Invited Speakers

A reason which is deaf to the divine and which relegates religion into the realm of subcultures is incapable of entering into the dialogue of cultures....Modern scientific reason quite simply has to accept the rational structure of matter and the correspondence between our spirit and the prevailing rational structures of nature as a given, on which its methodology has to be based. Yet the question why this has to be so is a real question, and one which has to be remanded by the natural sciences to other modes and planes of thought -- to philosophy and theology.

--Pope Benedict XVI
Regensburg Address (Sept. 12, 2006).

Check back soon for more information about our invited speakers.

Michael Baxter, Assistant Professor of Theology and Fellow of the Institute for International Peace Studies, specializes in theological ethics and the history of Christianity in America. A few years out of the Ph.D. program at Duke University, where he studied under Stanley Hauerwas, Baxter has already been recognized by the academic community with two distinguished fellowships, the Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship and a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for the Study of American Religion at Princeton University. He has published a dozen scholarly essays, including "Blowing the Dynamite of the Church: Catholic Radicalism from a Catholic Radicalist Perspective," "Catholicism and Liberalism," "Eruditio Without Religio?: The Dilemma of Catholics in the Academy," and "Is This Just War: Two Catholic Perspectives on the War in Afghanistan." Prof. Baxter has himself been extraordinarily active outside the academy. He helped found both a shelter and an employment service in the Phoenix area in the mid-eighties, and has delivered countless talks to non-academic groups, both in his capacity as a priest and as a participant in the Catholic Worker Movement. Most recently, in the autumn of 2003, he helped found a Catholic Worker House in South Bend.

Rev. David Burrell, CSC, Professor of Philosophy and Theology, Hesburgh Professor in the Notre Dame College of Arts and Letters and Director of Notre Dame's Jerusalem Program, specializes in philosophical theology, Islamic philosophy, and comparative theology. He is active in promoting understanding between the three major monotheistic traditions in the Middle East, and has done extensive research on the state of this relationship in the Middle Ages. The recipient of numerous research fellowships, including Woodrow Wilson and Fulbright awards, he has been a visiting professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and the National Major Seminary in Dhaka, Bangladesh. He is author of six books, including most recently Freedom and Creation in Three Traditions and Original Peace: Restoring God's Creations, many scholarly articles, and two major translations of the work of Al-Ghazali.

His Excellency Elias Chacour

Jude Dougherty is Dean Emeritus and Professor Emeritus at the Catholic University of America School of Philosophy. He has written or edited many books. His most recent books are Jacques Maritain: An Intellectual Profile (Catholic University of America Press, 2003) and Religion-Gesellschaft-Demokratie: Ausgewählte Aufsätze (Duncker & Humblot, 2003). Professor Dougherty has also written over 100 articles on topics in metaphysics, the philosophy of science, and social and political philosophy in English, Spanish, Italian, German, Swedish, and Polish philosophical journals and collections. Among Professor Dougherty's professional awards are honorary doctorates from The Catholic University of Lublin and Thomas More College. He was named a Knight of the Order of St. Gregory the Great by His Holiness John Paul II in 1999. Since 1971 Professor Dougherty has served as the editor of the important philosophical journal Review of Metaphysics. Professor Dougherty received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the Catholic University of America.

Jean Bethke Elshtain is a political philosopher whose task has been to show the connections between our political and our ethical convictions. She received her Ph.D. in politics from Brandeis University in 1973 and then joined the faculty of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. In 1988, she became the first woman to hold an endowed professorship in the history of Vanderbilt University. She was appointed to her current position at the University of Chicago in 1995 and has been a visiting professor at Oberlin College, Yale University, and Harvard University. Professor Elshtain was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996. Her books include Public Man, Private Woman: Women in Social and Political Thought, Meditations on Modern Political Thought, and Democracy on Trial. She has been a Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, a Scholar in Residence for the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Conference and Study Center in Como, Italy, and a Guggenheim Fellow. She is the recipient of the Ellen Gregg Ingalls Award for excellence in classroom teaching--the highest award for undergraduate teaching at Vanderbilt. She served as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton and is on the Board of Trustees of the National Humanities Center in Research Triangle Park in North Carolina. She also serves on the Board of the Illinois Humanities Council. Elshtain is a member of the Board of Advisors of the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture.

