Speakers

2011 Speakers will be posted shortly.
2010 New York Encounter Speakers
included the following people:

John Sexton President, New York University

John Sexton, the fifteenth President of New York University, also is the Benjamin Butler Professor of Law and NYU Law School's Dean Emeritus, having served as Dean for 14 years. He joined the Law School's faculty in 1981, was named the School's Dean in 1988, and was designated the University's President in 2001.

President Sexton is Chair of the Independent Colleges and Universities of New York, Chair of the New York Academy of Sciences, and Vice Chair of the American Council on Education. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of both the Association of American University Presidents and the Council on Foreign Relations. He has served as the Chairman of the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (2003-2006) and Chair of the Federal Reserve Systems Council of Chairs (2006). He served as a Board Member for the National Association of Securities Dealers (1996-1998), and was Founding Chair of the Board of NASD Dispute Resolution (2000-2002). He also serves on the Boards of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Institute of International Education and the Association for a Better New York. While Dean of the Law School he was President of the Association of American Law Schools.

President Sexton received a B.A. in History (1963) from Fordham College; an M.A. in Comparative Religion (1965) and a Ph.D. in History of American Religion (1978) Fordham University; and a J.D. magna cum laude (1979) from Harvard Law School.

He is an author of the nation’s leading casebook on Civil Procedure. He also is the author of Redefining the Supreme Court's Role: A Theory of Managing the Federal Court System (a treatment of the Supreme Court's case selection process) in addition to several other books, numerous chapters, articles and Supreme Court briefs.

He holds honorary degrees from Fordham University, Saint Francis College; Saint John's University, University of Rochester and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. The student editors of NYU's Annual Survey of American Law dedicated their Volume 60 in his honor. He was named by Emory University "Outstanding High School Debate Coach of the Last 50 Years" for work he did from 1960-1975. He has been honored at the Harvard Law Review Annual Banquet, and has been named "Alumnus of the Year" both at Fordham and at his high school, Brooklyn Prep. In July 2008 he was named a Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur, the national order of the Legion of Honor of France.

Before coming to NYU, President Sexton served as Law Clerk to Chief Justice Warren Burger of the United States Supreme Court (1980-1981), and to Judges David Bazelon and Harold Leventhal of the United States Court of Appeals (1979-1980). For ten years (1983-1993), he served as Special Master Supervising Pretrial Proceedings in the Love Canal Litigation. From 1966 - 1975, he was a Professor of Religion at Saint Francis College in Brooklyn, where he was Department Chair from 1970-1975.

Brad Gregory Associate Professor of History, University of Notre Dame

Gregory is a historian of late medieval and early modern Christianity, and of intellectual history in early modern Europe. His work is cross-confessional and comparative, devoted particularly to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Catholics, Protestants, and radical Protestants in England, France, the Low Countries, and Germany. He is concerned both to understand past people on their own terms in social, political, and cultural contexts, as well as to analyze the ways in which their commitments and actions help to explain change over time between the medieval and the modern worlds. In addition, Gregory is interested in issues related to historical methodology and the study of religion.

Daniel Sulmasy Professor of Medicine and Ethics, University of Chicago

Dr. Sulmasy, a Franciscan Friar, is the Kilbride-Clinton Professor of Medicine and Ethics in the Department of Medicine and Divinity School at the University of Chicago, where he serves as Associate Director of the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics. He has previously held faculty positions at New York Medical College and at Georgetown University. He received his A.B. and M.D. degrees from Cornell University and completed his residency, chief residency, and post-doctoral fellowship in General Internal Medicine at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.

He received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Georgetown University in 1995. He has served on numerous governmental advisory committees. His research interests encompass both theoretical and empirical investigations of the ethics of end-of-life decision-making, ethics education, and spirituality in medicine. He is the author of four books — The Healer’s Calling (1997), Methods in Medical Ethics (2001; 2nd ed. 2010), The Rebirth of the Clinic (2206), and A Balm for Gilead (2006). He serves as editor-in-chief of the journal, Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics. His numerous articles have appeared in medical, philosophical, and theological journals and he has lectured widely both in the U.S. and abroad.

Emilia Guarnieri President of the “Meeting for Friendship Among Peoples” Foundation

Emilia Guarnieri was born in 1947 in Italy. She attended the faculty of Modern Humanities at the University of Bologna, where she graduated with honors in 1969. She immediately started to teach Italian literature and Latin in high school.

