Dr. Carl Trueman of Grove City College is serving as the Visiting Scholar at the Center for Citizenship & Constitutional Government (CCCG) for the 2025–2026 academic year. His research centers on Thomas Aquinas and the concept of virtue—an idea he believes Protestantism has increasingly neglected, despite its growing importance for Christian life today. Trueman first connected with the CCCG after delivering a 2023 lecture at Notre Dame on his book A Strange New World, which prompted CCCG Director Professor Phillip Muñoz to encourage him to apply to the center’s Visiting Research Fellows Program. Trueman says he owes Muñoz a great debt of gratitude for that encouragement.
Originally from the West Country of England, in Gloucestershire, Trueman earned an M.A. in Classics from the University of Cambridge and a Ph.D. from the University of Aberdeen. He taught there and at the University of Nottingham before coming to the U.S. in 2001, where he taught at a Presbyterian Seminar outside of Philadelphia for over sixteen years. From 2017-2018, he was the William E. Simon Visiting Fellow in Religion and Public Life in the James Madison Program at Princeton University, and subsequently began his current role as a professor at Grove City College in the Calderwood School of Arts and Humanities.
Trueman was brought to academia as a result of three things, one of which being a lecture he attended in high school given by Terry Jones of Monty Python that he described as “electrifying.” He left wanting to pursue education and engage people through humor, careful reading, and public speaking on topics that enrich the human experience. Trueman was also influenced by Marxist historian Paul Cartledge, one of his supervisors at Cambridge. This was the first time Trueman had encountered a history teacher who thought that history meant something and who deeply engaged with the material. This relationship gave Trueman a passion for history that has stuck with him ever since. What began his academic career in earnest, however, was a friend’s question on what he would do if he could do anything, in light of Trueman’s struggles securing a job after his education. Trueman responded that he would love to do a Ph.D. on the intellectual history of the Reformation. His friend encouraged him to apply for programs, though Trueman did not believe he would be admitted, much less obtain funding. Trueman’s friend pointed out that by not applying, he had already guaranteed the result. He submitted his application, was accepted to Aberdeen, and began his research career.
Trueman’s Ph.D. research examined the development of Protestant thought in 17th-century England through the ways in which medieval thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus interacted with the reformed orthodox. Unexpectedly pulled into a discussion about transgender bathroom policies in his local public school district outside of Philadelphia, Trueman then began to consider issues shaping identity politics. Over the past ten years he has studied the moral transformation taking place in society.
During his time at Notre Dame this year, Trueman has conducted research and hosted colloquia for the center: one for graduate students based on his past work, and the other for undergraduate students on critical theory. In the spring of 2026, Trueman is teaching a one-credit course called “The Abolition of Man” based on C.S. Lewis’ book of the same title. The purpose of this course is to address what Trueman sees as the major question of our age: what does it mean to be a human being? His answer is that it means humans are made in the image of God, implying two ideas. First, human beings have a moral structure and must live in accordance with it to truly flourish. Second, as humans we have certain ends, and we must live in light of them. Both of these points, Trueman believes, are severely challenged by technology, which promotes a belief that we can invent our own ends. The center will host a book launch in honor of Trueman’s forthcoming title, The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity on Thursday, February 19, 2026.
Tony Maratea, a Constitutional Studies graduate student, attended Trueman’s colloquium and noted that Trueman “exemplified intellectual humility and charity in both his book talks and in his writing, and I was grateful for his willingness to dedicate several hours to discuss his work as well as answering questions about his writing process.” He went on to say that Trueman's collegiality and openness when guiding students made this event stand out in his memory as a special moment. “It was wonderful hearing him respond to questions about his work, challenges to his arguments,” Maratea commented, “and to hear where he would have liked to expand his ideas since the book’s publication. To interact with a scholar who connects the life of the mind to the current issues of today helps put our work into perspective.”
First-year student Militza Algredo-Huerta attended the undergraduate colloquium and believed it was “very interesting how Dr. Carl Trueman placed the framework of understanding these concepts as an anthropological question of what it means to be human.” She felt that “the link between this question and Critical Race Theory is often missed, and I think that utilizing this perspective helps us understand how it shapes our cultural and interpretive frameworks.” An aspect of the colloquium that particularly stood out to her was Trueman’s point “that modern culture is dominated by a spirit of negation, rather than one of creation,” which was “very fascinating and something that I resonated with. If we want to present a criticism of a current system, I believe that this is best done by providing an alternative solution.” Trueman himself enjoyed the colloquia he hosted, noting that the students present posed serious and thoughtful questions which encouraged him to examine his own position more deeply.
In the future, Trueman plans to write a book on Aquinas and virtue aimed at Protestants. He does not want this book to be heavily scholarly, but one that encourages Protestants who might be unfamiliar with Aquinas to engage with his writings. His forthcoming book The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity, a project that extends C.S. Lewis’ argument to the present day in terms of what has happened to humanity, will be published in April 2026 by Penguin Random House. He hopes to write a companion volume to The Desecration of Man titled The Virtueless Society, an exploration of the ways in which virtue has been mocked, marginalized, and contradicted in modern western culture.
Regarding his time here at Notre Dame, Trueman has praised its faculty members and has enjoyed working with the CCCG’s affiliated professors across departments. He shared his admiration of Notre Dame’s efforts to infuse the riches of the Catholic tradition into its campus and activities, and believes that the university has a wonderful custom of teaching things that are to be embraced and enjoyed. The student body, he believes, ought to continue to embrace Notre Dame’s commitment to faith, and allow it to enrich their studies.