Rev. Stephen M. Koeth, C.S.C., is Assistant Professor in the Department of History, Faculty Co-Director of the Church Properties Initiative, and priest-in-residence in Stanford Hall. Born and raised in Staten Island, New York, Father Koeth earned both a B.A. in History (’99) and an M.Div. (’06) from Notre Dame and was ordained a Holy Cross priest in 2007. After several years of parish ministry in Portland, Oregon, Father Koeth completed an M.A. in History at The Catholic University of America (’12) and in 2020 was awarded a Ph.D. in History from Columbia University.

Father Koeth is an urban, religious, and political historian of twentieth-century America. His research focuses on U.S. Catholic involvement in postwar metropolitan development, including urban renewal projects, public housing, and suburbanization, and the effects of these interactions on Catholic faith and politics. His first book, Crabgrass Catholicism: How Suburbanization Transformed Faith and Politics in Postwar America, was published by The University of Chicago Press in August 2025. Based on his doctoral dissertation, which received the American Catholic Historical Association's 2019 John Tracy Ellis Dissertation Award and Columbia University's 2020 Bancroft Dissertation Award, it examines the creation and expansion of the Diocese of Rockville Centre in suburban Long Island. He is currently at work on a new book exploring American Catholic involvement in public and affordable housing. Father Koeth's scholarship has been published in the Journal of Church and State, U.S. Catholic Historian, and American Catholic Studies and his commentary has appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Times, and on BBC Radio 4's Sunday.