John Borelli has served as the Special Assistant for Dialogue and Catholic Identity to the President of Georgetown University since 2004. He is also a Senior Research Fellow for the University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs. His recent research, lecturing and writing have focused on ecumenical and interreligious relations, and he is currently completing a comprehensive study on the genesis and development of Nostra aetate.
Prior to his years at Georgetown, he was Associate Director of the U.S. Bishops’ Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs for over 16 years, and served as Interim Director for one year. For 17 years, he was a consultor to the Vatican’s Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue. In these positions for the past 38 years, he has developed projects emphasizing how dialogue is at the heart of Catholic identity, one of the key emphases of the Second Vatican Council, and has sponsored, staffed, and participated in numerous ecumenical, interreligious, and multireligious dialogues and projects. He has authored and edited six books and 250 articles and chapters on various topics in theology, religious studies, ecumenical and interreligious relations.
Regarding Nostra aetate and its legacy for interreligious dialogue, he has authored a number of articles, notably, “Interreligious Dialogue at Vatican II,” in the Oxford Handbook on Vatican II (2023); “Correcting the Nostra Aetate Legend: The Contested, Minimal, and Almost Failed Effort to Embrace a Tragedy and Amend Christian Attitudes Toward Jews, Muslims, and the Followers of Other Religions,” in Nostra Aetate, Non-Christian Religions and Interfaith Relations (2021); “Nostra Aetate: Origins, History, and Vatican II Context,” in The Future of Interreligious Dialogue: A Multireligious Conversation on Nostra Aetate (2017); “Fifty Years Ago at Vatican II: 1964—The Critical Year for Interreligious Dialogue,” in Origins: CNS Documentary Service (2014); and “Vatican II: Preparing the Catholic Church for Dialogue,” also in Origins (2012).
He graduated from St. Louis University in 1968 with a major in Philosophy and received his doctorate in Theology and the History of Religions from Fordham University in 1976, teaching full-time in his final years of studies, and then eleven years as Director of Religious Studies at the College of Mount St. Vincent, also in New York City. For some of these years, he served part-time as staff writer and assistant for the Ecumenical Commission of the Archdiocese of New York and one year part-time as Secretary General of the USA chapter of Religions for Peace.
