Presenters

Most Reverend Shelton J. Fabre

Archbishop of Louisville

Celebrant and Homilist for the Red Mass

Archbishop Shelton J. Fabre was born October 25, 1963 to Luke Fabre, Jr. and Theresa Ann Vallet Fabre. He is the fifth of six children. He entered Saint Joseph Seminary College in St. Benedict, Louisiana, graduating with a Bachelor of History degree in 1985. Fabre was then sent to the American College of Louvain in Leuven, Belgium. He received additional priestly formation there while studying at the Katholieke Universiteit te Leuven. He was awarded a Bachelor of Religious Studies degree in 1987 and a Master of Religious Studies degree in 1989 from Katholieke Universiteit.

Fabre was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Baton Rouge on August 5, 1989. After his ordination, he served in various pastoral roles as well as diocesan positions including chaplain at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, Defender of the Bond for the Marriage Tribunal, and Dean of the Northwest Deanery. He also served on the Diocese of Baton Rouge Priest Council, College of Consultors, School Board, Clergy Personnel Board, Chairman of Pastoral Planning, and Director of the Office of Black Catholics.

On December 13, 2006, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Fabre as Auxiliary Bishop of New Orleans and he was ordained on February 28, 2007. As Auxiliary Bishop, he worked to help rebuild the Archdiocese of New Orleans after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

On September 23, 2013, Pope Francis appointed Bishop Fabre as the Bishop of the Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux. Later, on February 8, 2022, Pope Francis appointed Archbishop Fabre as the tenth Bishop and fifth Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Louisville. He was installed as Archbishop on March 30, 2022.

From 2018 to 2023, Archbishop Fabre served as the chair of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism and led the writing of the U.S. Bishops’ most recent pastoral letter on racism, Open Wide Our Hearts – The Enduring Call to Love (2018). He currently is a bishop-consultor on the USCCB Committee of Domestic Justice and Human Development and is a member of the USCCB Committee on Laity, Marriage, and Family Life. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Catholic Relief Services, on the Board of Trustees of the National Black Catholic Congress, and on the Board of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the United States.

See his diocesan biography for more details.

John H. Garvey

President emeritus, Catholic University of America

St. Thomas More Lecturer

John Garvey served as the 15th president of The Catholic University of America from 2010 until his retirement in 2023. He is a nationally acclaimed expert in constitutional law, religious liberty, and the first amendment. He has authored and co-authored numerous books, including What Are Freedoms For? (1996); Religion and the Constitution (2011), which won the Alpha Sigma Nu Jesuit book award; and Sexuality and the U.S. Catholic Church (2007), which won the Catholic Press Association Award.

The second of eight children, Garvey grew up in Sharon, Pennsylvania. From childhood, his Catholic faith has been at the center of his life. His father, a small town lawyer, took Garvey and his siblings to Mass before school. His extended family comprised devout grandparents on both sides who counted priests and religious among their siblings, nieces, and nephews.

Garvey received his A.B. summa cum laude from the University of Notre Dame in 1970. After graduation, Garvey entered Harvard Divinity School on a Danforth Fellowship but left after one semester. He entered Harvard Law School the following year, graduating in 1974. Garvey then clerked for Irving R. Kaufman, the Chief Judge of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, and later joined the law firm of Morrison & Foerster in San Francisco.

In 1976 he began teaching law at the University of Kentucky, an appointment he held until 1994. He spent the 1985-86 school year as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan. From 1981 to 1984 he served as Assistant to the Solicitor General of the United States. He argued several prominent cases before the United States Supreme Court, including Silkwood v. Kerr-McGee Corporation and Heckler v. Campbell, which addressed disability regulation within the Social Security Administration. He was elected to the American Law Institute at the age of 33. Garvey taught law at the University of Notre Dame from 1994 until 1999 when he was appointed dean of Boston College Law School.

Throughout his years as the President of The Catholic University of America, Garvey has emphasized that a Catholic approach to scholarship enriches every school and discipline. Garvey has continued to be a prominent voice in the public square on a number of issues, including higher education, culture, law, Catholicism, and religious liberty.

Garvey and his wife Jeanne Walter Garvey have five children and 23 grandchildren.

See his CUA biography for further details.

