Associate Professor of Christology and Cultures
Dwan Family Endowed Chair in Ecumenical and Interfaith Dialogue
B.A., M.A. Oxford University; MSc. London School of Economics; M.Phil. University College London; Ph.D. Boston College; S.T.L. Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara University
Email: tcattoi@jstb.edu
Phone: (510) 549-5005
Courses offered:
- SPHS 5000: History of Christian Spirituality (With Rev. Arthur Holder, Ph.D.)
- ST 2391: Christology, Ancient and Modern
- ST 2055: Theology of Religions
- ST 5020: Methods & Doctrines I - History of Theology
- STHR 2380: Christ, Krishna, Buddha: Towards a New Theology of Divine Embodiment
- STHS 4039: Patristic Theology
- STHS 4306: Mariology, Ancient and Modern
- STPF 4374: Introduction to the Theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar, Taught by Matthew Paulsen (GTU Ph.D. candidate) under the supervision of Prof. Cattoi
- STRS 4215: Nepal Theological Immersion
- STRS 4216: India Theological Immersion
- STSP 4704: Patristic Spirituality
- STSP 4322: Theology of Desire
- STSP 4279: Tibetan-Christian Dialogue
About the Professor
"For we were predestined before the ages to be in Christ as members of his body. He adapted us to himself and knitted us together in the Spirit as a soul to a body (...) For this we were created; this was God's good purpose for us before the ages."
Maximos the Confessor, Amb. 7
Dr. Cattoi joined the faculty in August 2006 after completing his doctorate at Boston College. His research interests include Christology and Patristics, Mahayana Buddhism (with particular attention to the Tibetan tradition), and the theology of inter-religious dialogue. His goal as a constructive theologian is to develop a comparative theology of embodiment and desire.
As Assistant Professor of Christology and Cultures, Dr. Cattoi teaches courses such as Christology: Ancient and Modern, Christ Krishna Buddha, and Revelation. Future courses include Introduction to Patristics, Theology of Religions, and Themes from Patristic and Tibetan Thought.
In Summer 2008, he taught a course on Origenism at Sun Yat Sen University in Guang Zhou (China), and in January 2009 he led a theological immersion in Nepal.
Dr. Cattoi is the holder of the Dwan Family Endowed Chair in Ecumenical and Interfaith Dialogue.
"I encourage students to observe, attend, survey, measure and revel in the near-dizzying array of religious and cultural diversity and innovation surrounding us... usually in the form of what is most unfamiliar to us."
Publications
- Divine Contingency: Theologies of Divine Embodiment in Maximos the Confessor and Tsong kha pa (Piscataway, N.J.: Gorgias Press, 2009),
- Theodore the Stoudite: Writings on Iconoclasm and the Spiritual Life (Ancient Christian Writers. New York, N.Y./Mahwah, N.J.: Newman/Paulist Press, forthcoming)
- Edited (With June McDaniel), Perceiving the Divine Through the Human Body: Mystical Sensuality (Palgrave McMillan, 2011)
- "What has Chalcedon to do with Lhasa? John Keenan’s and Lai Pai-Chiu’s reflections on classical Christology and the possible shape of a Tibetan theology of incarnation," Buddhist-Christian Studies (Vol. 28, 2008), 13-26.
- "The incarnate Logos and the rūpakāya: towards a comparative theology of embodiment", Religions East and West: Journal of the Institute of World Religions (Issue 8, October 2008), 109-131.
- "Picturing Bodies: Sacred Images and Transformative Practice in Byzantium and Tibet", Journal of Inter-religious Dialogue (Issue 2, October 1 2009), 38-46
- "The symphonic church: Chalcedonian themes in Maximos the Confessor’s liturgical theology," Studia Patristica (Vol. 48)
- "Salvific asymmetry: anhypostasy and icon veneration in Theodore the Studite’s Antirrhetici", in Studia Patristica (Vol. 51)
- "Why Images? Visualized Deities and Glorified Saints in Vajrayāna Buddhism and Patristic Theology", Journal of Philosophy and Education, Salesian Institute of Philosophy in India, October 2010
- "Normative texts and multiple meanings: rescuing alternative voices in Origen’s and Tsong kha pa’s approaches to scriptural interpretation", in Religions East and West (October 2012)
- "Basil of Caesarea’s De Spiritu Sancto and Haexameron", introductory chapter to the Chinese translation of these two works published by Zhejiang University Press, Hang Zhou, China (published in Chinese translation)
- "An Evagrian ὑπόστασις? Leontios of Byzantium’s understanding of subjectivity in Contra Nestorianos et Eutychianos", in Studia Patristica (forthcoming)
- "Primacy Revisited: Recovering Different Dimensions of Trinitarian Theology in Light of the 2007 Ravenna Declaration", in Khaled Anatolios (ed.), The Trinity in the Life of the Church (Baker Academic, forthcoming)
