On Thursday, July 7, the Summer Institute opens its annual speaker series at the Martha’s Vineyard Hebrew Center with James Carroll. The series continues each Thursday throughout the summer, from 7:30 to 9 p.m.

Mr. Carroll is a historian, journalist and author of 19 books, both fiction and nonfiction. He served as a Catholic Chaplain at Boston University from 1969 to 1974, and then left the priesthood to become a writer. His Boston Globe columns won the 2012 Scripps Howard National Journalism Award for Commentary.

Mr. Carroll’s most recent nonfiction book is Christ Actually: The Son of God for the Secular Age, which will be the springboard for his talk.

The following Thursday, July 14, E.J. Dionne will be the guest speaker. Mr. Dionne is a long time op-ed columnist for The Washington Post and frequent commentator on politics for National Public Radio, This Week and Meet the Press.

For a full list of summer institute speakers, visit mvsummerinstitute.com.