Catholicism and Feminism Roundtable

Experience the Event

Presented by McGrath Institute for Church Life

In a culture increasingly defined by ideological silos and digital fragmentation, the search for a coherent identity can leave women feeling isolated. We invite you to a space of deep encounter and vital conversation that addresses the core longing for community and truth. Here, the ancient wisdom of the Church meets the complexities of modern life with intellectual rigor and pastoral warmth. Experience a radical, pro-woman vision rooted in faith, and joyful alternative to modern gender theory.

Thirty years ago, in both Evangelium Vitae and his Letter to Women, Pope John Paul II issued a clear call for the genius of women to be “more fully expressed in the life of society as a whole, as well as in the life of the Church” (Letter to Women 10). Throughout his papacy, in fact, he emphasized women’s “prophetic character,” calling on them to be “witnesses” and “sentinels” — guardians of the sacred gift of life and the order of love (Mulieris Dignitatem 29; Homily at Lourdes 2004).

Meet the Speaker: Helen Alvaré

Helen Alvaré, J.D. is Professor of Law and the Robert A. Levy Chair in Liberty & Law at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, where she teaches and writes scholarship concerning Family Law and Law and Religion. She is also a member of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life, and a consultant to various Holy See initiatives concerning women, including at the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the Organization of American States. Her work appears regularly in law reviews and in public media. Among other books, she has authored Religious Freedom After the Sexual Revolution: a Catholic Guide, and Breaking Through: Catholic Women Speak for Themselves.

Meet the Speaker: Erika Bachiochi

Erika Bachiochi is a legal scholar working at the intersection of constitutional law, political theory, women’s history, and Catholic social teaching and the author of the acclaimed 2021 book, The Rights of Women: Reclaiming a Lost Vision. A Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, she is also the editor-in-chief of Fairer Disputations, the online journal of sex-realist feminism, and a 2024–25 Fellow at the Nesti Center for Faith and Culture at the University of St. Thomas (Houston) where she is teaching in the new Catholic Women and Gender Studies Program. Erika is the happily married mother of seven children, ages 23-6.

Meet the Speaker: Rachel Coleman

Rachel M. Coleman, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of Theology at Assumption University in Worcester, M.A. In addition to her Ph.D. in Theology, she holds a B.S. in Biology and B.A. in Philosophy, and writes most often about metaphysics.

Meet the Faculty: Abigail Favale

Abigail Favale is a writer and professor whose work lies at the intersection of Catholic theology, literature, and women’s studies. Her abiding interest as a writer and scholar is the meaning and dignity of woman, and her work explores sexual difference and embodiment in the Catholic imagination. She serves as professor of the practice of theology and literature.

Abigail supports MICL programming by writing and teaching on women, feminism, and gender from a Catholic perspective. She holds a concurrent appointment in the Department of Theology, where she teaches on topics like Edith Stein’s Theology of Woman and Religion & Literature.

Abigail has a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from George Fox University, as well as a master’s degree in Women, Writing and Gender and a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. Her first book, Irigaray, Incarnation, and Contemporary Women’s Fiction (Palgrave 2013) was awarded the 2014 Feminist and Women’s Studies Association Book Award. Her second book is Into the Deep: An Unlikely Catholic Conversion (Cascade 2018), a spiritual memoir that traces her journey from birthright evangelicalism to postmodern feminism and, finally, to the Catholic Church. Abigail’s most recent book, The Genesis of Gender: A Christian Theory, was published in 2022 by Ignatius Press and has already been translated into multiple languages. Her numerous essays have appeared in MICL’s Church Life Journal, The Atlantic, First Things, Public Discourse, Comment, and elsewhere. Abigail is also a fiction writer and was awarded the J.F. Powers Prize for Short Fiction in 2017.

She lives with her husband, Michael, and their four children in South Bend, Indiana.

Meet the Speaker: Angela Franks

Angela Franks, Ph.D. is a theologian, speaker, writer, and mother of six. She serves as Professor of Theology at St. John’s Seminary in Boston and as a Senior Fellow at the Abigail Adams Institute in Cambridge. She is the President-elect for the Academy of Catholic Theology for 2024-25, as well as a Life and Dignity Writing Fellow for Church Life Journal (University of Notre Dame). In August, she will be an Associate Professor of Theology at the Catholic University of America. Her areas of specialty include the body, identity, the Trinity, Christology, and the thought of John Paul II and Hans Urs von Balthasar. Her book Body and Identity: A History of the Empty Self comes out from the University of Notre Dame Press in the summer of 2025. She has written two other books on sexual ethics and the history of eugenics. An experienced speaker, she has spoken at numerous conferences and on EWTN, Catholic Answers Live, FOX News, and many other outlets. She has been published in America Magazine, First Things, Public Discourse, Church Life Journal, Catholic World Report, The Plough, and academic journals such as Theological Studies, Christian Bioethics, Nova et Vetera, Communio, and others.

