Georgetown University panel explores women’s leadership in the Catholic Church

On March 9, 2026, Georgetown University’s Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life presented a panel of “four remarkable women leaders” who highlighted the work Catholic women are doing around the world to promote the common good, as well as opportunities to advance women’s leadership in the Catholic Church.

Kim Daniels, director of the Georgetown initiative, served as moderator of the panel, which included:

• Sister Jane Wakahiu, head of the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation’s Catholic Sisters initiative and associate vice president of program operations;
• Joanna Arellano-Gonzalez, co-founder of the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership;
• Cynthia Bailey Manns, the director of Adult Learning at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Community in Minneapolis and a U.S. delegate to the Synod on Synodality (an initiative launched by Pope Francis);
• Anne Thompson, an award-winning NBC journalist who frequently covers the Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV and Pope Francis.

A lively conversation focused on the evolving roles of women within the Church. As the Church itself has recently acknowledged, women still “encounter obstacles in obtaining a fuller recognition of their charisms, vocation, and place in all the various areas of the Church’s life.” 

While Pope Francis—and, more recently, Pope Leo—appointed women, including Catholic sisters, to unprecedented leadership roles at the Vatican, Sr. Jane noted there continue to be “many cultural barriers that prevent women from advancing in those positions … not just at the Vatican level, but sometimes in the local diocese.”

Quoting Pope Francis, who said, “I see the church as a field hospital after battle,” Daniels asked Sr. Jane what inspires women religious to serve the vulnerable: “How do Catholic sisters respond to this image… of the Church as a ‘field hospital?’”

“One common denominator I’ve seen about Catholic sisters, or women religious, is love, commitment, and giving themselves for the common good,” Sr. Jane responded. “Go to the tea farms in India where no one knows that Catholic sisters are there. Go deeper in Ukraine where conflict is raging. They are there. Go to South Sudan where it’s very difficult. They are there. Sisters remain present and among the people.”

Sr. Jane described how just a few weeks prior, a Hilton Foundation partner, Sr. Lucía Caram of Barcelona, Spain, organized and led a humanitarian convoy of 21 ambulances and other vehicles carrying medicine, health equipment and other supplies to Ukraine, and returned with people who were ill and injured to receive care in Spain.

“That is the field hospital,” she concluded.

To learn more about the Georgetown University Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life, visit: Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life.

To learn more about how Catholic sisters around the world are assuming leadership positions, visit: Catholic Sisters: Profiles in Leadership – Hilton Foundation.