Susan Abraham, Berkeley (USA)
President

Abraham is Vice President of Academic Affairs, Dean of Faculty and Professor of Theology and Postcolonial Cultures. Her publications and presentations weave practical theological insights from the experience of working as a youth minister for the Diocese of Mumbai, India, with theoretical perspectives from postcolonial theory, cultural studies, and feminist theory. Ongoing research projects include issues in feminist theological education and formation, interfaith and interreligious peace initiatives, theology and political theory, religion and media, global Catholicism, and Christianity between colonialism and postcolonialism.

Antony John Baptist, Bangalore (India)

Currently Director of NBCLC (National Biblical Catechetical Liturgical Centre), Bangalore, India, he is a catholic priest of the Diocese of Vellore, Tamilnadu, India. He has masters in History and Education. He has also earned a Licentiate at Pontifical Biblical Institute, Rome. He holds a Doctorate in Biblical Theology from the Department of Christian Studies, Madras University, India. He has served as the professor of Sacred Scripture at Sacred Heart College, Chennai and as the Executive Secretary of CCBI (Conference of Catholic Bishops of India) Commission for Bible. He taught as a Guest Faculty at Department of Christian Studies, (Madras University), Arul Kadal (Jesuit Regional Theologate, Chennai) and Khrist Premalaya Regional Theologate-Ashta in Madhya Pradesh, India. Presently he teaches as a guest faculty at Vidya Deep College (Bengaluru), Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram (DVK, Bengaluru) and St. Peter’s Pontifical Institute, (Bengaluru). His areas of study include Old Testament Exegesis, Narrative Criticism, Feminist Biblical Interpretation, Dalit and Subaltern Reading of the Bible. Some of his recent publications include: Together as Sisters: Hagar and Dalit Women (Delhi: ISPCK, 2012); Unsung Melodies from Margins (Delhi: ISPCK, 2014); Thus Spoke the Bible: Basics of Biblical Narrative (New Delhi: ISPCK, 2016); Planted by the Spring: Biblical Themes for Today (Bengaluru: ATC, 2018) and a number of articles in the national and the international theological journals.

Albertus Bagus Laksana, S.J., Yogyakarta (Indonesia)

Laksana currently serves as president of Sanata Dharma University, Indonesia. He previously was president of the Wedabhakti Pontifical Faculty of Theology in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.  He received his licentiate in sacred theology at Weston Jesuit School of Theology (Cambridge, MA) and PhD in comparative theology from Boston College (2011) with a focus on Muslim-Christian encounters. His academic interests and publications, both in English and Indonesian, include comparative theology, Asian theology, postcolonial theology, interreligious dialogue, and encounters between theology and social sciences and the humanities. He serves as editor for BASIS, an Indonesian journal of culture, and a number of internationals and book series.

Steven Battin, South Bend (USA)

Battin is Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of Notre Dame. His research interests focus on the intersection of theology with both social psychology and decolonial theory. Dr. Battin is the author of Intercommunal Ecclesiology: The Church, Salvation, and Intergroup Conflict (2022).

Michelle Becka, Würzburg (Germany)

 She was born in 1972, doctorate in Theology at the university of Tübingen; professor for Christian Ethics in the faculty of Catholic Theology of Würzburg University. Her primary research interests lie in the fields of social ethics, ethics and law; ethics in prison and prison chaplaincy and theological ethics and interculturality.

Bernardeth Caero Bustillos, Cochabamba (Bolivia)
Director

She is born in 1973, Doctorate in Theology at the Paris Lodron Universität Salzburg in Austria. Lecturer at the Instituto Superior de Estudios Teológicos (2008–2011) and Professor at the Facultad de Teología “San Pablo” (2012–2014) of Old Testament in Bolivia. Since 2015 research at the Universität Osnabrück in Germany as a scholarship holder of the Stipendienwerk Lateinamerika– Deutschland e.V. Research interests: Biblical Theology, Biblical Hebrew, Interdisciplinary Theology, Teología India.

