Loyola University Chicago

Department of Theology

Richard A. McCormick, S.J., Chair of Catholic Moral Theology

Haker Photo

Hille Haker, Richard A. McCormick, S.J., Chair of Moral Theology

Please select the link below to go to Prof. Haker's website:
www.hillehaker.com

Please select the link below to go to Prof. Haker's public lectures:

Hille Haker Public Lectures

Please select the link below to go to Prof. Haker's McCormick Chair inauguration address: 

Hille Haker's Inauguration Address


Hille Haker, Ph.D., holds the Richard McCormick S.J. Endowed Chair of Catholic Moral Theology at Loyola University Chicago. Her research focuses on the foundations of ethics, moral identity, literary & narrative ethics, Christian ethics as critical social ethics, bioethics, and feminist ethics.

Prior to joining the faculty at Loyola, Dr. Haker was Chair of Moral Theology and Social Ethics in the Catholic Theology Department of Frankfurt University (2005 to 2009), Associate Professor of Christian Ethics at Harvard Divinity School (2003 to 2005), and Heisenberg Research Scholar (2002–2003). She holds a Ph.D (1998) and Habilitation (2002) in Christian Theological Ethics from the University of Tübingen, Germany.

From 2015-2018, Hille Haker served as the President of Societas Ethica, European Society for Research in Ethics. She served on the editorial board of the International Journal Concilium for many years and in this role co-edited nine journal issues. While working in Germany, she was a member of several Bioethics Committees, including the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies to the European Commission from 2005-2015, the German Ethics Committee of the Federal Physicians Chamber, and the Bioethics Committee of the German Bishops Conference.

Her most recent work is Towards A Critical Political Ethics. Catholic Ethics and Social Challenges. Prof. Haker is currently working on a book on two basic concepts of ethics,  Recognition and Responsibility.

Prof. Haker's publications include: Moralische Identität. Literarische Lebensgeschichten als Medium ethischer Reflexion (1999), Ethik der genetischen Frühdiagnostik (2002), and  Hauptsache gesund (2011); eight co-edited books, among them - The Ethics of Genetics in Human Procreation (2000)Ethik-Geschlecht-Wissenschaften (2006), Medical Ethics in Health Care Chaplaincy (2009), and Religiöser Pluralismus in der Klinikseelsorge (2014); multiple articles; and nine co-edited journal issues for Concilium, among them - Human Trafficking (2011), Postcolonial Theology (2012), The Return of Apocalypticism (2014), and Theology, Anthropology, and Neurosciences (2015).

Research Interests

  • Meta-ethics (e.g. agency, virtues and norms as ethical concepts);
  • Fundamental theological ethics and methods (normative ethics and hermeneutical/experiential ethics);
  • Social and political ethics (human rights and justice, citizenship);
  • Bioethics (reproductive medicine, human genetics, and new technologies);
  • Feminist ethics (existentialist and care ethics);
  • Aesthetics and ethics (modern literature and narratives as medium of/for ethics).

Publications

For a full listing of Prof. Haker's publications, see here

Eiditor of Book Series:

  • Values in Bioethics (Brill), since 2017
  • Medizinische Ethik in der Klinikseelsorge/Medical Ethics in Health Care Chaplaincy, Lit Verlag (4 volumes so far since 2009)

Monographs:

  • Towards A Critical Political Ethics. Catholic Ethics and Social Challenges. Studien zur Theologischen Ethik 156, Berlin (Schwabe) 2020.
  • Hauptsache gesund? Ethische Fragen der Pränatal- und Präimplantationsdiagnostik, München (Kösel) 2011.
  • Ethik der genetischen Frühdiagnostik. Sozialethische Reflexionen zur Verantwortung am Beginn des menschlichen Lebens, mentis: Paderborn, 2002.
  • Moralische Identität. Literarische Lebensgeschichten als Medium ethischer Reflexion. Mit einer Interpretation der "Jahrestage" von Uwe Johnson, Tübingen (Francke) 1999.

