Charles A. Gillespie is associate professor of Catholic Studies and the inaugural Director of the Pioneer Journey at Sacred Heart University. Gillespie also serves as the founding associate dean for SHU’s School of Performing Arts (SoPA). An award-winning “visionary leader,” Gillespie is an interdisciplinary scholar of performance, religions, and culture. His research and teaching draw on Christian theology, continental philosophy, theatre and performance studies, experimental performance practices, and religious aesthetics and cultural studies with a focus on the Catholic intellectual tradition, theories of interpretation, spirituality, formative education and pedagogy, and the dramatic humanities. He is the author of God on Broadway: Revealing the Sacred in the Spectacle (Fortress Press, 2025) as well as articles that have appeared in venues like MThZ, Logos, Religions, Labyrinth, Theatre Symposium, and The Other Journal and numerous chapters in edited volumes. With Larry D. Bouchard, he co-edited the special issue of Religions on “Religion and Theatrical Drama.” In 2025, Gillespie offered expert commentary on the papal conclave and election of Pope Leo XIV, where you can find him quoted in PEOPLE magazine and in appearances on ABC’s 20/20 and podcasts. He holds degrees from Villanova University, the Yale Institute of Sacred Music and Yale Divinity School, and the University of Virginia.
Gillespie is also a theatre-maker who trained in interreligious theatre for social change with the Parapanda Theatre Art Lab in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and he created the “Gospel Drama” experience for the World Meeting of Families Youth Congress in conjunction with Pope Francis’s visit to Philadelphia. Gillespie has developed and offered theatre and ritual workshops with church groups and parish communities in South Dakota, Tennessee, Connecticut, Virginia, and Scotland as well as given invited masterclasses and lectures for the University of Tennessee, Yale University, the University of St Thomas (Minnesota), and DeSales University. Gillespie co-founded the ecumenical liturgical drama troupe Theatrum Sacrum that made its international premiere at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Currently, he collaborates with Project Untitled and the Untitled Othello Project. Gillespie also serves as the Convenor of the Hans Urs von Balthasar Society of the Catholic Theological Society of America and as the Chair of the John Moriarty Institute for Ecology and Spirituality, an Irish charitable organization dedicated to expanding access, connection, and understanding of Moriarty’s vision for integrating myth, body, and world.
He holds memberships and has held leadership roles in multiple scholarly organizations, including the American Academy of Religion, the Association for Theatre in Higher Education, the Catholic Studies Consortium, the Catholic Theological Society of America, the College Theology Society, the International Federation for Theatre Research, and the International Society for Religion, Literature, and Culture.
Charles A. Gillespie, Ph.D. 