American Civic Life

Katie Gordon: How ‘Nones’ are Building Spaces with Creativity and Vision

June 1, 2022

Nuns and “nones” together in Albuquerque, New Mexico, October 2021. (Photo by Katie Gordon)
Katie Gordon

Katie Gordon

Katie Gordon is an Interfaith America Sacred Journey Fellow and co-founder and national organizer with Nuns & Nones, a collaboration between Catholic Sisters and spiritually diverse millennials that seeks to create communities of care, contemplation, and courageous action. She is also a staff member of Monasteries of the Heart, an online monastery of over 20,000 members that translates Benedictine wisdom for contemporary seekers. At the heart of both projects is the faith that intergenerational and interspiritual committed communities are essential for responding soulfully and prophetically to the greatest challenges of our times.

Katie finds her spiritual home in Erie, Pennsylvania, with the Benedictine Sisters in a small intentional community called the Pax Priory, a site of monastic tradition and experimentation. She is also building community locally with other monks and seekers who are drawn to the Benedictine tradition reimagined anew. Her deepest hope is to break open the “archetype of the monk” so that more of the “spiritual but not religious” might be able to cultivate this universal contemplative dimension. Katie studied at Harvard Divinity School where she explored the intersection of religion, politics, and identity in contemporary society, including the intersections between prophetic traditions and American politics, storytelling and spirituality, and new forms of community that weave faith and justice. While at Harvard, Katie worked with the Formation Project (born out of the work of the Sacred Design Lab), the On Being Project’s Civil Conversations Project, and a Retreat Center Collaboration sponsored through the Fetzer Institute. Prior to divinity school, Katie spent several years organizing interfaith community programs, campus initiatives, and leadership programs with the Kaufman Interfaith Institute at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She also holds a Master of Interfaith Action from Claremont Lincoln University and a Bachelor of Arts in Religious Studies and Political Science from Alma College.

Nuns & Nones