Edited Books:

  • Unaccompanied Minors and the Ethics of Child Migration. Social, legal, and ethical perspectives (co-edited with Molly Greening), Lexington, Lanham 2019.
  • Religiöser Pluralismus in der Klinikseelsorge, with G. Wanderer and K. Bentele, Lit Verlag, Berlin et al. 2014
  • Medical Ethics in Health Care Chaplaincy. Essays, Walter Moczynski, Hiller Haker und Katrin Bentele (Hrsg.), Berlin et al., Lit Verlag 2009.
  • Perspektiven der Medizinethik in der Klinikseelsorge, Walter Moczynski, Hille Haker, Katrin Bentele und Gwendolin Wanderer (Hrsg.), Lit Verlag, Berlin et al. 2009.
  • Ethik-Geschlecht-Wissenschaften, mentis Verlag, Paderborn 2006 (zus. m.  U. Konnertz u. D. Mieth).
  • Humane Genetik? Jahrespublikation Ethik und Unterricht, diesterweg, Stuttgart 2002 (zus. m. J. Dietrich und S. Graumann).
  • The Ethics of Genetics in Human Procreation, Ashgate, Aldershot, 2000 (zus. m. D. Beyleveld).
  • Ethics of Human Genome Analyis. European Perspectives, attempto, Tübingen 1993 (zus. m. R. Hearn u. K. Steigleder).

Book Projects

  • Recognition and Responsibility: Critical Theory and Christian Ethics (in preparation)

Edited Journal Issues (Concilium)

Co-Editor/Director of Concilium (translated into 6 languages: German, English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguise, Croatian) 2001-2015.

  • "Theology, Anthropology, and Neurosciences", Concilium 50/4/2015, co-edited with Thierry Marie Courau, Regina Ammich-Quinn, and Marie-Theres Wacker
  • "The Return of Apocalypticism", Concilium 50/3/2014, co-edited with Andres Torres Queiruga and Marie-Theres Wacker
  • "Postcolonial Theology," Concilium 49,2 (2013), co-edited with C.L. Susin and E. Messi
  • "Trafficking", Concilium 47,3, (2011), with Lisa Cahill and Elaine Wainwright.
  • "Natural Law – A controversy." Concilium 46,3 (2010) (with Lisa Cahill)
  • "HIV/AIDS." Concilium 43, 3 (2007) (with Regina Ammicht-Quinn)
  • "Women in World Religions." Concilium 42,3 (2006) (with Marie-Theres Wacker und Susan Ross)
  • "Cyberspace – Cyberethic - Cybertheology." Concilium 41,1 (2005), with E. Borgmann and. S. Van Erp.
  • "Structural Betrayal of Trust: Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church." Concilium 40,3 (2004), Grunewald 2004, with R. Ammicht-Quinn and M. Junker-Kenny).

Articles submitted or forthcoming:

  • "Uprooted: Towards a Medical Ethics of Suffering." In: Christof Mandry (Hg.): Suffering. Paderborn, Schöningh, 2019 (accepted, forthcoming 2020).
  • "Theodor Hesburgh" (in preparation)
  • "Migration and Ethics" (in preparation)
  • "Verletzliche Freiheit. Zu einem neuen Prinzip der Bioethik". In: Hildegund Keul (ed.), Theologische Vulnerabilitätsforschung – gesellschaftsrelevant und interdisziplinär, Stuttgart (Kohlhammer), 2020. (forthcoming)
  • "Ethische Reflexionen zur Covid Krise" (submitted)
  • "Catholic Moral Theology," Special Issue (in preparation)
  • "Metamorphosen der Moral". In : Scheidewege. Schriften für Skepsis und Kritik.

Articles 2020

English:

  • "From political theology to Critical political ethics." In: (: M. Becka, Bernarderth Caero Bustillos, João Vila-Chã (eds.): Politics, Theology, and the Meaning of Power, Concilium 3/2020, in five languages, English version p. 63-73.
  • "Towards a Decolonial Narrative Ethics," Reprinted in: Adam Zachary Newton (ed.): Ethics and Literary Practice, Basel 2020: MDPI, 2020, 72-102. (https://www.mdpi.com/books/pdfview/book/2424)
  • "Vulnerable Agency – Human Dignity and Gendered Violence". In: Jonathan Rothschildt and Matthew Petrusek (eds.): Value and Vulnerability. An Interfaith Dialogue on Human Dignity, Notre Dame (University of Notre Dame Press), 2020, 411-457.
  • Andorno, Roberto, Baylis, Francoise et al. (Haker, Hille): "Geneva Statement on Heritable Human Genome Editing: The Need for Course Correction"
    In: Trends in Biotechnology,| Volume 38, ISSUE 4, P351-354, April 01, 2020, 
    https://www.cell.com/trends/biotechnology/fulltext/S0167-7799(19)30317-8?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0167779919303178%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

 


White Supremacy

Breaking White Supremacy: The Black Social Gospel, Martin Luther King, Jr. and the "Fury in the Negro"

Distinguished theologian and ethicist Prof Gary Dorrien gave a lecture titled Breaking White Supremacy: The Black Social Gospel, Martin Luther King, Jr., and the “Fury in the Negro” on Monday, April 16, 2018 at 4 p.m. in the Information Commons, 4th Floor Lecture Hall. Sponsored by the John Cardinal Cody Chair of Theology and the Richard A. McCormick, S.J. Chair in Catholic Moral Theology.

