2025: Ana María Pineda R.S.M.

Sister Ana María Pineda, RSM, STD, was born in El Salvador. Her father, José Antonio, brought her mother, Matilde, two-year-old Ana María, and her older brother, Antonio, from El Salvador to the Mission District of San Francisco. Ana María grew up in an area that has historically been one of the most notable centers of Latino culture. Raised in the Spanish-speaking Mission District of San Francisco, CA, her life’s work has centered on Hispanic ministry and theology, both locally and nationally.

Her early years were dedicated to teaching and parish ministry for inner-city Hispanic and Latino families while mentoring Latino and Latina students. She served as co-director of the Diocese of San Jose’s Office of Hispanic Ministry and worked as a consultant for catechetics focused on the Hispanic community. For a decade, she was a faculty member and director of the Hispanic Ministry Program at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, Illinois. While on the faculty at CTU, she participated in a collaborative effort with the Archdiocese of Chicago to establish the Óscar Romero Scholars Program, which prepared lay Hispanic and Latina women and men for professional ministry.

In 1997, Ana Maria applied for a faculty position at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, California. After one year, her temporary teaching assignment transitioned into a tenure-track position. She became the first Latina in the department of religious studies and the first in the nation to teach the theology of Our Lady of Guadalupe at a university, bringing the program with her from Catholic Theological Union to Santa Clara in 1997.

She is one of the founding members of the Hispanic Theological Initiative (HTI), established in 1995. She served as the president of the Academy of Catholic Hispanic Theologians in the United States (ACHTUS) in 2000. She has published numerous articles on Hispanic ministry, popular religiosity, pastoral practices, and the distinction between oral and literate cultures. Her more recent publications include “Romero and Grande: Companions on the Journey” (2016) and “Rutilio Grande: Memory and Legacy of a Jesuit Martyr” (2021).

Ana María also served as the vice president of the leadership team of her religious community, the Sisters of Mercy West Midwest Community, from 2018 to 2021.

Nationally, Ana María was involved in the earliest Hispanic Church dialogue during the national Encuentros and was a keynote speaker at the V Encuentro. She contributed to the development of the Academy of Catholic Hispanic Theologians in the United States (ACHTUS), serving as its president in 2000. She also helped create the Hispanic Theological Initiative (HTI) that supports Latinos/as in theological doctoral studies.

Ana María is the author of “Romero and Grande: Companions on the Journey” (2016) and “Rutilio Grande: Memory and Legacy of a Jesuit Martyr” (2021). She attended Archbishop Oscar Romero’s beatification in El Salvador in 2015 and his canonization in Rome in 2018. In 2022, she attended the beatification of Rutilio Grande, S.J. in El Salvador. She has published numerous articles on Hispanic ministry, popular religion, pastoral practices, and the significance of oral tradition. Additionally, she is the co-editor of “Dialogue Rejoined: Theology and Ministry in the United States Hispanic Reality.”

Sister Ana María Pineda’s deep roots in the Salvadoran community have been essential to her life and ministries. She reflects, “Without having full understanding of it, I always felt called to be a part of the Latino community that I loved and to be involved in its blossoming. My other vocation has been to be a Sister of Mercy.”

Over the years, the U.S. Conference of Bishops has invited Ana María to participate in the Bishops’ Committee for Women and the Committee for Hispanic Ministry. She served on the board of the Louisville Institute, initiating the consultation of younger African American and Hispanic minority scholars, and CRISPAZ (Christians for Peace, El Salvador).

Ana María holds a B.A. in Liberal Studies from Russell College in Burlingame, CA; an M.A. in Theology from the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, IL; and a Sacred Theology Doctorate in Pastoral/Applied Theology from the Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca in Spain. Besides her work with ACHTUS, she is a member of the Academy of American Religion (AAR) and the Catholic Theological Society of America (CTSA). She also previously served as a member of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians.

Her previous honors and awards include the Yves Congar Award for Theological Excellence from Barry University in Miami, FL; an Honorary Doctorate from Saint Xavier University in Chicago, IL; the Oscar Romero Founder Award for establishing the Oscar Romero Scholarship Program at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, IL; the Virgilio Elizondo Award from ACHTUS; and the Encuentros Award (El Premio de los Encuentros) from the USCCB in Baltimore, Maryland.