Following Advisory Council recommendations, the Catholic Institute for Nonviolence Coordination Committee provides planning and oversight as an active forum that regularly engages the Institute. It will oversee the development of new initiatives screen strategic opportunities, and develop alliances to ensure the Catholic Institute for Nonviolence relevance and global reach.

The Coordination Committee encourages the pooling of resources, increases communication among the Institute’s different bodies and members, and helps the associates to develop and spread programs and research that are accessible, inclusive, and efficient.

The members of the Coordination Committee are Ken Butigan (US); Marie Dennis (US); Eli McCarthy (US);  Jasmin Nario Galace (Philippines); Nicolás Paz (Spain); Martha Inés Romero (Colombia); Sheila Kinsey (Italy/US); Teresia Wamuyu Wachira (Kenya).

The Catholic Institute for Nonviolence seeks to increase concerted research by scholars, theologians, and grassroot practitioners aimed at deepening the theological and strategic foundations for nonviolence in the Church and to inform Church teachings and pastoral approaches.

In order to do that, Associates of the Catholic Institute for Nonviolence come together around three main areas of study and practice.

At the same time, each research concentration develops specific topic working groups within their own research concentration area or intersectional working groups with associates from the other research concentration areas according to their own identified needs.

This group of theologians, scriptural scholars, ethicists, and pastoral specialists work on specific topics regarding nonviolence as a spirituality, a way of life, a method of change, and a universal ethic as related to scripture, the Christian tradition, the teachings of the Church, a new ethical framework, and the life and mission of the Church (education, formation, ministry, pastoral life, etc.). This concentration includes demonstrating how the Church can integrate Gospel nonviolence throughout its life and work; how a new moral framework of “active nonviolence and just peace” can enable the institutional Church as a moral authority to be more consistent with the nonviolent creativity of the Gospel; and how the Church can learn from and partner with the world’s religions to spread and activate nonviolence throughout the world.

Strategic nonviolence offers alternatives to violence and passivity. This group of scholars and practitioners focus on illuminating the strategies, models, dynamics, practices, and findings that indicate the effectiveness of nonviolence. This work gathers and conducts research on the effectiveness of nonviolent strategies (building on the research being conducted by scholars around the world) and explores the effectiveness of nonviolent strategies related to real-world problems. It also includes a focus on illuminating those strategies, models, dynamics and practices in the digital world and in relation to artificial intelligence uses.

This group of practitioners and scholars document the lived experience of nonviolence in the communities, particularly marginalized communities, around the world by gathering and illuminating case studies of nonviolent practice within and across disciplines and contexts to understand the deeper connections among various forms of violence and how nonviolence can function as a cross-cutting praxis to generate a more sustainable transformation. It includes a focus on everyday nonviolence practices in plural and multidimensional contexts like family, schools, workplaces, neighbourhoods, digital world, etc.