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SYNODALITY: Envisioning the Future of the Church
March 27 - March 28
A conversation on the significance and future of synodality as the structure and service of the Christian Church. The conference will convene Roman Catholic Church and Orthodox theologians from New England, the United States, and internationally to discuss the history and vision of the synodal system through the centuries as well as to assess how it should impact the wider ecumenical church.
2024 SYNODALITY: Envisioning the Future of the Church Conference Schedule
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
6.30 PM | Registration & Refreshments
7.00 PM | Most Rev. Dr. Metropolitan Job of Pisidia, Keynote Speaker | Fr. John Chryssavgis, Chair
His Eminence Metropolitan Job of Pisidia is the Orthodox co-chairman of the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. Metropolitan Job is Dean of the Patriarchal Institute of Graduate Studies in Orthodox Theology (Geneva, Switzerland).
Thursday, March 28, 2024
9.00 AM | Registration
9.30-11.00 AM | Session I | Synodality and the Global Community
Panelists: Dr. Moira McQueen, Dr. Massimo Faggioli, Rev. Dr. Alexis Torrance | Presv. Maria Drossos, Chair
Dr. Moira McQueen, LL. B, M.Div., Ph.D., DSL (Hon.) taught moral theology at St Michael’s Faculty of Theology, University of Toronto, until 2022 and is the Executive Director of the Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute. She authored the award-winning book Matters, Bioethics Matters (re-published 2023) and Walking Together: A Primer on the New Synodality, in 2022. She was the Canadian lay representative at the Second Synod on Marriage and the Family, in 2015, and served on the International Theological Commission, 2014-19.
Dr. Massimo Faggioli is a Professor of Historical Theology at Villanova University. His publications include The Liminal Papacy of Pope Francis. Moving Toward Global Catholicity (2020) and The Oxford Handbook of Vatican II (2023), which he co-edited with Catherine Clifford. He is a member of the steering committee for the project “Vatican II: Legacy and Mandate” for the intercontinental commentary of Vatican II. He lives in the Philadelphia area with his wife and their two children.
Rev. Dr. Alexis Torrance is the Archbishop Demetrios Associate Professor of Byzantine Theology at the University of Notre Dame. He is a Protopresbyter of the Ecumenical Throne and serves as Orthodox Co-Secretary of the Joint International Commission for the Theological Dialogue between the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church. He recently authored Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ (Oxford University Press, 2020).
11.00-11.30 AM | Break
11.30-1.00 PM | Session II | Synodality and the Local Community
Panelists: Dr. Valerie Karras, Rev. Dr. William Clark, Rev. Dr. Cyril Hovorun | Rev. Dr. Philip Halikias, Chair
Valerie Karras, Ph.D., Th.D., has earned doctorates from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and The Catholic University of America. She has taught historical theology and church history at several institutions, including Hellenic College/Holy Cross, Saint Louis University, and Southern Methodist University. Dr. Karras has published numerous articles in edited volumes and peer-reviewed academic journals and has been involved in ecumenical consultations for the World Council of Churches. She served on the board of the North American Academy of Ecumenists and currently serves as vice president of the Interfaith Partnership of Greater St. Louis.
Rev. Dr. William Clark, SJ, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, College of the Holy Cross (Worcester, MA), received the Doctorate in Sacred Theology from Weston Jesuit School of Theology (Cambridge, MA ) and teaches courses in Catholic doctrine, church community, and Christian prayer. He is the author of A Voice of Their Own: The Authority of the Local Parish (Liturgical Press, 2005); A Theology of the Parish (Paulist Press, 2022); and co-editor of Collaborative Parish Leadership (Lexington Books, 2016).
Archimandrite Cyril Hovorun is a Professor of Ecclesiology, International relations, and Ecumenism at Sankt Ignatios College, University College Stockholm, and a Director of the Huffington Ecumenical Institute at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. He was a chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, first deputy chairman of the Educational Committee of the Russian Orthodox Church, and later research fellow at Yale and Columbia Universities, visiting professor at the University of Münster in Germany.
1.00-2.30 PM | Lunch
2.30-4.00 PM | Session III | Synodality and the Role of Laity
Panelists: Dr. Mary Ann Hinsdale, Dr. Robin Darling Young, Dr. Marcus Plested | Rev. Dr. Luke Veronis, Chair
Dr. Mary Ann Hinsdale, IHM, a native of Chicago, IL, is an Associate Professor of Systematic Theology at Boston College and a vowed member of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Monroe, Michigan). Professor Hinsdale has taught theology at the undergraduate, seminary, and doctoral levels for over forty years. Her specializations are Theological Anthropology, Ecclesiology, and Feminist Theologies. She is co-editor (with Stephen Okey) and contributor to the T & T Clark Handbook of Theological Anthropology (Bloomsbury, 2021).
Dr. Robin Darling Young is Ordinary Professor of Church History at the Catholic University of America. She has served on the Eastern Orthodox-Roman Catholic Dialogue and the Oriental Orthodox-Roman Catholic Dialogue. Prof. Darling Young is a member of the International Theological Commission of the Roman Catholic Church. She has translated and/or critically edited texts in the Armenian, Greek, and Syriac traditions of early Christianity, and was the chief editor and translator of Evagrius of Pontus: The Gnostic Trilogy (2023). She is currently at work on a monograph on the philosophy and ethics of Evagrius of Pontus.
Dr. Marcus Plested is a Professor of Greek Patristic and Byzantine Theology at Marquette University. He gained his doctorate from the University of Oxford in 1999 under the supervision of Metropolitan Kallistos Ware. He is a member of the St Irenaeus Joint Orthodox-Catholic Working Group. His most recent book was Wisdom in Christian Tradition: The Patristic Roots of Modern Russian Sophiology (Oxford: OUP 2022).
4.00-4.30 PM | Break
4.30-5.00 PM | Rev. Dr. Nicolas Kazarian, Closing Remarks | Fr. John Chryssavgis, Chair
5.00 PM | Chapel