Notre Dame Theologian Wins Prestigious Ratzinger Prize| National Catholic Register

Cyril O’Regan is the first Irishman to receive the coveted award named for the late Pope Benedict XVI.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — A University of Notre Dame theologian with Irish roots is the latest recipient of a prestigious award named in honor of the late Pope Benedict XVI.

Cyril O’Regan, a systematic theologian who specializes in the thought of 19th- and 20th-century Catholics like St. John Henry Newman, Henri de Lubac and Hans Urs von Balthasar, is a recipient of the 2024 Ratzinger Prize, the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Vatican Foundation announced on Sept. 18.

Born in Ireland in 1952, O’Regan is the first Irishman to win the coveted prize, which has been awarded to distinguished scholars mostly working in theology and philosophy since 2011.

Etsurō Sotoo, a Japanese sculptor whose work appears in places like the Sagrada Família Basilica in Barcelona, Spain, was also announced as an award winner. 

O’Regan, who earned doctorates in both theology and philosophy from Yale University and has taught at Notre Dame since 1999, told the Register that he is “deeply honored and immensely grateful to the Ratzinger Foundation to receive this award that has a truly venerable pedigree.”

The systematic theologian also admitted that he was “somewhat in a state of shock” to be awarded the prize. He cited both Notre Dame’s “congenial relationship” with the Vatican and the “high reputation” of the Indiana university’s theology department as possible factors in his selection. Notre Dame’s theology program regularly ranks among the top in the world.

The foundation, however, cited O’Regan’s impressive theological contributions and teaching prowess in its statement announcing the 2024 award recipients.

Professor O’Regan “is much appreciated by students for his attentive teaching relationship,” a statement from the Ratzinger Foundation noted. “He has devoted several important articles to the figure and teaching of Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI.”

Past recipients of the Ratzinger Prize include some of the world’s top theologians and philosophers, such as Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor and French theologian and philosopher Jean-Luc Marion, who taught at the University of Chicago from 1994 to 2022.

“It is extraordinarily gratifying to be in their company,” O’Regan said.

Other members of the Ratzinger Prize “honor roll” were happy to welcome the Irish scholar in to their ranks.

“This is very happy news,” Australian theologian Tracey Rowland, who won the award in 2020, told the Register. “[O’Regan’s] The Anatomy of Misremembering book is such a classic text, he deserves it for that work alone.”

Meanwhile, Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute for Church Life responded to the news by posting to social media an archive of more than 40 essays O’Regan has written for the institute’s Church Life Journal. Among them is a memoriam the Irish theologian wrote on Benedict XVI after the latter’s death on the last day of 2022, in which he described the late Pope as “plausibly the greatest pastoral theologian of the Catholic Church over the last century.”

Other works by O’Regan include a study of modern Gnosticism and a book on 19th-century German philosopher Georg Hegel. O’Regan, who has focused on Trinitarian doctrine and the “Last Things” and is especially active at the intersection of theology and continental philosophy, is currently working on two volumes on the relationship between von Balthasar and Martin Heidegger.

The Irishman is the second Ratzinger Prize winner associated with Notre Dame. Jesuit Father Brian Daley, who taught in the university’s theology department but now teaches classics, won the Ratzinger Prize in 2012.

Meanwhile, Sotoo is the first East Asian and the first sculptor to win the Ratzinger Prize, which has recently been expanded to include awardees who practice the arts “with Christian inspiration.”

O’Regan and Sotoo will be presented the Ratzinger Prize by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state, at a Nov. 22 ceremony in Rome. Prior to the award presentation, a Mass in memory of Pope Benedict XVI will be celebrated at the late Pope’s tomb in the crypt of St. Peter’s Basilica, and the two award-winners will be received by Pope Francis. 

The Holy Father approved the nominations of the prize winners, which are proposed to him by a Ratzinger Foundation committee. Among the committee members is Bishop Rudolf Voderholzer of Regensburg, Germany, and president of the Pope Benedict XVI Institute. 

Previous award recipients had the opportunity to meet with Pope Benedict XVI before his death at age 95 on Dec. 31, 2022. The German prelate was one of the most important intellectual figures of post-Vatican II Catholicism, serving as St. John Paul II’s doctrine head for more than two decades before he was elected to the papacy in 2005. 

With O’Regan and Sotoo now added to the list, 18 countries and each inhabited continent are represented among Ratzinger Prize recipients. Ratzinger’s native Germany leads the way with seven award recipients. Europe has the most Ratzinger Prize winners, with Spain, Italy and France each claiming multiple awardees, but recipients also hail from non-European countries like Brazil, Burkina Faso and Lebanon. Award winners are primarily Catholics, but also include other Christians and even a member of the Jewish faith.

The Ratzinger Foundation was established in 2007 by former students of the German theologian with the aim of “the promotion of theology in the spirit of Joseph Ratzinger.” The nonprofit, which is affiliated with the Vatican, also funds deserving graduate students and holds international conferences on the life and legacy of Pope Benedict XVI.