Alex Lessard studied theology as an undergraduate at the University of St. Thomas (MN) with Don Briel, the founder of the Catholic Studies movement, who introduced him to the writings of St. John Henry Newman and to the breadth and depth of Catholic literature. He took his doctorate in systematic theology at Boston College with Fr. Matt Lamb, who directed his thesis: Conversion & the Art of Reading: Dante vs. Augustine. He is an Adjunct Professor in the Institute for Catholic School Leadership at Saint Paul Seminary | University of St. Thomas, teaching the History, Philosophy & Mission of the Catholic School. Having co-founded St. Monica Academy, an independent Catholic school in Pasadena in 2001, he and his wife, Angela, now support the renewal of Catholic Liberal Education and Culture through their nonprofit, Adeodatus.

Alex is Executive Co-Director of The Cornerstone Forum, founded by Gil Bailie to bring René Girard’s anthropological contribution to human self-understanding into fruitful dialogue with the theological tradition exemplified by Joseph Ratzinger, Henri de Lubac, et al. He is a Fellow of the Boethius Institute; serves on the Thomas Aquinas College Board of Regents; on the board of the Cantwell Foundation, a nonprofit supporting Catholic Arts & Culture; on the Executive Advisory Team of the John Paul the Great Institute of Lafayette, Louisiana; as the Theological Advisor to Gaudent Angeli, an apostolate promoting renewed devotion to St. Vibiana, the patroness of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles; and is Executive Board Secretary of the Newman Club of Los Angeles, a lay Catholic literary organization founded in 1899 under the inspiration of Bishop George Montgomery – less than a decade after Newman’s death – with an uninterrupted series of monthly meetings over the subsequent 124 years.

He is a perpetual member of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars and a Knight of Columbus at St. Therese Carmelite Church in Alhambra, CA. Alex and Angela have nine wonderful children and eagerly anticipate the births of their sixth and seventh grandchildren.