HARVARD CATHOLIC FORUM

Fr. Clooney is a Jesuit priest who has taught at Harvard since 2005. During 2022-23, he was the President of the Catholic Theological Society of America. Fr. Clooney has written widely on the Sanskrit and Tamil traditions of India, on the Jesuit missionary tradition, and on the developing field of comparative theology, of which he is a leading figure worldwide. This discipline is distinguished by the attentiveness to the dynamics of theological learning deepened through the study of traditions other than one’s own. Among his dozens of publications, recent books include Reading the Hindu and Christian Classics: Why and How it Matters (2019) and Western Jesuit Scholars in India (2020). His PhD, in East Asian Languages and Civilizations, is from the University of Chicago. He serves regularly in a Catholic parish in Sharon, MA on weekends. Faculty Website.

Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Professor Girón-Negrón has taught at Harvard since 1997. His teaching and writing range over medieval and Golden Age Spanish literature; medieval, Arabic, Latin and Hebrew literatures; history of religions; and comparative literature. He serves as a Faculty Member of the Committee on the Study of Religion, the Committee on Medieval Studies, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, and the Center for Jewish Studies. In addition to about three dozen articles and reviews, Professor Girón-Negrón is the author of Visión Deleytable: Philosophical Rationalism and the Religious Imagination in 15th Century Spain (2001) and Las Coplas de Yosef: Entre la Biblia y el Midrash en la poesía judeoespañola (2006, with Laura Minervini). His current projects include an annotated edition and study of the 15th century Arragel Bible. His AB, MTS, and PhD degrees are from Harvard University. Faculty Website.

A priest of the Archdiocese of Boston, Fr. Hehir taught at Harvard from 1993 to 2021, first at the Divinity School as Professor of the Practice in Religion and Society, and then from 2001 at the Kennedy School. His research and writing focus on issues of ethics and foreign policy, Catholic social ethics, and the role of religion in world politics and in American society. In addition to his academic work, Fr. Hehir has served as President of Catholic Charities USA, and as Pastor/Senior Chaplain at St. Paul’s, Harvard Square. He is currently Secretary of Health and Social Services for the Archdiocese of Boston. He received a MacArthur Award in 1984 and the Laetare Medal from Notre Dame in 2004. Fr. Hehir is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. His ThD is from Harvard Divinity School. Faculty Website.

Professor Smith teaches courses in Late Antique, Medieval, and Italian Renaissance and Baroque architecture, and on the history of urbanism. Her research focuses particularly on church construction, liturgy and architecture, and pre-modern architectural theory and texts. Among other books, she has written The Baptistry of Pisa (1978), Architecture in the Culture of Early Humanism (1992), and (with Joseph O'Connor) Building the Kingdom: Giannozzo Manetti on the Material and the Spiritual Edifice (2006) and Eyewitnesses to Old St. Peter's: Maffeo Vegio's "Remembering the Ancient History of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome" (2019). Her current project is a book-length study on the experience of wonder as it relates to architecture. Her PhD is from New York University. Faculty website.

Professor Glendon, former U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See, began teaching at Harvard in 1987. Her writings address human rights, comparative law, and political theory. Among her many publications: The Forum and the Tower (2011), Traditions in Turmoil (2006), A World Made New: Eleanor Roosevelt and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (2001), A Nation Under Lawyers (1996), Rights Talk (1991), The Transformation of Family Law (1989), winner of the Order of the Coif Triennial Book Award, and Abortion and Divorce in Western Law (1987). Professor Glendon was President of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences (2003-13) and has represented the Holy See at various conferences including the 1995 U.N. Women’s conference in Beijing. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and received the National Humanities Medal. Her JD is from the University of Chicago. Faculty Website.

Professor Hankins has taught at Harvard since 1985. His work centers on the history of philosophy, theology, literature, and political thought. A specialist in the intellectual and cultural history of the Renaissance, he has been since 1998 General Editor of the I Tatti Renaissance Library. Among his dozens of publications, including edited volumes, articles, and book chapters, he has authored Plato in the Italian Renaissance (1990), Humanism and Platonism in the Italian Renaissance (2003-4), Virtue Politics: Soulcraft and Statecraft in Renaissance Italy (2019), and Political Meritocracy in Renaissance Italy: The Virtuous Republic of Francesco Patrizi of Siena (2023). In 2012, he was honored with the Paul Oskar Kristeller Lifetime Achievement Award from the Renaissance Society of America. His MA, MPhil, and PhD are from Columbia University. Faculty Website.

Born and raised in Sweden, Professor Öberg has taught at Harvard since 2013. Her specialty is astrochemistry and her research aims to uncover how chemical processes affect the outcome of planet formation, especially the habitability of nascent planets. She has published over 200 refereed articles, including in Nature and Science. Professor Öberg has been awarded the Harnack Lectureship by the Max Planck Society (2022), a Simons Investigator Award (2019), the American Astronomical Society's Newton Lacy Pierce Prize (2016), a Packard Fellowship (2014), and a Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship (2014). She is Board Member of the Society of Catholic Scientists and a frequent public speaker on questions of science and faith. Her PhD in astronomy is from the University of Leiden.

Professor VanderWeele has taught at Harvard since 2009. His writing and teaching address psychosocial measurement theory, psychiatric and social epidemiology, the science of happiness and flourishing, and the study of religion and health. In addition to publishing over four hundred papers in peer-reviewed journals, he has authored several books, including most recently Modern Epidemiology and Measuring Well-Being (both 2021). Professor VanderWeele has a B.A. in Philosophy and Theology as well as an M.A. in Mathematics from Oxford, an M.A. in Applied Economics from Wharton, and a PhD in Biostatistics from Harvard. Faculty Website.