H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr. holds full professorships at both Baylor College of Medicine and Rice University and is a member of the Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy. He is the editor of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, co-editor of Christian Bioethics, co-editor of the Philosophy and Medicine book series with over sixty volumes in print, co-editor of the book series Clinical Medical Ethics, and editor of the series Philosophical Studies in Contemporary Culture. Engelhardt has authored over two hundred fifty articles and chapters of books in addition to numerous book reviews and other publications. There have been over one hundred twenty reprintings or translations of his publications. He has also co-edited more than 25 volumes and has lectured widely throughout the world. His books include Bioethics and Secular Humanism: The Search for a Common Morality and the second, thoroughly revised edition of The Foundations of Bioethics, which has appeared in Chinese, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish. A Chinese translation of Bioethics and Secular Humanism appeared in 1998. His most recent work is The Foundations of Christian Bioethics, which appeared in the summer of 2000. Engelhardt is a member of the Board of Advisors of the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture.

Wael Farouq is a professor of Islamic Sciences and Philosophy at the Coptic Catholic Faculty of Sakakini in Cairo. He proposes an original re-reading of the origins of Arabic reason in the book Dio salvi la ragione (May God Save Reason), which includes Pope Benedict's Regensburg lecture and his related homilies in Munich and Regensburg, as well as essays commenting or reacting to the Regensburg lecture. In January 2007, in response to Mgsr. Luigi Giussani’s book The Religious Sense, he contributed to a booklet entitled Broadening Reason in Traces, a communion and liberation international magazine.

Russell Hittinger is the William K. Warren Professor of Catholic Studies in the Department of Religion and Philosophy, at the University of Tulsa, where he is also a Research Professor in the School of Law . He has taught at Fordham University and at the Catholic University of America, and has taught as a Visiting Professor at Princeton University, New York University, Charles University in Prague, and at the Pontifical Università Regina Apostolorum in Rome, where he currently teaches and directs dissertations. Since 2001, he is a member of the Pontificia Academia Sancti Thomae Aquinatis (Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas), to which he was elected a full member (ordinarius) in 2004. He was elected to the consilium or governing board of the Academy in 2006. The theological, metaphysical, and anthropological foundations of natural law theory remain Professor Hittinger's abiding interest in the areas of teaching and research. This, of course, includes study and teaching of the secunda pars of Thomas's Summa theologiae . Since 2000, Professor Hittinger has turned his attention to the evolution of papal political theology and social doctrine. Having published several pieces of this work in this line of research, he is finishing a book that provides a synoptic narrative, entitled The Popes and the Desacralized Caesar: Roman Theories of the Modern State 1800-2000. In 2003, to mark the centenary of the death of Pope Leo, Professor Hittinger gave a lecture to Ministry of Culture of the Italian Government. In 2004 he gave “Secularity and the Anthropological Problem,” as the Inaugural Claude Ryan Lecture in Catholic Social Thought, McGill University in Montreal . In December 2006, he will address the President, Prime Minister, and Speakers of the Polish Parliament in the Royal Castle in Warsaw. His keynote address will culminate a week-long celebration of human rights and the Polish constitution. His many honors include the Josephine Yalch Zekan Award for the best scholarly article in faith and law and a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship for university teachers. Hittinger was a Visiting Fellow at the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture in Fall, 2000 where he researched the development of papal views of modern political, legal, and cultural liberties from the French Revolution to the present day. He also serves as a member of the Center's Board of Advisors.

Margaret Monahan Hogan is the Executive Director of the Garaventa Center for Catholic Intellectual Life and American Culture, the McNerney-Hanson Professor in Ethics and a professor of philosophy at the University of Portland. She has demonstrated her commitment to Catholic teaching in a variety of roles: as the founder of King's College Center for Ethics and Public Life, in numerous consulting positions (to the Bishop of Scranton, the Wyoming Valley Health Care System, and Allied Health Care), and as a wife and mother of six children. She publishes in the areas of medical ethics, business ethics, the intersection of the Catholic tradition and philosophy, and natural law. She also serves as a member of the board of directors of the Center for Academic Integrity at Duke University. Her most recent publication is "Legal, Ethical, and Public Policy Implications of Market Share Liability in DES Litigation," forthcoming in the Journal of Business Ethics. During her time at the Center, Professor Hogan worked on a second edition of Finality and Marriage, her 1993 study of the development of Catholic teaching in the twentieth century on the nature of marriage, the multiple goods to be accomplished in marriage, and the relation and proper characterization of those goods within marriage. She is currently collaborating with the Center's director, David Solomon, on a collection of case studies and commentaries in medical ethics and an edited collection of Notre Dame's J. Philip Clarke Family Lectures in Medical Ethics. Professor Hogan delivered the J. Philip Clarke Family Lecture on Medical Ethics entitled, "Bioethics and its Gordian Knot," at the annual Medical Ethics Conference in 2007. She has been an invited speaker for our "Culture of Death," "Culture of Life," "From Death to Life," "Formation and Renewal," "Epiphanies of Beauty" and "Joy in the Truth" conferences. She was Visiting Fellow at the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture, Fall 1999-Spring 2000.