In 1980 she was one of the co-founders of the Meeting for Friendship among People and she took on the role of head of the cultural program.

Since 1993 she has also been the President of the foundation that organizes the week-long Rimini Meeting. Since then, she has been traveling around the world (just to mention a few cities—Moscow, Jerusalem, Paris, Berlin, Prague) as an ambassador for the Rimini Meeting and for the ideal that moves her and all those who help with the event.

In 2003 the President of Italy conferred upon her the honor of “Commendatore dell’Ordine al Merito” of the Italian Republic and in 2004 she was awarded the “Sigismondo d’Oro,” the most important honor of the City of Rimini in Italy.

Emilia is married, has two daughters, and resides in Rimini.

Joseph Weiler Joseph Straus Professor of Law, New York University

J.H.H. Weiler is University Professor as well as holder of the European Union Jean Monnet Chair at New York University School of Law, Director of the Straus Institute for the Advanced Study of Law & Justice, and Co-Director of the Tikvah Center for Law & Jewish Civilization. Weiler is also Professor at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium and Natolin, Poland; Honorary Professor at University College, London; Honorary Professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen; and Co-Director of the Academy of International Trade Law in Macao, China.

Weiler is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Reporter of the American Law Institute (International trade: WTO). He holds degrees from Sussex (B.A.); Cambridge (LL.B. and LL.M.); and The Hague Academy of International Law (Diploma of International Law). He earned his Ph.D. in European Law at the EUI, Florence. He is recipient of Doctorates Honoris Causa from London University and from Sussex University, and is Honorary Member of the Senate of the University of Ljubljana.

Weiler served as a member of the Committee of Jurists of the Institutional Affairs Committee of the European Parliament, co-drafting the European Parliament's Declaration of Human Rights and Freedoms and Parliament's input to the Maastricht Inter-intergovernmental Conference. He is a WTO and NAFTA Panelist, and a founding editor of the EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW, the EUROPEAN LAW JOURNAL, and the WORLD TRADE REVIEW. Weiler is author of articles and books in the fields of international, comparative, and European law. His publications include: CONSTITUTION OF EUROPE - DO THE NEW CLOTHES HAVE AN EMPEROR? (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1998 - translations into Spanish, Italian, German, Slovenian, Japanese, Chinese, Greek, Serbian, Portuguese, Romanian in print or in preparation); KOMPETENZEN UND GRUNDRECHTE (with Bruno Simma, Markus C. Zöckler) (Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, 1999); THE EU, THE WTO, AND THE NAFTA: TOWARDS A COMMON LAW OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE? (Academy of European Law, EUI, Florence/Oxford Univ. Press, 2000); THE EUROPEAN COURT OF JUSTICE. Edited with Grainne de Burca, (Oxford Univ. Press, 2001); UN’EUROPA CRISTIANA (Rizzoli, 2003 - translations into German, Polish, Spanish, Portuguese, Slovenian, French, Hungarian, Dutch); and a novella, DER FALL STEINMANN (Piper 2000).

Weiler's research focus is on issues of European integration, globalization and democracy.

Lorenzo Albacete Theologian, author, columnist

Msgr. Lorenzo Albacete, author, theologian, and New York Times Magazine contributor, is a physicist by training.

He holds the degree in Space Science and Applied Physics as well as a Master’s Degree in Sacred Theology from the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. He holds a doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas in Rome.

He is co-founder and has been a professor at the John Paul II Institute in Washington, DC. He has taught at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Yonkers, NY, and from 1996 to 1997 served as President of Catholic University of Puerto Rico in Ponce.

He has been advisor on Hispanic Affairs to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. He is a columnist for the Italian weekly Tempi, has written for The New Yorker, and has appeared or has been interviewed on CNN, The Charlie Rose Show, PBS, EWTN, Slate, The New Republic, and Godspy, where he is the theological advisor.

Beside columns and articles on a number of American and international publications, Albacete is the author of God at the Ritz: Attraction to Infinity (Crossroad Publishing Company), a book in which as priest-physicist he talks about science, sex, politics, and religion.

He is the responsible of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation in the United States and Canada.

He is the Chairman of the Crossroads Cultural Center Board of Advisors.

Msgr. Albacete resides in Yonkers, NY.

