On September 23rd and 24th two professors from this Department, Dr. James Cutsinger and Dr. Waleed El-Ansary, and a graduate student, James McKenzie, attended a conference, "Tradition in the Modern World," hosted by the University of Alberta and the scholarly journal Sacred Web. Dr. Cutsinger gave a presentation on "The Noble Lie" and Dr. El-Ansary contributed remarks provisionally titled "A Traditionalist Critique of Modern Economics" as part of a forum panel.

The conference was centered around the "traditionalist" school of thought which holds that the major world religions contain immutable and universal truths that point to the same absolute Truth. Traditionalism advocates the defense of these religions from the influence of reductionism, relativism, and secularism. The purpose of the conference was to promote these principles and their application to the modern world.