For nearly thirty years, Karen Smith has shaped the media content (magazines, books, videos, and websites) of three award-winning Catholic publications: as editorial director of America, the national Jesuit review of faith and culture; as editor of CHURCH, the journal for pastors and parish staff published by the National Pastoral Life Center; and as associate editor of Commonweal, an intellectual lay Catholic journal of opinion. She also served as a consultant to the Catholic Health Association of the United States.
Karen is a long-time Bread for the World member and social justice activist. She has served on the Host Committee for Bread for the World and Alliance to End Hunger’s Annual Gala to End Hunger held in New York. Smith is an active member of The Church of St Ignatius Loyola, where she recently coordinated the Women’s Voices project and is co-coordinating the Courageous Women of Faith project.
She holds a Master of Arts in Theology from the University of Notre Dame and a Master of Divinity from Harvard Divinity School. Before obtaining these degrees, she was a partner at Koinonia Farm, Americus, Georgia an interracial Christian community founded in 1942 by Clarence Jordan. She is Catholic. New York, New York.