John A. Di Camillo, Be.L.
Staff Ethicist
John A.
Di Camillo graduated summa cum laude from the University of
Pennsylvania and received the President’s Award for Undergraduate Research. He achieved
his Bioethics Licentiate degree at the Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostolorum
in Rome and is a doctoral candidate at the same institution. Mr. Di Camillo
worked as a self employed Italian-English translator and simultaneous
interpreter for four years while living and studying in Rome. He co-translated
Elio Cardinal Sgreccia’s world-renowned Manuale
di bioetica, published in English by The NCBC as Personalist Bioethics. He holds a Certification with Distinction in
Health Care Ethics from The NCBC and a Certification in Healthcare
Interpretation from the Health Federation of Philadelphia, and has worked as a
pharmacy technician, interpreter, university instructor, high school
teacher, and middle school teacher. Mr. Di Camillo was also a founding editor and
managing editor of Dappled Things
Magazine, a literary and artistic journal seeking to engage contemporary
culture through the rich heritage of the Catholic Church.
Edward J. Furton, Ph.D.
Director of Publications
Dr. Furton serves in an active dual role at the NCBC as one of the Center’s four ethicists and also as Director of Publications. He is Editor-in-Chief of The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, Editor of Ethics & Medics, a monthly bulletin on moral issues in the health and life sciences, and edits books published by the Center, and edits books published by the Center, most recently the proceedings from the Twenty-first Workshop for Bishops, Urged On By Christ: Catholic Health Care in Tension with Contemporary Culture. He received his master’s and doctoral degrees in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., and has taught at St. Charles Borromeo Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, LaSalle University in Philadelphia, and Rockhurst University in Kansas City, Missouri. Joseph Meaney, Ph.D.
President
Joseph Meaney received his PhD in bioethics from the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Rome. His doctoral program was founded by the late Elio Cardinal Sgreccia and linked to the medical school and Gemelli teaching hospital. His dissertation topic was Conscience and Health Care: A Bioethical Analysis. Dr. Meaney earned his master’s in Latin American studies, focusing on health care in Guatemala, from the University of Texas at Austin. He graduated from the University of Dallas with a BA in history and a concentration in international studies. The Benedict XVI Catholic University in Trujillo, Peru, awarded Dr. Meaney an honorary visiting professorship.
Dr. Meaney was director of international outreach and expansion for Human Life International (HLI) and is a leading expert on the international pro-life and family movement, having traveled to eighty-one countries on pro-life missions over the last twenty-five years. He founded the Rome office of HLI in 1998 and lived in Rome for nine years, where he collaborated closely with dicasteries of the Holy See, particularly the Pontifical Council for the Family and the Pontifical Academy for Life. He is a dual US and French citizen and is fluent in French, Spanish, Italian, and English. His family has been active in the health care and pro-life fields in Corpus Christi, Texas, and in France for many years.
Dr. Meaney was general editor of the English edition and co-author with his father, Dr. Michael Meaney, of a chapter in the Pontifical Council for the Family’s Lexicon: Ambiguous and Debatable Terms Regarding Family, Life, and Ethical Questions and has published in a number of scholarly journals. He has also written many popular articles and has been interviewed by newspapers, radio, and television in Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. His popular articles have appeared in the National Catholic Register, Crux, Inside Catholic, Crisis Magazine, Inside the Vatican, and many other publications.
Dr. Meaney, his wife, Marie, and their young daughter, Thérèse, moved to Pennsylvania from Paris in the summer of 2019.
Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, Ph.D.
Director of Education
Fr. Tad is a priest of the diocese of Fall River, Massachusetts. As an undergraduate he earned degrees in philosophy, biochemistry, molecular cell biology, and chemistry, and did laboratory research on hormonal regulation of the immune response. He later earned a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Yale University. He also worked for several years as a molecular biologist at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School. Fr. Tad studied for 5 years in Rome where he did advanced work in dogmatic theology and in bioethics, examining the question of delayed ensoulment of the human embryo. He has testified before members of the Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Virginia and North Carolina State Legislatures during deliberations over stem cell research and cloning. He has given presentations on contemporary bioethics throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe. He is Director of Education for The National Catholic Bioethics Center and directs the Center’s National Catholic Certification Program in Health Care Ethics.
Marie Hilliard, J.C.L., Ph.D., R.N.
Senior Fellow
Dr. Hilliard holds graduate degrees in Maternal-Child Health Nursing, Religious Studies, Canon Law and Professional Higher Education Administration (former tenured Division Chair in Catholic Higher Education). She has an extensive professional background in medical ethics and public policy and advocacy (former Director of the Connecticut Catholic Conference). She is a registered nurse who has been substantially involved in health care regulation at the state and national levels for twelve years (former Executive Officer, Connecticut Board of Examiners for Nursing; Area IV Director, The National Council of State Boards of Nursing). In addition, she is a canon lawyer and serves as a resource for the United States Bishops on the implementation of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services as well as Church - State relations.John M. Haas, Ph.D., S.T.L., K.M.
President Emeritus and Senior Fellow
John M. Haas is the President Emeritus of The National Catholic Bioethics Center. Dr. Haas received his Ph.D. in Moral Theology from The Catholic University of America and his S.T.L. in Moral Theology from the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. He also has a Master of Divinity degree and has studied at the University of Munich and the University of Chicago Divinity School. Before assuming the Presidency of The National Catholic Bioethics Center, Dr. Haas was the John Cardinal Krol Professor of Moral Theology at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and Adjunct Professor at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies in Marriage and the Family, Washington, D.C. Dr. Haas also served as a member of the Medical Moral Commission of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. He has testified before the Joint Judiciary Committee of the Massachusetts Legislature on physician-assisted suicide and before the US Senate Committee on Health and Public Safety on the subject of human cloning. He has also provided testimony to the President’s National Bioethics Advisory Commission.