Julián Carrón President of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation

Julián Carrón was born in 1950 in Navaconcejo (Cáceres, Spain). While still very young he joined the Conciliar Seminary in Madrid, where he completed high school and theological studies. He was ordained a priest in 1975 and the following year graduated in Theology from the Universidad Pontificia Comillas in Madrid, specializing in Holy Scripture.

He was lecturer at the Madrid Complutense University.

He won a fellowship as Élève Titulaire at the École Biblique et Archéologique Française in Jerusalem, where he worked under the direction of M.É. Boismard. He spent one year doing research at the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C. and was lecturer at the School of Theology of the Conciliar Seminary in Madrid.

He headed the Minor Seminary, taught religion and was in charge of pastoral care at the Colegio Arzobispal de la Immaculada y San Dámaso in Madrid, which he directed from 1987 to 1994.

In 1984 he obtained his doctorate in Theology from the Faculty of Theology of Northern Spain, in Burgos. He was lecturer at the San Dámaso Institute of Theology, Religious and Catechetical Sciences, in Madrid, and Professor of New Testament at the San Dámaso Faculty of Theology in Madrid, where he taught “Introduction to Sacred Scripture,” “The Pauline Corpus and Acts of Apostles,” and “The Origins of Christianity.” He was a member of the editorial committee of the series “Studia Semitica Novi Testamenti.” He was director of the San Justino Institute of Classical and Oriental Philology, in Madrid. He has given many presentations on the historicity of the Gospels in Madrid, Milan, Turin, Bologna, Rome, Florence and Rimini, and has given lectures on the theme “In search of the certainty of the historical value of the Gospels” at New York University, the John Paul II Institute at Catholic University in Washington and the University of San Francisco (February 1996). Besides authoring numerous papers in various journals, he published El Mesías manifestado. Tradición literaria y trasfondo judío de Hch 3, 19-26 (Studia Semitica Novi Testamenti 2, Madrid 1993). He was director of the Spanish edition of the international Catholic journal Communio, of the journal Estudios Bíblicos, and also of the Library of the San Dámaso Faculty of Theology in Madrid, and the Institute of Religious Sciences, associated with the Faculty.

In September 2004 he moved to Milan, called by Fr. Luigi Giussani, founder of the ecclesial Movement Communion and Liberation, to share the responsibility of leading the entire movement. On March 19, 2005 the Central Diaconia of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation appointed him President of the Fraternity, as successor of Fr. Giussani who had died on February 22, 2005. On May 13, 2005, the Pontifical Council for the Laity appointed him Ecclesiastic Assistant to the Association Memores Domini.

Since the 2004-2005 academic year, he has taught Introduction to Theology at the Catholic University “Sacro Cuore”, in Milan. In 2005 he participated, as a member appointed by the Holy Father, to the Synod of Bishops on the Holy Eucharist. On June 3, 2006, he spoke in St. Peter’s Square during Pope Benedict XVI meeting with the ecclesial movements.

On March 24, 2007, he led the international pilgrimage of Communion and Liberation in St. Peter’s Square for the audience granted by the Holy Father on the occasion of the 25th Anniversary of the pontifical recognition of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation.

On March 8, 2008, since the term of the mandate given to him on March 19, 2005, to succeed Fr. Giussani in guiding the Movement had expired, the Central Diakonia of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation confirmed his appointment as President of the Fraternity for the next six years.

In April 2008 he was appointed by the Holy Father as Consultor of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, and in October 2008 he took part in the Synod as Synodal Father appointed by the Holy Father.

He was the director of the series “I libri dello Spirito Cristiano” published by Rizzoli, and is the director of the record label “Spirto Gentil”, both founded by Fr. Giussani.

Stanley Hauerwas Christian Theologian and Ethicist, Duke University Divinity School

Professor Stanely Hauerwas is the Gilbert T. Rowe Professor of Theological Ethics at Duke University, where he also holds joint appointments in the Schools of Divinity and Law.

Named by Time magazine in 2001 as 'America's Best Theologian', Stanley Hauerwas has been known to many as a theological provocateur on topics ranging from care for the handicapped, the church as a political community, narrative theology, medical ethics, and peacemaking.

He is a central figure to the recovery of virtue ethics in philosophical theology in recent decades. Hauerwas delivered the esteemed Gifford Lectures at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland in 2001, which formed the basis of his book, With the Grain of the Universe: The Church's Witness and Natural Theology. His book, A Community of Character, was named one of the 100 most important books in religion in the 20th century.

