INSTITUTE ON RELIGION AND PUBLIC LIFE INC
9 E 40TH ST FL 10, New York, NY 10016 www.firstthings.com

---

Organizations Filed Purposes: The Institute on Religion and Public Life is an interreligious, nonpartisan research and educational 501(c)(3) organization. The Institutes mission is to articulate a governing consensus that supports:- a religiously pluralistic society that defends human dignity from conception to natural death.- a democratic, constitutionally ordered form of government supported by a religiously and morally serious culture.- a vision of freedom that encourages a culture of personal and communal responsibility.- loyalty to the Western tradition that provides a basis for responsible global citizenship.The Institutes flagship program, First Things magazine, is the leading intellectual journal of its kind in the United States. In addition to publishing ten issues of First Things each year, the Institute hosts educational programs that promote religiously informed analysis of culture, society, theology, and politics.

The Institute on Religion and Public Life, Inc. is an interreligious, nonpartisan research and education institute whose purpose is to advance a religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society.

PUBLICATION OF FIRST THINGS MAGAZINEFIRST THINGS magazine, the Institute's flagship program, seeks to reach a broad public audience of religious believers and others concerned with the intersection ofreligion, culture, politics, and society. The magazine has a diverse and influentialreadership; from political leaders in Washington and industry executives in New York, to officials at the Vatican, protestant clergy, college students, teachers, and families around the country.Our primary audience is in the United States and have a large-and growing-body ofinternational readers, thanks to firstthings.com. In 2019, over 2 million web sessions originated from outside the US, representing 27% of total web traffic for the year. FIRST THINGS has also held international academic symposia in Europe and Asia.FIRST THINGS readers are engaged and active in our work. There are currently 40 independent, self-organized reading groups (Readers of FIRST THINGS, or ROFTers) that regularly meet to discuss FIRST THINGS content and act as ambassadors for our mission in their communities. An additional 55 ROFTers groups are currently forming in countries around the world including Austrailia, Canada, Colombia, Israel, Italy, and Japan.FIRST THINGS magazine is published ten times a year, with an average printcirculation of over 28,000. The magazine can be accessed via Android, iPad, Kindle,and Nook, as well as on firstthings.com.Firstthings.com complements and extends the reach of the print magazine. The site has a large-and growing-readership. In 2019, firstthings.com received 12 million pageviews from 3.9 million unique visitors. FIRST THINGS also maintains anactive social media presence, with new content posted multiple times each day. Themagazine currently has over 134,000 Facebook and Twitter followers.

EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS Beyond print and online publications, FIRST THINGS educational programs are a longstanding, and ever growing, commitment. The Institute believes strongly thatcreating a visible community of believers is an important part of accomplishing ourmission. Each year the Institute sponsors and hosts a variety of educational eventsand academic colloquia in order to engage our friends, subscribers, nationalinfluencers, as well as noted scholars and promising students.Three Major Accomplishments in the Past 12 Months:1. Continued strength of FIRST THINGS seminar program in New York and additional expansion to other states: The inaugural FIRST THINGS Intellectual Retreat was held in New York City in 2015, titled "The Paradox of Freedom." Interest in the seminar was remarkably strong and enrollment was at capacity.Given the success of the first retreat the program has expanded every year since to other cities in the US. In addition to the now annual retreat in New York City, FIRST THINGS has hosted retreats in Los Angeles, Waco, Philadelphia, and Washington DC to meet the demand among readers in those regions of the country. The themes and assigned readings for the retreats vary and have covered topics such as Economics and the Human Person, The Life of the Mind, The Political Life, The Good of Marriage, Love and Friendship, the Common Good and the Search for Happiness. The retreats commonly gather together 50-100 in-person participants.Feedback from retreats has been exceptionally positive. One participant wrote thatthe retreats were "absolutely wonderful. Readings were inspiring. Teachers wereknowledgeable and very good at getting discussion going and moving to anothersubject. The attendees were so smart and open to learning and love God." Anotherremarked, "I've participated in quite a few events in the last few years and this one was planned and executed on par with the quality we experience each month with the magazine."2. Publishing the Best Writing on Religion, Culture, and Society: In a time whenprint journalism is struggling, FIRST THINGS subscriptions continue to rise. Oursuccess can be credited to consistently publishing the best writing on religion,culture, and society in ten issues of FIRST THINGS magazine each year and daily atfirstthings.com.FIRST THINGS continues to provide a clarifying voice amidst the noise ofour current political and cultural environment. We provided readers with substantivepieces that examined the deeper historical, religious, and cultural roots of issuesbeing debated .True to our name, FIRST THINGS continued to put politics and culture intoperspective. Politics is an end for human endeavors, but not our first or ultimateend. Our work reflects this truth.3. The 32nd Annual Erasmus Lecture in New York: The 32nd annual Erasmus Lecture wasdelivered by noted theologian N.T. Wright. He has served as Bishop of Durham in the Church of England and is one of the world's leading Bible scholars. He now serves as chair of New Testament and Early Christianity at the School of Divinity at the University of St. Andrews. For twenty years he taught New Testamant studies at Cambridge, McGill, and Oxford Universities. He is best known for his academic and popular work on Jesus and Paul, having published over 80 books and many hundreds of articles.Professor Wright's lecture was titled "Loving to Know." It was presented before an audience of more than 450 and livestreamed to thousands of viewers. The lecture was the latest in the prestigious series held in New York, each year presenting an exceptional thought leader. Previous Erasmus lecturers have included Pope Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Josef Ratzinger), Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Dana Giola, Ross Douthat, Russell Moore, Bishop Robert Barron, and Rmi Brague among many other noteworthy speakers. The lecture also appears in the pages of First Things and on firstthings.com.

---

---

Data for this page was sourced from XML published by IRS (public 990 form dataset) from: https://s3.amazonaws.com/irs-form-990/202033159349302598_public.xml