The Most Rev. Thomas John Paprocki

Bishop of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois

St. John Fisher Lecturer

Bishop Thomas John Paprocki is the ninth Bishop of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois (installed on June 22, 2010). Growing up in Chicago, he was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Chicago in 1978. After ordination, he studied law at DePaul University College of Law and was admitted to the Illinois Bar in 1981. Working as a parish priest at St. Michael Church in South Chicago, a neighborhood with high unemployment due to shutdowns of the local steel mills, then-Father Paprocki co‑founded the South Chicago Legal Clinic to help answer the need for legal services for the poor. In 2014 Bishop Paprocki was named President Emeritus and Of Counsel of the organization, now called the Greater Chicago Legal Clinic.

In November, 1985, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin appointed Fr. Paprocki Vice‑Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Chicago and in 1987 sent him to do post‑graduate studies in canon law at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He completed his doctoral degree in 1991. Father Paprocki then returned to his previous position in Chicago as Vice‑Chancellor and was appointed Chancellor in March, 1992, serving in that capacity under Cardinal Bernardin and then under Cardinal Francis George, following Cardinal Bernardin's death in 1996. Concluding his service as Chancellor after two terms in office in June, 2000, Father Paprocki studied Polish language and culture at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. In January 2001, he was appointed Pastor of St. Constance Parish, serving primarily a large immigrant community from Poland on the northwest side of Chicago.

On January 24, 2003, Pope John Paul II appointed him to serve as Auxiliary Bishop of Chicago. Cardinal George named him Liaison for Health and Hospital Affairs in the Archdiocese of Chicago. In May 2013, he received his Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) degree from the University of Notre Dame. He taught as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Loyola University's Chicago School of Law from 1999 to 2015, and at Notre Dame Law School from 2016-2021. He is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law, Business, and Bioethics at Quincy University's Oakley School of Business, Quincy, Illinois, and Adjunct Professor of Law, Ave Maria School of Law, Naples, Florida. Bishop Paprocki also serves on the Illinois Catholic Health Association Board and serves as the chairman of the Committee on Canonical Affairs and Church Governance for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

See the diocesan website for further details.

Gerard V. Bradley

Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame Law School

Charles Rice Lecturer

Gerard Bradley has been Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame since 1992.  Before then he taught at the University of Illinois College of Law and, before that, he was a trial lawyer in New York County District Attorney’s Office.  For twenty-five years until 2019 Professor Bradley and John Finnis directed at Notre Dame the Natural Law Institute and edited The American Journal of Jurisprudence (published by Oxford University Press).  Bradley has been a Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University and a Visiting Professor of Politics at Princeton.  He served for many years as the President of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, as well as Chair of the Federalist Society’s Religious Liberties Practice Group.  Bradley is a Senior Fellow of the Witherspoon Institute, in Princeton, New Jersey.  He serves (with Hadley Arkes) as Co-Director of the James Wilson Institute for Natural Rights and the Founding.  He is a founding member of the American Academy of Catholic Scholars and Artists.

Bradley’s first publication was a co-authored book on labor racketeering.  His second book was a history of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.    Among his most recent books is Catholic Social Teaching: A Volume of Scholarly Essays, which he co-edited with Cristian Brugger (published by Cambridge University Press).  Saint Augustine’s Press will bring out a third collection of Bradley’s published and unpublished papers in 2024.

Gerry Bradley met Pamela Vivolo when they were both law students at Cornell.  They married in 1981 and have raised eight children.  Only four have become attorneys – so far.  They have seventeen grandchildren.

Paul R. DeHart

Professor of Political Science, Texas State University

Dr. Paul R. DeHart is Professor of Political Science at Texas State University, where he has taught since August 2009. Prior to that he was Assistant Professor of Political Science at Lee University from 2005-2009. He holds a Ph.D. and an MA from the Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin and a BA in political science and philosophy from Houghton College (summa cum laude and with major honors in political science). While at Houghton College he also studied classical vocal performance with the late Paul Giles, a founding performer of the Boston Lyric Theatre.