Rev. Paul Kollman, CSC (B.A., 1984; M.Div., 1990, University of Notre Dame; Ph.D., 2001, History of Religions at the University of Chicago Divinity School) is an expert in the history of missions and missiology who focuses in particular on the church in Africa. His dissertation, "Making Catholics: Slave Evangelization and the Origins of the Catholic Church in 19th Century East Africa," was approved with distinction by the Reading Committee of the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. He held appointment at the University of Notre Dame as Erasmus Dissertation Fellow in 2000-2001, and at the University of Chicago, a Lilly Fellow for Theological Education in 1999-2000. He has articles forthcoming and has published reviews in such journals as The Journal of Religion and African Christian Studies.

Alasdair MacIntyre has written widely in philosophy since his first book, Marxism: An Interpretation, appeared in 1953. He has taught at Oxford University, Princeton University, Brandeis University, Boston University, Wellesley College, Vanderbilt University, Duke University, and the University of Notre Dame. In 1989 he was a Luce Visiting Scholar at the Whitney Humanities Center of Yale University. He has also served as President of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association. Professor MacIntyre is the author of over thirty books, including the influential triumvirate of recent works: After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition. He has made prominent contributions to the history of philosophy, moral philosophy, political theory, philosophy of the social sciences, and philosophy of religion. He recently published an examination of the philosophical work of Edith Stein set against the background of twentieth century phenomenology entitled Edith Stein: A Philosophical Prologue, 1913-1922, as well as two volumes of his collected papers, The Tasks of Philosophy: Selected Essays and Ethics and Politics: Selected Essays.

Ralph McInerny, professor of philosophy and director of the Jacques Maritain Center at Notre Dame, holds degrees from the St. Paul Seminary, University of Minnesota and Laval University. He has taught at the University of Notre Dame since 1955 and since 1978 has been the Michael P. Grace Professor of Medieval Studies. He is author of two dozen scholarly books and many more scholarly essays, as well as numerous general interest works. He is expert in the work of Thomas Aquinas, Soren Kierkegaard and Jacques Maritain, and has written and lectured extensively on ethics, philosophy of religion and medieval philosophy. McInerny is editor of an acclaimed series of translations of Aquinas's commentaries; for many years, he directed Notre Dame's prestigious Medieval Institute. In his spare time, he founded, edited and wrote for Crisis, a journal of lay Catholic opinion, and penned over fifty novels, including the well-known Father Dowling mystery series. He has appeared on William Buckley's Firing Line and National Public Radio, and has lectured in nine countries, spanning three continents. He has served as president of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, the Metaphysical Society, the American Maritain Society and the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars. He is a fellow of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. His Gifford Lectures, delivered in Glasgow in 1999-2000, were published under the title Characters in Search of Their Author (University of Notre Dame, 2001). He was recently appointed to membership on President Bush's Committee on the Arts and Humanities. Prof. McInerny is a member of the Board of Advisors of the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture.

