Fr. Michael Agliardo, S.J., Ph.D.

Fr. Michael Agliardo, S.J., Ph.D., serves as director of McGrath Institute's Church Life Asia initiative. The focus of this initiative is to promote dialogue and engagement with the Church in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly with Chinese Catholics.

Program areas he directs include:

• The John C.H. Wu Speaker Series, which promotes understanding of the dialogue between China and the West, and in particular, the role of Christianity in that dialogue.

• The Dom Pierre-Celéstin Fellowship, which offers a year of enrichment on the Notre Dame campus to late-stage doctoral candidates, early-stage scholars, and people involved in ministry who seek to deepen the academic foundations of their work.

• The Christianity and Chinese Culture Roundtable, which provides a forum for young scholars on campus to share their work with one another and the wider Notre Dame community.

• The CCC Youth Program, which offers young people a half-month of faith-informed activities on the Notre Dame campus, also provides the opportunity to explore the connection between Christian faith and Chinese culture.

• For those pursuing ministerial service in the Asia-Pacific region, Church Life Asia collaborates with the Department of Theology to recruit and provide ongoing support for qualified MTS and Ph.D. candidates.

In the coming years, Church Life Asia will work with the STEP Program at the McGrath Institute to develop online theology courses.

After earning his A.B. in history at Harvard University, Fr. Michael entered the Society of Jesus ("the Jesuits") and was ordained to the priesthood in 1994. As a Jesuit, he earned an M.Div. and an S.T.L. at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology. He earned his Ph.D. in sociology at the University of California, San Diego, where he focused on qualitative sociology, cultural sociology, the sociology of religion, and environmental sociology.

Fr. Michael has taught theology at Fordham University, sociology at Boston College, Loyola University Chicago, Santa Clara University, and now the University of Notre Dame. He has also taught sociology at the National Seminary in Beijing, China. And he served as Executive Director of the U.S.-China Catholic Association.

He is a member of the American Sociological Association (where he previously served on the leadership team of the Environment and Technology section), the Association for the Sociology of Religion, the Religious Research Association, and the Society of Catholic Social Scientists. He currently serves on the board of the Religious Research Association as Chair of its Outstanding Applied Research Committee.

In addition to his work for Church Life Asia, Fr. Michael pursues research on faith and the environment. He has received grants from the Religious Research Association and the Louisville Institute to conduct research in this area. He is currently working on a five-country study of the reception of Laudato si', the encyclical of Pope Francis on care for the Earth, our common home.