DeHart specializes in the American founding, early modern political theory (especially Thomas Hobbes and Locke), social contract theory, the grounds of political authority and obligation, the relationship between religion and political order, natural law. and constitutional design. He is author of Uncovering the Constitution’s Moral Design (University of Missouri Press 2007; released in paperback 2017) and editor (with Carson Holloway) of Reason, Revelation, and the Civic Order: Political Philosophy and the Claims of Faith (Northern Illinois University Press 2014).  DeHart's articles have appeared in journals such as Polity, Critical Review, Locke Studies, Perspectives on Political Science, and the Catholic Social Science Review. His public scholarship has been discussed within multiple Presidential campaigns and within state government. He has delivered invited lectures at Oxford University in the Rothermere American Institute's Constitutional Thought and History Seminar, in a series for the Attorney General's Office for the State of Texas, and at the Law School of the University of Dayton.

In 2014, DeHart received the Presidential Distinction Award for Excellence in Scholarly Work. He has also received a Summer Stipend from the National Endowment for the Humanities. In 2016, He received a College Achievement Award for Excellence in Teaching. He has also been recognized as an Alpha Chi Favorite Professor. But better than any award, as he sees it, is to see students become truly intrigued by and animated by the questions and problems of political life.

See his Texas State faculty profile for further details.

Brendan Wilson

Partner, Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP

Adjunct Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School

Brendan Wilson advises nonprofit organizations and philanthropists on tax and corporate law matters. Brendan’s clients include individual philanthropists, businesses, family offices, private foundations, charities, churches and religious organizations, trade associations, hybrid enterprises, health care organizations, and educational nonprofit organizations.

Brendan also advises nonprofit clients on tax law matters. He has experience counseling private foundations on excise tax matters and advising nonprofit clients on unrelated business income tax issues. He also has experience seeking rulings and determinations from tax authorities and resolving tax controversies with federal, state and local taxing authorities. Brendan helps nonprofit clients obtain exemption from state income and sales taxes, and comply with state-level charitable solicitation rules and regulations.

Brendan works with clients engaged in international activities. He advises clients on international grant making issues, OFAC and FCPA compliance issues, the creation of foreign affiliates, and cross-border tax issues. Brendan also works with foreign nonprofit organizations operating in the United States, advising them on legal structuring issues, fundraising issues and the creation of “friends of” organizations.

Additionally, Brendan is an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame Law School.

Scott D. Pollock

Founder, Scott D. Pollock & Associates, P.C.

Scott D. Pollock has practiced U.S. immigration law since 1985. He is the founder of Scott D. Pollock & Associates, P.C., a nationally recognized immigration law firm in Chicago that is rated AV (very high to preeminent) by Martindale Hubbell. He has been selected as a Leading Illinois Attorney for immigration law for since 2004, a distinction reserved for the top 5% in the field as determined by other attorneys in Illinois.

Pollock’s active legal practice includes all areas of immigration law and procedure, including immigrant and non-immigrant visas, political asylum, deportation/removal defense, waivers of inadmissibility, employment authorization and employer compliance/sanctions, appeals and litigation. He is a frequent speaker on immigration topics. His clients include universities, religious organizations, financial, manufacturing, health care and high tech companies, and individuals. He is fluent in Spanish and enjoys variety and challenges. 

See his firm biography for additional information.

Andrea Picciotti-Bayer

Director, The Conscience Project

Andrea Picciotti-Bayer is Director of the Conscience Project. A Stanford-educated lawyer, she has dedicated her legal career to civil rights and appellate advocacy.

Andrea got her start as a trial and appellate attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. Prior to leading the Conscience Project, she served as the legal advisor for the Catholic Association, filing amicus briefs with federal courts of appeal and the U.S. Supreme Court in key religious freedom and free speech cases.

Andrea appears frequently in the media to discuss religious freedom controversies and legal victories, and in 2021 she received First Place for Best Coverage — Religious Liberty Issues from the Catholic Media Association. Andrea is a legal analyst for EWTN News and a regular columnist for the National Catholic Register. Her writing has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, National Review, Fox News, Newsweek, CNN en Español and other well-regarded publications. She has also joined Fox News, Newsmax and a variety of other television and radio shows to share expert commentary.

Andrea lived in Colombia for more than a decade. She has ten children and lives in the Washington, DC area.

Nina Hope Shea

Senior Fellow, Hudson Institute

Director, Center for Religious Freedom

Nina Shea is a Senior Fellow of the Hudson Institute, where she directs the Center for Religious Freedom, an entity she founded in 1986. Beginning in 1999, she was appointed for seven terms by the U.S. House of Representatives to serve as a Commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.