Gary Dorrien is the Reinhold Niebuhr Professor of Social Ethics at Union Theological Seminary and Professor of Religion at Columbia University. Prof. Dorrien is the author of 16 books and approximately 275 articles that range across the fields of ethics, social theory, theology, philosophy, politics, and history. Philosopher Cornel West describes him as “the preeminent social ethicist in North America today” and philosopher Robert Neville describes him as “the most rigorous theological historian of our time.” Prof. Dorrien’s recent book, Kantian Reason and Hegelian Spirit: The Idealistic Logic of Modern Theology, won the PROSE Award from the Association of American Publishers as the best book in Theology and Religious Studies of 2012.


Religion and Violence

4th International McCormick Ethics Colloquium

“Healing the Wounds of Violence: How to Understand and Respond to Religious and Political Violence” was the theme of the 4th International McCormick Ethics Colloquium, which was held on April 18 – 19 in Coffey Hall – McCormick Lounge at Loyola’s Lake Shore Campus. Fr. Michael Pfleger, Senior Pastor of the Faith Community of St. Sabina, gave the colloquium’s keynote lecture at 4:00 p.m. on Monday, April 18, 2016.

Program

Poster


Responsibility/Integrity Photo

Responsibility and the Integrity of Life
Spring 2014 McCormick Chair Lecture and Colloquium
Thursday, April 16 at 4 p.m.
William Schweiker, Edward L. Ryerson Distinguished Service Professor of Theological Ethics at the University of Chicago Divinity School Information Commons, 4th Floor
Sponsored by the Richard A. McCormick, S.J. Chair of Catholic Moral Theology


Tend the Earth Photo

To Tend the Earth: Responding to the Global Climate Change Crisis
George Crabtree, Senior Scientist, Argonne Distinguished Fellow, Argonne National Laboratory
Lisa Sideris, Associate Professor, Indiana University

Mary Evelyn Tucker, Senior Lecturer and Research Scholar, Yale University
William French, Associate Professor, Loyola University Chicago
Rep. Robyn Gabel, 18th District, Illinois House of Representatives
Kathleen Smythe, Professor, Xavier University
Daniel R. DiLeo, Project Manager of Catholic Climate Covenant
Elke U. Weber, Jerome A. Chazen Professor of International Business and Professor of Management and Psychology at Columbia University
Organized by the the Institute for Environmental Sustainability, the Department of Theology, and the Richard A. McCormick Chair of Catholic Moral Theology


McCormick Chair Photo

3rd International McCormick Chair Colloquium

The City as an Intersectional Site of Ethics and Theology

May 23 - 25 
Universität Erfurt

In a continuation of the Spring 2013 dialogue with faculty and students from the Universität Erfurt, the Richard J. McCormick Chair of Catholic Moral Theology co-sponsored the 3rd International McCormick Chair Colloquium with the Universität Erfurt on May 3–5. Twelve Loyola Theology Department faculty and students traveled to Erfurt, Germany to present papers on the topic of "The City as an Intersectional Site on Ethics and Theology."

For more information click here‌.


Politics and Ethics Photo

"How Politics Became Impossible and Ethics Became Unnecessary: The Shrinking Vocabulary of Modern Public Life"

Colloquium
Friday, Feb. 21, 2014, 11 a.m.–2:30 p.m.
Robin Lovin
Piper Hall
Sponsored by the Richard A. McCormick, S.J. Chair of Catholic Moral Theology


Energy and Environment Photo

Sustainability Conference

James Balog, Founder & Director, Extreme Ice Survey, Founder, Earth Vision Trust
Knut Nadelhoffer, University of Michigan
Larry Rasumussen, Union Theological Seminary
Emmanuel Agius, University of Malta
Howard Learner, Environmental Law and Policy Center
Donald Wuebbels, University of Illinois
Jame Schaefer, Marquette University
Jo Ann Rooney Hall
Organized by the Office of the President, the Institute for Environmental Sustainability, the Department of Theology, and the Richard A. McCormick Chair of Catholic Moral Theology


Storytelling Photo

"Storytelling as Sword and Shield: Oak Creek and Supermax—Two Case Studies"

September 26, 2013
Valarie Kaur
Damen Student Center MPR North
Sponsored by the Richard A. McCormick, S.J., Chair of Catholic Moral Theology


McCormick Chair Events and Lectures Archive