Stan Chu Ilo, Chicago (USA)
Director

Stan Chu Ilo is research professor of global Christianity and African studies at the Center for Global Catholicism and Intercultural Theology at DePaul University, Chicago. He is an honorary professor of religion and theology at Durham University in England and a research scholar at the Institute of African Studies at the University of Nigeria. He is the 2017 recipient of the Afro-Global Excellence Award for Global Impact. He is the founder of Canadian Samaritans for Africa. He is the coordinating servant of the Pan-African Theology and Pastoral Network and the Regional Coordinator of the North American Working Group of a global project, Doing Theology from the Existential Peripheries, a special research project of the Dicastery for Integral Human Development. Some of his most recent books are: Church and Development in Africa (2014); A Poor and Merciful Church (2018); Wealth, Health, and Hope in African Christian Religion; (2019), and Someone Beautiful to God: Finding the light of Faith in a Wounded World (2020). He co-edited the three-volume Faith in Action in Africa (2020) ; and editor of Handbook of African Catholicism (Orbis Books, 2022), and African Ecological Ethics and Spirituality of Human and Cosmic Flourishing: An African Commentary on Laudato Si’ (Cascade, 2022).His forthcoming books are: Contested Identities: Critical Race Theory, LGBTQ+ Rights and the Battle of Inclusion in Catholic Schools(Cascade Books, 2023), and Health for the Poor: Catholic Global Public Health Leadership Beyond the Pandemic (Paulist Press, 2023).

Catherine Cornille, Boston (USA)

Catherine Cornille is Professor of Comparative Theology at Boston College, where she holds the Newton College Alumnae Chair of Western Culture.  She obtained her PhD from the Catholic University of Leuven, where she also taught from 1990 until 2000.  Her areas of research focus on Theology of Religions, Comparative Theology, Interreligious Dialogue, and Religious Hybridity.  She is the author of The Im-Possibility of Interreligious Dialogue (2008) and Meaning and Method in Comparative Theology (2020).  Her edited volumes include Many Mansions? Multiple Religious Belonging and Christian Identity (2002), Interreligious Hermeneutics (2010), The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Interreligious Dialogue (2013), Women and Interreligious Dialogue (2013) and Atonement and Comparative Theology (2021). She is founding and managing editor of the book series “Christian Commentaries on non-Christian Sacred Texts” which has published 10 volumes. 

Geraldo Luiz de Mori, Belo Horizonte (Brasil)

He was born in 1960 in Cachoeiro in Itapemirim, in the state of Espírito Santo, Brazil, and he currently lives in Belo Horizonte. Geraldo is a Jesuit professor of Systematic Theology in the Faculty of Theology and Philosophy (FAJE). He earned his Masters and Doctorate degrees in Theology from the Jesuit Faculty in Paris. Currently he serves as the Dean of the Department of Theology of the FAJE. His areas of interest include Theological Anthropology, Christian Eschatology, Pastoral Theology, Latin American Theology, mysticism, as well as the philosophical fields of Phenomenology and Hermeneutics. Geraldo served as the vice president of the Theological and Religious Sciences Society (SOTER) from 2010-2013, and he has been a visiting professor at the Catholic University of Louvain and the Jesuit Faculty in Paris. He is currently the general editor of the Digital Encyclopedia of Latin American theology www.theologicalatinoamericana.com He exercises pastoral ministry in the parish St. Francis Xavier.

Anne-Béatrice Faye, Dakar (Senegal)

She is religious of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception of Castres. She studied philosophy at the Catholic Faculties of Kinshasa from 1991 to 1995. Doctor of Philosophy at the Cheik Anta Diop University of Dakar in Senegal since 2005. Professor of philosophy at the Saint Augustin Center in Dakar and at the Grand Séminaire Interdiocésain in Brun. Member of the ATA (Association of African Theologians). Interested in the question of the promotion of women in the African context. Coordinator of the African Group for Research in Intercultural Philosophy (GARPI) Since 2012 is a member of the Academic Council of the Ecumenical Institute Al mowafaqa in Morocco – Rabat. She is also a professor of philosophy in the same Institute. After 5 years of mission in Rome as a member of the General Team of her Institute, she is since October 2013 in mission in Burkina Faso for the formation of young people. Member of the African Academy of Religious, Social and Political Sciences. Since June 2021, member of the Commission of Theologians for the synod 2023.