Phil Nuzzo Founder & Director, New York Metro Chamber Orchestra

Maestro Philip Nuzzo’s highly diverse and successful performing career has brought him debuts throughout the Far East, Europe, and the United States. In recent seasons, he has been a principal guest conductor of the Cairo Symphony Orchestra in Egypt. Mo. Nuzzo has held the post of Artistic Director of The Mississippi Opera. Guest conducting appearances include work at the Music at Penn’s Woods Festival, the highly acclaimed St. Olaf Orchestra and the Niagara Symphony among others, he has appeared with major symphonies in Vienna, Austria and Kharkov, Ukraine.

In the field of opera Philip Nuzzo has appeared with The Tampa Bay Opera, Cairo Opera among others. He has concluded Aida with Metropolitan Opera soprano Leona Mitchell in Hong Kong, and has premiered the Jonathan Dove reduction of Wagner’s Ring in an exciting concert with the internationally renowned soprano Audrey Stottler. His Metro Chamber Orchestra commissioned a re-orchestration of Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier which was performed in 2003 with a cast of rising young artists.Now in his sixth season as Artistic Director of The Metro Chamber Orchestra he has led the orchestra in many exciting new works and orchestrations which the orchestra has commissioned including Concerto for Clarinet by Sean Hickey, Philip Hagemann’s reorchestration of Debussy’s L’Enfant Prodigue, David Matthew’s arrangement of Berlioz’s Nuit d’Ete. This season the Metro Chamber Orchestra has commissioned an arrangement of the Dance and final scene from Strauss’ Salome and an arrangement of Mussorgsky’s “Songs and Dances of Death”.

Christopher Vath pianist

Christopher Vath was born in New Orleans and attended North Texas State University, where he received a Bachelor of Music Degree in Piano Performance with Joseph Banowetz. After doing graduate studies at the Julliard School in New York with Martin Canin, he resided in Italy, where he worked as a solo pianist, chamber musician, and chamber music teacher. On his return to the US, he started teaching piano and working as the music director/choir director at a church in New York City, activities that continue today.

He has worked as composer, arranger, and pianist in the field of commercial music (VISA, Mercedes Benz, Anderson Consulting) and co-written music for two film scores, as well as incidental music for the theatrical production The Sacrament of Memory. Two of his choral arrangements are published by World Library Publications. He gave solo recitals at Carnegie Hall in New York in 2005 and 2006. In 2005, in addition to his Carnegie Hall debut, he gave a private performance for Pope Benedict XVI at the papal summer residence.

John Waters journalist for the Irish Times, author, and playwright

John Waters is a journalist, author and playwright. His first book, JIVING AT THE CROSSROADS (1991), about the cultural underbelly of Irish politics, was a bestseller. His other publications include RACE OF ANGELS (1994) a study of the roots of U2's music in Irish history and culture. His most recent book is THE POLITBURO HAS DECIDED THAT YOU ARE UNWELL (2004). His award-winning plays include LONG BLACK COAT (1994) and EASTER DUES (1997). He writes a popular weekly column for THE IRISH TIMES. He and his daughter Roisin live in Dublin.

Greg Wolfe Publisher and Editor of Image Journal

Gregory Wolfe is Writer in Residence at Seattle Pacific University and the founder and editor of Image, one of America’s leading literary quarterlies, now celebrating its twentieth anniversary. He also directs the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at SPU. In 2005, he served as a judge for the National Book Awards. Wolfe has published essays, reviews, and articles in numerous journals, including Commonweal and First Things.

His essays have been anthologized in collections such as The Best Christian Writing and The Best Catholic Writing. Among his books are Intruding Upon the Timeless: Meditations on Art, Faith, and Mystery, Malcolm Muggeridge: A Biography and Sacred Passion: The Art of William Schickel. Wolfe is also the editor of Bearing the Mystery: Twenty Years of IMAGE (forthcoming), and The New Religious Humanists: A Reader. A new collection of essays, Beauty Will Save the World, is forthcoming from ISI Books. He has co-authored several books on parenting with his wife, the novelist Suzanne Wolfe, including Books That Build Character and Bless This House: Prayers for Families and Children. He received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Hillsdale College and his M.A. in English literature from Oxford University. He and his wife are the parents of four children and live in Seattle, Washington.