John Cavadini
Professor
McGrath-Cavadini Director of the McGrath Institute for Church Life
Primary Area: History of Christianity
Secondary Area: Christianity and Judaism in Antiquity
Biography
John C. Cavadini is Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame, where he also serves as McGrath-Cavadini Director of the McGrath Institute for Church Life. He teaches, studies and publishes in the area of patristic theology with a special focus on the theology of St. Augustine. He has served as a consultant to the USCCB Committee on Doctrine since 2003 and served a five-year term on the International Theological Commission (appointed by Pope Benedict XVI). He received an Honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from The Catholic University of America in 2022. In 2018 he received the Monika K. Hellwig Award from the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities for Outstanding Contributions to Catholic Intellectual Life.
Recent Graduate Courses: Augustine's De trinitate; Augustine's City of God; Two Ancient Apologists; Theology of Origen; Introduction to Patristic Exegesis; Introduction to Patristic Theology; Gregory the Great's Moralia in Iob; Theology of the Priesthood; etc. Undergraduate Courses: Christian Traditions I (for Majors); The Catholic Faith (Core course); Miracles; Short courses on Creation; Resurrection; the Saints. I have directed 34 dissertations and I am currently directing 2. As McGrath-Cavadini Director of the McGrath Institute for Church Life I direct and administer programming connecting the University to the Church, including programs such as Echo (training in catechetical leadership); Vision (summer conferences for high school students); the Notre Dame Office of Life and Human Dignity; the Notre Dame Center for Liturgy; conferences and lecture series (such as "Saturdays with the Saints,"), etc.
Research Interests
Patristic Theology, Patristic Exegesis, St. Augustine, Origen, Early Medieval Theology, Ancient Apologetics, Mariology
Selected Publications
Alcuin of York, On the Faith of the Holy and Undivided Trinity and Seven Books Against Felix
of Urgel, translated, with notes and introduction. With Joshua McManaway. (Washington, DC; CUA Press, Fathers of the Church Medieval Continuation, forthcoming 2025).
Visioning Augustine. (London: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.: 2019).
“Epilogue: The Architectonic Plan of Augustine’s City of God,” in The Cambridge Companion
to Augustine’s City of God, edited by David Vincent Meconi, S.J., (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021), 297-320.
“Augustine and Ambrose” in Augustine and Tradition, David G. Hunter and Jonathan P. Yates,
editors (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2021), pp. 326-350.
“From Letter to Spirit: The Multiple Senses of Scripture,” in Paul Blowers and Peter Martens,
eds., The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Biblical Interpretation (Oxford University
Press, 2019), pp. 126-148.
Education
- B.A., Wesleyan University
- M.A., Marquette University
- M.A. Yale University
- M.Phil. Yale University
- PhD. Yale University