event is made by the seminary.”
(LifeSiteNews) — St. John’s Seminary canceled a lecture by Catholic philosopher Edward Feser because he was “too controversial.”
On February 13, Feser wrote on X: “I had been invited to speak later this month at St. John’s Seminary in Los Angeles. I have now been informed that the event is being cancelled due to complaints from unnamed critics who find me too controversial.”
The philosophy professor noted that while he got canceled the notoriously pro-LGBT Jesuit Father James Martin is allowed to speak at events in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles headed by Archbishop José Gómez.
“Meanwhile, the always controversial Fr. James Martin will be speaking this month at the Los Angeles Religious Education Congress, on the theme ‘Hope on the Horizon: LGBTQ Catholic Update 2026,’” Feser wrote.
“It appears that, for some in @ArchbishopGomez‘s archdiocese, Fr. Martin is welcome to speak about that topic to educators of Catholic youth, but I am not welcome to speak to seminarians about how to defend the Church’s teaching on the soul’s immortality.”
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Feser’s talk titled “The Immortality of the Soul” was scheduled to take place on February 24 at the St. John’s Seminary Conference Hall in Camarillo.
His cancellation was likely not due to the talk’s topic but to Feser’s outspoken criticism of modernism within the Church. He was critical of the doctrinal ambiguity and heterodoxy of Pope Francis and is especially well known for his defense of the licitness of the death penalty. His 2018 book, By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment. garnered international attention as Feser and his co-author Joseph Bessette became prominent critics of Francis’ surprise alteration to the Catechism of the Catholic Church regarding capital punishment.