Stephen Frederick Schneck (born 1953) is an American Catholic activist.
Schneck attended Rockhurst University, where he received a B.A. in Political Science and Philosophy in 1976. He earned his masters and doctoral degrees from the University of Notre Dame in 1981 and 1984, respectively. [1]
Formerly an associate professor at The Catholic University of America (CUA), where he was also the Director of CUA's Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies, he retired from the university in 2018. A public speaker and lecturer, Schneck is a frequent source of media analysis on issues involving Catholicism and public policy. [2] [3] [4] He was chair of the Department of Politics from 1995 to 2007 and Acting Undergraduate Dean of the School of Arts & Sciences in 1988. [2] From 2012 to 2013, he was appointed as the Acting Dean of the National Catholic School of Social Service at Catholic University. [5]
Schneck's academic work has focused on political philosophy, with special emphases on 18th- century American political thought and contemporary continental political theory. [2] More recently he has focused on the role of religion in democracy. [2] He is the author of several books and articles in the field of political philosophy; notable publications include two books on the political theory of Max Scheler, an edited volume on the work of Fred Dallmayr, and articles and book chapters examining such figures as Tocqueville, Michel Foucault, and Jürgen Habermas, among others. [6]
He serves on the Board of Directors for Catholic Mobilizing Network and for Catholic Climate Covenant. He was previously a board member for Sojourners, for Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, and for Democrats for Life of America. [7] [8] He served as national co-chair of Catholics for Biden in 2020. [9] He served as a national co-chair of Catholics for Obama in 2012. [10] In 2015, Schneck was appointed to President Barack Obama's third Advisory Council on for the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. [11]
On June 15, 2022, the White House announced Schneck's appointment to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. [12] On June 3, 2024, Schneck was unanimously elected to Chair the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. [13]
Critique is a method of disciplined, systematic study of a written or oral discourse. Although critique is frequently understood as fault finding and negative judgment, it can also involve merit recognition, and in the philosophical tradition it also means a methodical practice of doubt. The contemporary sense of critique has been largely influenced by the Enlightenment critique of prejudice and authority, which championed the emancipation and autonomy from religious and political authorities.
Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre is a Scottish-American philosopher who has contributed to moral and political philosophy as well as history of philosophy and theology. MacIntyre's After Virtue (1981) is one of the most important works of Anglophone moral and political philosophy in the 20th century. He is senior research fellow at the Centre for Contemporary Aristotelian Studies in Ethics and Politics (CASEP) at London Metropolitan University, emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, and permanent senior distinguished research fellow at the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture. During his lengthy academic career, he also taught at Brandeis University, Duke University, Vanderbilt University, and Boston University.
Theodore Martin Hesburgh, CSC was an American Catholic priest and academic who was a member of the Congregation of Holy Cross. He was president of the University of Notre Dame for 35 years from 1952 to 1987.
Max Ferdinand Scheler was a German philosopher known for his work in phenomenology, ethics, and philosophical anthropology. Considered in his lifetime one of the most prominent German philosophers, Scheler developed the philosophical method of Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology.
Mary Ann Glendon is the Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and a former United States Ambassador to the Holy See. She teaches and writes on bioethics, comparative constitutional law, property, and human rights in international law.
Rev. John Ignatius Jenkins, C.S.C. is an American Catholic priest of the Congregation of Holy Cross. He is best known for his service as the 17th president of the University of Notre Dame from 2005 to 2024. He previously served as its vice-president and associate provost. He replaced Edward Malloy as president.
Edmund Daniel Pellegrino was an American bioethicist and academic who served as the 11th president of The Catholic University of America (CUA) from 1978 to 1982. For 35 years, Pellegrino was a distinguished professor of medicine and medical ethics and the Director of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University. Pellegrino was an expert both in clinical bioethics, and in the field of medicine and the humanities, specifically, the teaching of humanities in medical school, which he helped pioneer). He was the second layman to hold the position of President of Catholic University.
Catholic Democrats is an American not-for-profit organization of Catholics to support the Democratic Party, based in Boston, United States. The Catholic Democrats have more than 60,000 members in all 50 American states and Puerto Rico. It claims no authorization from the Catholic Church, or any Catholic bishop, Catholic diocese, candidate or candidate committee.
Douglas William Kmiec is an American legal scholar, author, and former U.S. ambassador. He is the Caruso Family Chair and Professor of Constitutional Law at Pepperdine University School of Law. Kmiec came to prominence during the 2008 United States presidential election when, although a Republican, he endorsed Democrat Barack Obama. In July 2009, he was nominated by President Obama to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Malta. He was confirmed by the Senate and served for close to two years as ambassador to Malta. He resigned his post effective May 31, 2011.
Eliot Sandler Deutsch was a philosopher, teacher, and writer. He made important contributions to the understanding and appreciation of Eastern philosophies in the West through his many works on comparative philosophy and aesthetics. He was a Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.
Stephen K. White, is James Hart Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia. His research focuses on critical social and political theory, philosophy of social science, and continental political thought. He has contributed to several scholarly works on Jürgen Habermas, including The Cambridge Companion to Habermas, which he edited. He is also a past editor of the journal Political Theory.
Reflective disclosure is a model of social criticism proposed and developed by philosopher Nikolas Kompridis. It is partly based on Martin Heidegger's insights into the phenomenon of world disclosure, which Kompridis applies to the field of political and social philosophy. The term refers to practices through which we can imagine and articulate meaningful alternatives to current social and political conditions, by acting back on their conditions of intelligibility. This could uncover possibilities that were previously suppressed or untried, or make us insightfully aware of a problem in a way that allows us to go on differently with our institutions, traditions and ideals.
Christian privilege is a social advantage bestowed upon Christians in any historically Christian society. This arises out of the presumption that Christian belief is a social norm, that leads to the marginalization of the nonreligious and members of other religions through institutional religious discrimination or religious persecution. Christian privilege can also lead to the neglect of outsiders' cultural heritage and religious practices.
Winfried Reinhard Dallmayr was an American philosopher and political theorist. He was Packey J. Dee Professor Emeritus in Political Science with a joint appointment in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame (US). He held a Doctor of Law from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, and a PhD in political science from Duke University. He was the author of some 40 books and the editor of 20 other books. He served as president of the Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy (SACP); an advisory member of the scientific committee of RESET – Dialogue on Civilizations (Rome); the executive co-chair of World Public Forum – Dialogue of Civilizations (Vienna), and a member of the supervisory board of the Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute (Berlin).
Gary Michael Gutting was an American philosopher and holder of an endowed chair in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. His daughter is writer Tasha Alexander.
Waldemar Gurian was a Russian-born German-American political scientist, author, and professor at the University of Notre Dame. He is regarded particularly as a theorist of totalitarianism. He wrote widely on political Catholicism.
Vincent Phillip Muñoz is an American political scientist. He is the Tocqueville Professor in the Department of Political Science and Concurrent Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of two books on the principles of the American Founding focusing on religious liberty and the separation of church and state in the United States.
Patrick J. Deneen is an American political theorist and author, known for his critical examination of liberalism and its effect on contemporary society. He is a professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame, where his work emphasizes the interrelations of political philosophy, culture, and religion.
The Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies (IPR) is an interdisciplinary institute and research center at The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC.
Peter K. Kilpatrick is an American chemical engineer and academic administrator currently serving as the 16th president of the Catholic University of America since July 2022. He previously served as provost of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago from 2018 to 2022 and as dean of the Notre Dame College of Engineering from 2008 to 2018.