| The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) is a canonically approved membership organization which exists as a support system and corporate voice for leaders of institutes of women religious (Catholic sisters) in the United States.
Members of LCWR are Catholic women religious who are leaders of their orders in the United States. The conference has approximately 1000 members, who represent about 95 percent of the 73,000 women religious in the United States.
At the request of the Vatican’s Congregation for Religious, leaders of pontifical orders of women religious in the United States founded the conference in 1956 and named it the Conference of Major Superiors of Women. The name was changed in 1971 to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.
The scope of the conference’s concerns is broad and includes:
- collaborating in Catholic church and societal efforts that influence systemic change
- studying significant trends and issues within the church and society
- utilizing our corporate voice in solidarity with people who experience any form of violence or oppression
- creating and offering resource materials on religious leadership skills.
LCWR serves as a resource to its members, as well as to members of the public seeking information on leadership for religious life.
The purpose of the Conference shall be to promote a developing understanding and living of religious life by:
assisting its members personally and communally to carry out more collaboratively their service of leadership in order to accomplish further the mission of Christ in today’s world.
fostering dialogue and collaboration among religious congregations within the Church and in the larger society.
developing models for initiating and strengthening relationships with groups concerned with the needs of society, thereby maximizing the potential of the Conference for effecting change.
Elected Officers:
Mary Whited, CPPS, President
J. Lora Dambroski, OSF, President-Elect
Mary Dacey, SSJ, Past President
Staff:
Executive Director: Carole Shinnick, SSND (cshinnick@lcwr.org)
Associate Director for Finance and Planning: Pat Cormack, SCSC (pcormack@lcwr.org)
Associate Director for Social Mission: Marie Lucey, OSF (mlucey@lcwr.org)
Director of Communications: Annmarie Sanders, IHM (asanders@lcwr.org)
Executive Assistant: Marianne Benson (mbenson@lcwr.org)
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