Rev. Paulinas Odozor, CSSP (S.T.B., Urban University Rome/Bigard Memorial Seminary, Enugu, Nigeria, 1984; Th.M., University of St Michael's College/University of Toronto, 1989; S.T.L., Regis College, Toronto, 1990; Th.D., University of Toronto/Toronto School of Theology, 1993; S.T.D., Regis College, Toronto, 1994.) is a scholar of the foundational issues in moral theology/Christian ethics; history of moral theology; contextual theological issues, including questions pertaining to inculturation; theology and society; African Christian theology; and the theology of marriage. His major publications include: Moral Theology in An age of Renewal: A study of the Catholic Tradition since Vatican II (Notre Dame Press, 2003); Sexuality, Marriage and Family: Readings in the Catholic Tradition (Notre Dame Press, 2001), editor; Africa: Towards Priorities of Mission (Enugu: SIST Publications, 2000), edited with Elochukwu Uzukwu; and Richard McCormick and the Renewal of Moral Theology (Notre Dame Press, 1995). His articles have appeared in journals in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America. Odozor is currently working on a book that will explore the question of morality and tradition from an African Christian theological perspective. Before coming to Notre Dame in 1999, Fr. Odozor held numerous academic, administrative, and pastoral positions in Nigeria and Canada. He is currently president of the Governing Council of Spiritan International School of Theology in Enugu, Nigeria.

Rev. Khalil Samir, SJ is a is a Cairo-born Jesuit and recognized expert on the Muslim world. He teaches Islamic Sciences and Oriental Theology at Beirut's St. Joseph University, and holds courses in various European universities such as the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome. Father Samir is also a founder and leader of CEDRAC (Centre for Arab-Christian Documentation and Research). He is an ardent proponent of Islamic/Christian dialogue and has spent much of his life arguing for rights of Muslims, claiming that Islam denies the most basic of human rights. He is well known as the author of no less than 30 books and more than 500 articles (original studies and critical editions of Arabic texts), critical participant in the international debate concerning Muslim-Christian dialogue, and more importantly the enthusiastic and passionate promoter of the study of Christian Arabic Literature.

George Weigel, a Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, is a Roman Catholic theologian and director of the Catholic Studies program at the center. He attended St. Mary's Seminary College in Baltimore and the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto. Weigel taught at St. Thomas Seminary School of Theology in Kenmore before becoming Scholar-in-Residence at the World Without War Council of Greater Seattle, and later fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. From 1986 until 1989, Weigel served as founding president of the James Madison Foundation. From 1989 through June 1996, Weigel was president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he led a wide-ranging, ecumenical and inter-religious program of research and publication on foreign and domestic policy issues. In his present role as a Senior Fellow of EPPC, Weigel prepared a major study of the life, thought, and action of Pope John Paul II. Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II. It was published in the Fall of 1999 in English, French, Italian, and Spanish editions. Weigel is the author or editor of sixteen other books, including more recently The Truth of Catholicism: Ten Controversies Explored (HarperCollins, 2001), The Courage To Be Catholic: Crisis, Reform, and the Future of the Church (Basic Books, 2002), and Letters to a Young Catholic (Basic Books, 2003). He has also contributed essays, op-ed columns, and reviews to the major opinion journals and newspapers in the United States, and has appeared on numerous network television, cable television, and radio discussion programs. His weekly column, "The Catholic Difference," is syndicated to more than fifty newspapers around the United States. Weigel, who has been awarded six honorary doctorates and the papal cross Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice, serves on the boards of directors of several organizations dedicated to human rights and the cause of religious freedom. He is also a member of the editorial boards of First Things and Orbis, and serves as a consultant on Vatican affairs for NBC News. The Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture sponsored his talk, "The Legacy of Pope John Paul II" in February of 2001. That autumn, he was an invited speaker for our "Culture of Life" conference.

Ralph Wood, University Professor of Theology and Literature at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, holds B.A. and M.A. degrees from Texas A&M University at Commerce, as well as M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Chicago. From 1971 to1997 he taught at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he held the John Allen Easley Professorship in Religion. During the 1997-98 academic year, he was Distinguished Professor of Religion at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. At Baylor he teaches in the departments of English and Religion, as well as the Truett Theological Seminary. His major book, first published in 1988 and still in print from the University of Notre Dame Press, is entitled The Comedy of Redemption: Christian Faith and Comic Vision in Four American Novelists (Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy, John Updike, and Peter De Vries). He also serves as an editor-at-large for the Christian Century, and on the editorial board of the Flannery O'Connor Review. His most recent books are Contending for the Faith: The Church's Engagement with Culture (Baylor University, 2003), The Gospel According to Tolkien: Visions of the Kingdom in Middle-earth (Westminster John Knox, 2003) and Flannery O'Connor and the Christ-Haunted South (Eerdmans, 2004). His book on Tolkien has sold more than 25,000 copies, and he has been invited to give dozens of lectures on Tolkien and O'Connor at major universities and churches across the U. S. and Canada.

Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture
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