Luca Ferracci, Bologna (Italy)
Director

Luca is research fellow at the Department of Education and Humanities of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia and affiliated researcher at FSCIRE-Fondazione per le scienze religiose, Bologna. He is the editor of the multi-volume work A History of the Desire for Christian Unity. Ecumenism in the Churches (19th-21st Century), published in English by Brill and in Italian by Il Mulino. He is a member of the editorial board of the Bologna Studies in Religious History series, published in the Brill catalog. In 2020-2021 he taught Church History at the Theological Faculty of Emilia Romagna (FTER). His latest book is Battesimo Eucarestia Ministero. Genesi e destino di un documento ecumenico, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2021. The focus of his current research is on Ronald Reagan’s public diplomacy against Liberation Theology in Central America and at home. 

Margareta Gruber OSF, Vallendar (Germany)
Director

She was born 1961 in Germany. She did her studies in Tübingen, Jerusalem and Frankfurt/Sankt Georgen. Since 2008 she holds the Chair of New Testament Exegesis and Biblical Theology at the Philosophisch-Theologische Hochschule Vallendar (Faculty of Catholic Theology at the University of Vallendar, Germany), where she is presently the Dean. From 2009-2013 she held the Laurentius-Klein-Chair of Biblical and Ecumenical Theology in the German Academic Program at the Dormition Abbey in Jerusalem. Her field of research covers the Gospel of John, the Book of Revelation, Biblical Hermeneutics, Intertextuality, Exegesis and Biblical Spirituality. Since her time in Jerusalem her field of interest is also Bible in interreligious contexts; she is engaged in academic interreligious exchange. She is a Franciscan sister.

Leo Guardado, New York City (USA)
Director

Born in El Salvador, Leo is an assistant professor at Fordham University. His academic formation is in systematic theology and peace studies (University of Notre Dame), with a focus on forced displacement and migration from Central America. His first monograph is titled Church as Sanctuary: Reconstructing Refuge in an Age of Forced Displacement (Orbis, 2023). Other publications include “Sanctuary for Asylum Seekers” (Theological Studies, 2021), “Theologians in the Field: ‘Dices que eres un teólogo, ¿ cuál es tu practica?’” (Journal of Moral Theology, 2023), “Oscar Romero, Patron Saint of Church Asylum” (Louvain Studies, 2022), and “Teología de la Liberación: Nuevas Presencias, Nuevas Búsquedas,” (Paginas, 2021). He has worked at the US-Mexico border with dioceses, parishes, and NGO’s, collaborated with the US conference of Catholic bishops (USCCB) on migration initiatives, and is currently engaged in ethnographic research in New York City on indigenous healing practices among migrant communities. Other research interests include early church monasticism, Cistercian spirituality, Christian mysticism, the relationship between structural violence and health, and the impact of surveillance technologies on migrant communities.

Ludovic Lado, SJ, N’Djamena (Chad)

Lado is from Cameroon. He joined the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) in 1992. He holds a Doctorate in Social and Cultural Anthropology from Oxford University, UK. He specializes in the anthropology of religion, focusing on current trends in African Catholicism. He is currently the Director of Centre d’Etude et de Formation pour le Développement (CEFOD) and of CEFOD Business School in N’Djamena, Chad.  His publications include, Catholic Pentecostalism and The Paradoxes of Africanization (Brill, 2009) ; le pluralisme religieux en Afrique (Yaoundé : Presses Universitaires de l’UCAC, 2013) and several journal articles. His most recent book is The politics of Gender Reforms in Côte d’Ivoire (Notre Dame University Press, 2023).

