Berkley Center

Chester Gillis is a professor in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies who served as the dean of Georgetown College from 2008 to 2017. An expert on the U.S. Catholic Church, the history of Catholicism, and the papacy, including Pope Benedict XVI, his other areas of expertise include interfaith dialogue and religious pluralism. Gillis was the initial holder of the Amaturo Chair in Catholic Studies and was a Berkley Center research fellow who directed the center's Program on the Church and Interreligious Dialogue; in 2008, he was the faculty mentor for the Berkley Center's undergraduate fellows program. Gillis has served on the faculty of Georgetown University since 1988. His publications include, among others, Catholic Faith in America (2003/2012), The Political Papacy (2005), and Pluralism: A New Paradigm for Theology (1993). He holds degrees in philosophy and religious studies from the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium and earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.