Meet the Speaker: Leah Libresco Sargeant

Leah Libresco Sargeant is the author of Arriving at Amen and Building the Benedict Option. She works in family policy in Washington, D.C. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Plough, First Things, and other outlets. She runs Other Feminisms (otherfeminisms.com), a substack community focused on advocating for women as women in a world that treats us as defective men. Her next book, The Dignity of Dependence for Notre Dame University Press, will come out in Fall 2025.

Meet the Speaker: Jessica Keating Floyd '13 M.Div.

Jessica Keating ’13 M.Div. directs the Notre Dame Office of Life and Human Dignity in the McGrath Institute for Church Life. In her role, she leads the Institute’s research, education, and outreach efforts on the nature and dignity of the human person and contemporary issues related to the sanctity of life. The Office collaborates with academic experts and practitioners to elaborate the breadth and depth of Catholic tradition’s teaching on the fundamental dignity of the human person to life in the Church. She also works closely with Catholic educators and pastoral leaders to develop resources and strategies to more effectively witness to the Gospel of Life.

Jess originally hails from the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C. She earned a Masters of Divinity from the University of Notre Dame in 2013. In addition to her work with the Institute, she is also doctoral candidate in Systematic Theology at Notre Dame.

Jess’ writing has appeared in publications such as, Notre Dame Magazine, America Magazine, Commonweal, and in volume of essays, Dante, Mercy, and the Beauty of the Human Person.

She lives in the suburbs of Boston with her husband and toddler and, when she has time, she enjoys baseball, literature, puzzles, and running.

Meet the Faculty: Melissa Moschella

Melissa Moschella is a philosopher whose work spans the fields of ethics, political philosophy, and law. Her areas of special expertise include natural law theory, biomedical ethics, and the family (especially parental rights).

Melissa’s first book, To Whom Do Children Belong? Parental Rights, Civic Education, and Children’s Autonomy (Cambridge University Press, 2016), offers a foundational account of the nature and basis of parental rights, and argues that parents (not the state) have primary responsibility and authority to direct the education and upbringing of their children. Her second book, Ethics, Politics, and Natural Law: Principles for Human Flourishing (University of Notre Dame Press, Spring 2025) offers a fresh and accessible yet rigorous presentation of the influential natural law account of ethics and politics that has come to be known as “new natural law theory.” Melissa has also published numerous articles in scholarly journals as well as popular media outlets, including Bioethics, The Journal of Medical Ethics, The American Journal of Bioethics, The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, Notre Dame Law Review, The Journal of Law and Religion, The Public Discourse, First Things, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and The Washington Post. She serves as Associate Editor of Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics, on the editorial board of the National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, and on the editorial advisory board of The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy. She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College, earned a Licentiate in Philosophy summa cum laude from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, and received her Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Princeton University.

Melissa contributes to the mission of the MICL through her research, writing, teaching, and public speaking on a variety of contemporary topics, including religious freedom, bioethical issues, and issues related to marriage and family. In particular, she collaborates frequently with the Notre Dame Office of Life and Human Dignity and the Science & Religion Initiative. She also teaches regularly in the Business, Ethics, and Society Program in the Mendoza College of Business. Before coming to Notre Dame, Melissa was Associate Professor of Philosophy at the Catholic University of America, where she worked for over a decade.

When she is not busy with her academic pursuits, Melissa enjoys singing (especially choral singing), playing the piano, gardening, cooking, biking, and hiking. She lives in South Bend with her husband, David Cloutier, an expert in Catholic social ethics who is a Professor in the Department of Theology and Director of the Business, Ethics, and Society Program in the Mendoza College of Business.

Meet the Speaker: Deborah Savage

Deborah Savage, Ph.D. is Professor of Theology at the Franciscan University of Steubenville. Dr. Savage is a student of St. Thomas Aquinas with a particular interest in investigating his thought in light of contemporary questions. Her research areas include: the nature of man and woman, the human person, the theological meaning of human work and the conversion of the acting person. She is a recognized scholar of the work of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II and has written and presented or published several papers on how his philosophical anthropology informs his body of work as Pope, his understanding of human work, the complementarity of man and woman, and of the dignity and vocation of women. She has written and presented many talks and papers on these topics both nationally and internationally.