A lawyer by training, she undertakes analysis and strategic advocacy regarding religious freedom as a component of U.S. foreign policy. She was a principal leader of the coalition for the International Religious Freedom Act (1998). She was appointed as a U.S. delegate to the UN’s main human rights body by both Republican and Democratic administrations. 

She has authored or co-authored three books on religious persecution. She produced widely publicized reports on extremist indoctrination in Saudi textbooks, which led to comprehensive Saudi textbook reform. She writes in the Wall Street Journal, National Review, and elsewhere.  

Her proposal and research for the renaming of a Washington street to honor Hong Kong political prisoner Jimmy Lai is now a bill before Congress. Also pending before Congress is a resolution on Nigeria based on Shea’s writing demonstrating that it is among the world’s worst religious persecutors and should be officially designated as a “country of particular concern.” 

Last year, Shea was a recipient of the Bradley Prize and the Benedict Leadership Award of Belmont Abbey College.

Patrick Jenevein

CEO, Pointe Bello

Patrick Jenevein serves as the chief executive at Pointe Bello and, previously, Tang Energy Group. Tang developed several electric power businesses in China. Its due diligence capabilities there and others’ competitive and litigation intelligence needs in the United States led to Pointe Bello’s formation.

Before engaging China’s biggest defense contractor in litigation in the United States, Tang earned widespread recognition for its contributions in the United States and China.

Pointe Bello leverages its authoritative research in Chinese to provide strategic, cutting-edge intelligence on China’s economic and commercial activity worldwide. Doing so has helped others frame decisions at the highest levels of government around the world and prevail in legal disputes in the United States.

Jenevein is a Davidson College graduate, Council on Foreign Relations Life Member, and past Chairman of the Board, Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Dallas.

His speaking engagements have included appearances at CFR, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Security Council, Pentagon and Naval Postgraduate School, U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. Jenevein has published work in top national media outlets. He is the coauthor of Dancing with the Dragon, which will be published 1 October 2024.

Eric Kniffin

Fellow, Ethics and Public Policy Center

Owner/Partner, Kniffin Law PLLC

Eric Kniffin is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he works on a range of initiatives to protect and strengthen religious liberty as part of EPPC’s HHS Accountability Project.

Kniffin has been an attorney focusing on religious liberty for almost 20 years. As an attorney in Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice during the George W. Bush Administration, he helped enforce the Fair Housing Act, the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons (CRIPA), and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). As legal counsel at the Becket Fund, he contributed to landmark religious liberty decisions including Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby.

In private practice, Kniffin has protected hundreds of religious employers from the HHS contraception and abortifacient mandate and the HHS gender transition mandate. He has represented the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Knights of Columbus, and the Assemblies of God, among others, in amicus briefs before the Supreme Court. His work helping religious organizations understand, maximize, and defend their religious liberties has made him a nationally recognized expert in the field.

Kniffin is a sought-after commentator on religious liberty issues and has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, National Review, Huffington Post, National Catholic Register, Inside Higher Ed, and Washington Times, and has spoken regularly for The Federalist Society and The Heritage Foundation.

Kniffin holds a B.A. in philosophy from Wheaton College and received a M.A. in theology from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary before earning his J.D. at Notre Dame Law School. He lives in Colorado Springs with his wife, Bonnie, and their seven children.

Nikolas T. Nikas

Co-founder, President and General Counsel, Bioethics Defense Fund (BDF)

Nikolas T. Nikas is co-founder, president and general counsel of Bioethics Defense Fund (BDF), a public-interest organization that creates winning arguments for life to benefit lawmakers, courts, students and citizens across the United States and abroad. Nikas addresses bioethics issues including abortion, healthcare rights of conscience, human cloning/embryonic stem cell research, and end of life matters.

Nikas is known for clearly integrating the principles of natural law and political theory with the facts of science and medicine as the foundation for dynamic educational speaking events, and the development of model legislation and litigation strategies.

Nikas received his B.A. (1979) and M.A. (1981) in government and international relations from the University of Notre Dame, with his masters focusing on political theory. He received his Juris Doctorate, magna cum laude, in 1986 from Arizona State University College of Law. He and his wife Melinda, the parents of five grown children, live in Phoenix, Arizona.

See his BDF Biography for additional details.