Dr Maureen Day

Dr Maureen K. Day an Associate Member of Las Casas Institute for Social Justice, Blackfriars Hall, Oxford. She is also a Research Affiliate at the University of Southern California’s Center for Religion and Civic Culture as well as their Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies. She was tenured as Associate Professor of Religion and Society at the Franciscan School of Theology, USA. Maureen holds a PhD in Theology/Ethics and Social Theory from the Graduate Theological Union, USA, and she is a member of the Board of Governors for the Burke Lectureship on Religion and Society.

Maureen is an award-winning author, published in both Catholic and academic publications. Committed to collaboration and service, she partners regularly with professional and academic organizations for consultation or as an officer, currently serving the Association for the Sociology of Religion as well as the Religious Research Association.

As a sociologist with training in theology, her teaching and research have included areas such as religion in American civic life, Catholic campus ministry, young adults, family, stewardship, congregational thriving, and priestly well-being and support. She has provided her expertise to the Catholic Church at the diocesan, national and international level.

She teaches (occasionally) and a regular public speaker on issues related to pastoral ministry and Church life. Her public scholarship has been featured in several media outlets, including America and the National Catholic Reporter.

Select Publications:

Catholicism at a Crossroads: The Present and Future of America’s Largest Church, with James C. Cavendish, Paul M. Perl, Michele Dillon, and Mary L. Gautier and William V. D’Antonio (NY: NYUP, 2025); Cultural Catholics: Who They Are, How to Respond (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2024); Catholic Activism Today: Individual Transformation and the Struggle for Social Justice (Religion and Social Transformation Series) (NY: NYUP, 2020); Young Adult American Catholics: Explaining Vocation in Their Own Words (Ed.) (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 2018); ‘Justice and Mercy Over Exclusion and Isolation: The Pandemic and Africa’ in Geoffrey Karabin (Ed.), Pandemic Reflections: Francis and the Lepers Catch Up with COVID, 2023, 108-117; and ‘Franciscan Roots of American Catholic Social Justice Ministry’ in The Way of St. Francis, 2023, 28(1), 12-15.