COME TO FORDHAM!

Faith and Freedom The 40th Anniversary of Vatican II and the Declaration on Religious Liberty

Monday, October 17, 2005, 9:00-4:30
Fordham University, McNally Amphitheatre, 140 West 62nd Street
Free and Open to the Public

Sponsored by: The Fordham Center on Religion and Culture
The Curran Center for American Catholic Studies
Institute on Religion, Law, and Lawyer’s Work, Fordham Law School

To ensure a seat at this event, kindly RSVP by calling 212-636-6927, or you may register on line at http://www.Fordham.edu/Religculture_registration

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More information about this event:

"Faith & Freedom:
The 40th Anniversary of Vatican II and the
Declaration on Religious Liberty"

Dignitatis humanae, the Declaration on Religious Liberty, was adopted by Vatican II on December 7, 1965. This landmark event in Catholic history transformed the church’s teaching on religious freedom, church and state, and conscience. Scholars, intellectuals, lawyers, and theologians from the United States and Europe will explore the background of this historic change as well as examine developments in the understanding of religious freedom both within faith groups and in the civil order over the last forty years.

Session 1: A Change of Mind on Religious Freedom- The American and European Contribution

What was the important American contribution (and in particular that of the Jesuit theologian John Courtney Murray) to the Declaration on Religious Liberty? How did the American view interact with the corresponding contributions of the European experience and theological analysis?

Speakers: The Reverend Joseph Komonchak is John C. and Gertrude P. Hubbard Professor of Religious Studies at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He is an ecclesiologist specializing in the history and reception of Vatican II.

The Reverend Jean-Yves Calvez, S.J., a philosopher and theologian, is currently Director of the Department of Public Ethics, Centres Sèvres, Paris, and teaches at the Institut Catholique. He served as a member of the Pontifical Council for Non-Believers and the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, and is author of many books dealing with ecumenism, social development, and the social doctrine of the church.

Session 2: Conscience, Freedom, and Community in the 21st Century

The Declaration on Religious Liberty affirmed traditional views of the binding power of religious truth while also stressing the right of conscience to be free of every kind of coercion, including psychological. What does that mean for the formation and exercise of conscience? How can religious communities respect individual conscience while maintaining their own standards of belief, practice, and identity?

Speaker: The Reverend J. Bryan Hehir is the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Religion and Public Life at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. He is also the Secretary for Social Services and the President of Catholic Charities in the Archdiocese of Boston. His research and writing focus on ethics and foreign policy and the role of religion in world politics and in American society.
Respondent: Marie Failinger is Professor of Law at Hamline University School of Law and is editor-in chief of the Journal of Law and Religion. She has also served on the editorial council of the Journal of Lutheran Ethics.

Session 3: Faith Traditions and Public Discourse

What is the appropriate place of religion in the public and political discourse of a society marked by religious diversity and the separation of church and state?

Panel:
Melissa Rogers is Visiting Professor of Religion and Public Policy, Wake Forest University Divinity School. She has served as Executive Director of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, and general counsel of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs.

M. Cathleen Kaveny is the John P. Murphy Foundation Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame Law School. Her writing and teaching focuses on the relationship among theology, philosophy, and law. She is a columnist for Commonweal magazine.

Russell Pearce is Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics at Fordham University. He teaches, writes, and lectures in the field of professional responsibility, including the role of religion in a lawyer's work. He is the co-author of Religious Lawyering in a Liberal Democracy: A Challenge and an Invitation, and the author of The Jewish Lawyer's Question.

Asifa Quraishi is Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Wisconsin, where she teaches course in Islamic law and U.S. constitutional law. She is the author of “No Altars: An Introduction to Islamic Family Law in U.S. Courts,” in Islamic Family Law.

Margaret Steinfels, Co-director
Fordham Center on Religion and Culture
113 West 60th Street, Room 224
New York, NY 10023-7484
Phone: 212-636-7624
Fax: 212-636-7863
e: [email protected]
web: www.Fordham.edu/religculture
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