Silvia Martínez-Cano, Madrid (Spain)

Martínez-Cano has a PhD in Education from the Complutense University of Madrid, Bachelor in Fundamental Theology from the University of Deusto and Master in Visual Arts and Education from the University of Barcelona. She is a multidisciplinary artist from a feminist and religious perspective, www.silviamartinezcano.es . She teaches Theory of Education, Social Pedagogy and Aesthetic Education at the Complutense University of Madrid, and teaches different subjects of Fundamental and Pastoral Theology at the Instituto Superior de Pastoral and the Instituto San Pío X, both at the Pontifical University of Salamanca. Her areas of research are interdisciplinary, being Trinitarian Theology, Theological Aesthetics, Visual and Cultural Studies, Art and Gender, Art and Education, Ecclesiology and Theological Anthropology. She is currently pursuing her second PhD in Trinitarian Theology and Theological Aesthetics.

Gianluca Montaldi, Roma (Italy)
Managing secretary

Born in 1966 in Varese Ligure (Italy), obtained a PhD in Theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University with a research on the concept of faith in Vatican II. He worked in both the educational and the pastoral fields. He published: In fide ipsa essentia revelationis completur, EPUG, Rome 2005, and, together with F. Bosin, Ridire il credo oggi. Percorsi, sfide, proposte, EDB, Bologna 2015. He also edited the general index of Concilium 1965-2016.

Carlos Schickendantz, Santiago (Chile)

He was born in Córdoba, Argentina (1957). He is doctor in Theology from the Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen, Germany. He was dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Humanities of the Catholic University of Córdoba, Argentina (2002-2005) and academic vice-rector of the same University (2006-2011). He was professor of Systematic Theology of the Faculty of Philosophy and Humanities of the Catholic University of Córdoba, Argentina (1998-2011). He has been a visiting research scholar at Boston College STM (Boston, USA) and visiting professor at different universities. Since 2011 he works as professor and researcher at the Manuel Larraín Theological Center of the Jesuit Alberto Hurtado University (Santiago, Chile). Research Interest: Systematic Theology; Vatican II; Ecclesiology; Reform of the Church; Theology of Karl Rahner & Johann Baptist Metz; Latin America Theology; Theology of the Signs of the Times; Theological methodology.

Stephan van Erp, Leuven (Belgium)

Stephan van Erp is professor fundamental theology and the coordinator of the Research Unit Systematic Theology and the Study of Religions. He is also the coordinator of the Research Group for Fundamental and Political Theology and of the Interfaculty Centre for Catholic Thought. He studied theology at the Theological Faculty of Tilburg and philosophy at the Catholic University of Nijmegen. His dissertation was on fundamental theology and aesthetics, and was entitled The Art of Theology: Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Theological Aesthetics and the Foundations of Faith (Studies in Philosophical Theology, Vol. 25, Leuven, Peeters 2004). He has been a visiting fellow at the University of Oxford and King’s College London. In Oxford, he was a tutor in Philosophy of Religion and Doctrine and Interpretation. He has taught Fundamental Theology, Dogmatic Theology and Ethics at the universities of Tilburg, Nijmegen, and Groningen. His research interests concern the fields of philosophical and fundamental theology, in particular the relationship between faith and reason, the concept of catholicity and the role of theology in the academy. He explores the connection between these methodological issues with political theology, in particular the challenges of global catholicism for faith and theology. His specific expertise concerns 20th and 21st-century systematic theology, especially the theologies of Edward Schillebeeckx, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Karl Rahner, and Rowan Williams. He also has an interest in Philosophy of Religion and Philosophical Theology, especially in the work of Giordano Bruno, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, and Ernst Cassirer. Currently he is working on research projects on the theology of Edward Schillebeeckx, on political theology, and on the concept of catholicity.Stephan van Erp is the Managing Editor of Tijdschrift voor Theologie, Editor-in-chief of Brill Research Perspectives in Theology, Series Editor of T&T Clark Studies in Edward Schillebeeckx (Bloomsbury Press) and of Studies in Philosophical Theology (Peeters Publishers), and on the eitorial boards of Philippiniana Sacra and of Crossing: The INPR Journal. He is also Chair of the jury of the Edward Schillebeeckx Essay Prize, and organiser of the annual Edward Schillebeeckx Lecture.