CARITAS Internationalis has named a new leadership team that includes Caritas Australia chief executive officer Kirsty Robertson, elected as vice president.
While Caritas Internationalis has had a woman as secretary-general, Robertson is the first woman to be elected vice president, a position that entails representing the leadership at Caritas events around the globe and “relating with the church leadership at the highest levels,” she said, after being elected during the 22nd General Assembly of Caritas Internationalis taking place in Rome.
“In every country in the world, women have yet to achieve economic equality with men,” she said. “The face of poverty is the face of a woman.”
But also, with so many women leading national Caritas organisations and volunteering with Catholic charities around the globe, she said, “it is only right and just to see the face of women at all levels in our confederation.”
Kirsty Robertson will serve alongside new president Archbishop Tarcisius Isao Kikuchi of Toyko over the next four years.
Ms Robertson has more than 20 years’ experience in humanitarian aid and development.
She started her career at Caritas Australia in the justice resources team, and has since lived, worked, and travelled in over 50 countries, including in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, working with the development arm of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and at Machermo, a health post in the Gokyo Valley in Nepal, looking into the protection of the rights of porters for the International Porters Protection Agency.
Ms Robertson has worked at Anglican Board of Mission, Act for Peace, and spent five years as chief executive officer of Mary MacKillop Today.
She returned to Caritas Australia in September 2019 to become the first female chief executive officer of the organisation.
“It’s a wonderful privilege to be taking on this role, a privilege to be serving the members of the Caritas Confederation across the world, and a privilege to be serving the Church and all of the supporters of Caritas Internationalis,” Ms Robertson said.
“We are an amazing confederation, one united by our mission in service to the world’s poor. As a woman it is a particularly important day for us in the confederation.
“By every measure possible, women are disproportionately affected by poverty.
“As a confederation we are committed to serving women in villages, parishes, and communities, but also in leadership.
“My appointment today reflects that commitment.”
Newly-elected Archbishop Kikuchi said that from his experience as a Caritas volunteer with Rwandan refugees in Africa and later as executive director of Caritas Japan from 1999-2004 and its president from 2007-2022, the people Caritas assists are grateful for the food, clothing and shelter offered, but they always ask not to be forgotten once the war or disaster has dropped from the headlines.
The archbishop said that Caritas Internationalis, “but also dioceses and the entire Catholic Church,” which are always talking about love for others, must ensure they “execute the same thing inside.”
“We want to bring hope to people, hope for life,” the archbishop said. “As Caritas, we want to walk with people in their difficulties, to be with them and create hope for the future.”
