Joseph Trabbic, Ph.D.

Dr. Joseph Trabbic is Associate Professor of Philosophy and chair of the Philosophy Department at Ave Maria University. In systematic areas his interests are in metaphysics, philosophical theology, and political philosophy. In historical areas his interests are in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas and his commentators (especially Cajetan, Bañez, and John of St. Thomas) and continental philosophy (especially Martin Heidegger and Jean-Luc Marion). He has published in these areas in various academic and popular journals.

Like many Catholic philosophers, Dr. Trabbic’s work sometimes crosses over into theology. A lot of his recent research and writing have been on the relationship between the Catholic Church and the state. In 2023 he published a chapter on this in the Palgrave Handbook of Religion and State, vol. I: Theoretical Perspectives. A short piece on the same topic that he wrote for Public Discourse in 2018 sparked a lively discussion online and in print.

Dr. Trabbic has been invited to do several interviews over the years. He has shared his thoughts about St. Thomas's arguments for God's existence with Matt Fradd on Pints with Aquinas and with Michael Dauphinais on The Catholic Theology Show. And he has spoken with John DeRosa about the philosophical use of analogy on the Classical Theism podcast and with Deal Hudson on Heidegger and Catholicism on Church and Culture.

He is also an Italian translator. Besides a number of articles, he has translated two books. In 2012 Ignatius Press published his translation of Nicola Bux's La riforma di Benedetto XVI (Benedict XVI's Reform: The Liturgy between Innovation and Tradition) and in 2016 The Catholic University of America Press published his and Roger Nutt’s translation of Pasquale Porro’s Tommaso d'Aquino: Un profilo storico-filosofico (Thomas Aquinas: A Historical and Philosophical Profile).

As a member of the Thomistic Institute's speakers bureau since 2019, Dr. Trabbic has traveled to colleges and universities around the country to give talks on arguments for God's existence, postmodernism and religion, the problem of evil, and human rights.

Dr. Trabbic and his wife Rose have five children.

You can find his Academia.edu page here.

• “St. Thomas Aquinas on God as ipsum esse subsistens,” Religions. (Forthcoming).
• “Religion and the State: A Catholic View,” in Palgrave Handbook of Religion and State, vol. I. Theoretical Perspectives. S. Holzer, ed. London: Palgrave Macmillan. 2023, 185-221.
• Review of C.M. Brown, Eternal Life and Human Happiness in Heaven: Philosophical Problems, Thomistic Solutions. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2021, in Review of Metaphysics, 76 (2022): 135-136.
• “Jean-Luc Marion and the Phénoménologie de la Donation as First Philosophy,” American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 95 (2021): 389-409.
• “MacIntyre, Natural Law, and Natural Rights.” Lex Naturalis 5. (2020): 3-21.
• Translation of Paolo Prosperi, “Pathei Mathos: Rereading Aeschylus’s Orestaia.” Communio (2019): 660-711.
• “By Revelation Alone? Some Objections to Robert Sokolowski’s ‘Christian Distinction’.” The Heythrop Journal 59. (2018): 456-467.
• “Heidegger’s Critique of Christian Philosophy in the Introduction to Metaphysics.” Religious Studies 53. (2017): 71-86.
• “Praemotio Physica and Divine Transcendence” in Thomism and Predestination: Principles and Disputations. S.A. Long, R.W. Nutt, and T.J. White, eds. Ave Maria: Sapientia. 2016. 152-165.
• “Aquinas and Ontotheology Again.” International Journal of Philosophy and Theology. International Journal of Philosophy and Theology 77.1 (2016): 45-61.
• “Can Aquinas Hope ‘That All Men be Saved’?” The Heythrop Journal 57. (2016): 337-358.
• Translation of Pasquale Porro, Thomas Aquinas: A Historical and Philosophical Profile. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2016 (with Roger Nutt).
• Review of Jean-Luc Marion, In the Self’s Place: The Approach of Saint Augustine. Stanford University Press, 2012. International Philosophical Quarterly 55 (2015): 259-262.
• Review of Daniele Lorenzini, Jacques Maritain e i diritti umani: Fra totalitarianismo, antisemitismo e democrazia (1936-1951). Morcelliana, 2012. The Catholic Historical Review 99 (2013): 385-387.
• Review of Merold Westphal, Whose Community? Which Interpretation? Philosophical Hermeneutics for the Church. Baker Academic, 2009. Nova et Vetera 11 (2013): 588-600.
• “Analytical Thomism.” In New Catholic Encyclopedia Supplement 2012-2013: Ethics and Philosophy. Robert L. Fastiggi, ed. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale, 2013. Pp. 68-70.
• “A Critique of Maritain’s Political Philosophy.” Saint Austin Review (Nov./Dec. 2012): 18-21.
• Translation of Angelo Campodonico, “Hans Urs von Balthasar’s Interpretation of the Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas.” Nova et Vetera 8 (2010): 33-53.
• Review of Christina Gschwandtner, Reading Jean-Luc Marion: Exceeding Metaphysics. Indiana University Press, 2007. International Philosophical Quarterly 49 (2009): 535-537.
• “Aquinas and Continental Philosophy of Religion: Finding a Way Out of Ontotheology.” Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 76 (2002): 222-234.