Slate of Candidates for the CMA Board of Directors Election

The CMA Nominating Committee has recommended a slate of candidates for officers on the Catholic Media Association Board of Directors, and the executive director has confirmed their willingness to serve. Officers serve a two-year term, beginning on June 28, 2025, at the conclusion of the Catholic Media Conference.

Additionally, there is a vacancy on the board that requires a special election. The CMA Nominating Committee recommended a slate of candidates to serve the remaining two years on the recently vacated Magazine Member at Large board seat.

Voting officially opens on April 25, 2025, and closes at the end of the day on May 10, 2025. Each voting member will receive an email with a link to the official CMA voting site where you log in to verify your right to vote.  Organizational Media Members, Organizational Communications Members and Freelance Members are eligible to vote. We encourage you to be an active member and participate in the election.

Learn more about the Board nomination process by visiting our frequently asked questions page.

Voting open through May 10 - must be logged in

Paula Gwynn Grant is an Emmy Award-winning television and radio broadcaster and marketing/media professional, who currently is Secretary for Communications for The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington (D.C.), home of the Catholic Standard and El Pregonero archdiocesan newspapers.  
Prior to this position, Paula served for five years as Director of Communications for The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta, home of The Georgia Bulletin.  She is the media spokesperson and representative for the Cardinal Archbishop.

Paula is grateful to be of service to our Church as a professional Catholic communicator. Currently, for a second time, Paula is a Consultant for Communications Committee for The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

Paula has served on several Catholic non-profit boards including the Ignatius House and Loyola Jesuit Retreat Centers, Catholic Charities of Washington, D.C., and the Mercy Care Foundation.  

A former Miss Black America (1989) and honors graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park, Paula has over 35 years of experience producing and hosting television and radio programs and working as a top Communications advisor for religious clergy/bishops, numerous politicians/government officials, doctors, professional athletes, and entertainers.  

Paula considers it a great honor and privilege to be serving her second term on our Catholic Media Association Board.  

Paula is grateful for the life journey God has her on professionally and personally with her husband, Ray, and their 28-year-old daughter, and 24-year-old son.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

Given this time of extreme polarization both inside the Church and in our outside secular world, Paula is convinced that the need for reliable trustworthy Catholic media is critical.  As journalists and communication professionals, Paula sees the role of Catholic media as one that informs, educates, and accompanies the People of God by sharing their diverse stories as encouraging signs of life and our mission of spreading the Good News of the Gospel in all the various formats and platforms that we can.

Kerry Weber is an executive editor for America, where she has worked since 2009. Kerry is the author of "Mercy in the City: How to Feed the Hungry, Give Drink to the Thirsty, Visit the Imprisoned, and Keep Your Day Job" (Loyola Press) and "Keeping the Faith: Prayers for College Students" (Twenty-Third Publications). Her writing and multimedia work have earned several awards from the Catholic Media Association, including Writer of the Year in 2023. She was part of the team from America Media that conducted an exclusive interview with Pope Francis in 2022. 

A graduate of Providence College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, she has previously worked as an editor for Catholic Digest, a local reporter in Greenwich, Conn., a newspaper reporter and television producer for the Diocese of Springfield, Mass., and as a special-education teacher on the Navajo Nation in Arizona. Kerry has also served as a board member for the Ignatian Solidarity Network and has been a Mercy Associate since 2012.

Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and Sojourners, among other outlets. She lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband and three children.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

As local newspapers close and newsrooms shrink around the United States, strong Catholic journalism is increasingly crucial. We are part of a struggling industry, but the Catholic corner of the journalism world faces additional challenges. From culture wars to liturgy wars, the U.S. church is hurting.

Catholic journalists are immersed in these painful stories as a matter of course. It is not easy to hold both the sins of the church and its sacred beauty—and by this I mean first the faithful and the charitable works, though I mean the churches and art, too—in tension all the time. It can be hard not to be overcome by despair or to turn a blind eye to its problems. But journalism is always about truth. And the truth is that the church has both inflicted pain and relieved it. Catholic journalists must bring both types of stories into the light.

Today’s church includes unique moments of pain and of hope—and it is more than any one of them. Part of the role of a Catholic journalist is to hold all this in tension.

“Catholic journalists have a great challenge before them,” Cardinal Wilton Gregory of Washington said in his homily at the Catholic Media Conference memorial Mass on June 9, 2023. “You must adhere to the highest principles of your profession. You must be diligent in research, honest in your editorial policy, competent in your use of the modern means of communication, but always motivated by the truth of Christ that is all too often only whispered in locked rooms or spoken in darkness.”

In its best moments, Catholic media helps people encounter Christ, whether through stories of work done in his name or through the revealing of evils that seek to tear it down. Being a part of the Catholic Media Association, along with colleagues from across the county, is a good reminder of our need to support one another in our shared mission. It helps me to feel hopeful that, together, our work might help build a church that challenges and loves and invites people to feel at home.

Pablo Kay is the Editor-in-Chief of Angelus, the multimedia news platform of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. Prior to joining Angelus in 2018, Pablo worked as a news editor for NBC-owned stations in Los Angeles and San Diego. He has reported from different parts of the U.S. and the world, including Panama, Israel, Rome, and the U.S.-Mexico border. His work has appeared in several publications, including Alfa y Omega, The Spectator World, and Omnes. During his time at Angelus, he has overseen redesigns both of the print magazine and of AngelusNews.com.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

If Catholic media doesn't help audiences understand the Church's message to a world with so much suffering, then no one else will. 

Telling the story of the Catholic Church is not easy. Her history is often misunderstood or underappreciated, her leaders get more attention for their weaknesses than their virtues, and her teachings get reduced to political or ideological categories. Unfortunately, we see the consequences in our news feeds daily. 

Thankfully, Catholic media still has the potential to evangelize and inspire people like Sts. Francis de Sales and Maximillian Kolbe once did, presenting Jesus Christ as the answer to our deepest questions. But it also has a responsibility to keep Catholic audiences informed and connected with the universal Church through every possible medium, by following sound journalistic standards and practices, pushing for accountability, and helping audiences understand current events and cultural trends through a lens of faith. (It's also important for Catholic communicators to network and learn from each other, something that makes the Catholic Media Association so particularly special.)

That's why Catholic institutions that use shrinking communications budgets and rising production costs as an excuse to cut back on support for Catholic media are unwise. A stronger, more credible Catholic media makes the Church itself more credible, and helps bring people out of their political or ideological silos.  

In other words, in an age when mass media is less inclined to take matters of faith and belief seriously, it's important that someone does.

James Ramos is the content editor at the Texas Catholic Herald, where he leads design and digital media efforts for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston news outlet. His writing and photography, which feature stories from the two million-plus Catholics in the Texas Gulf Coast, is also seen in OSV News, Every Sacred Sunday, Aleteia and Columbia Magazine, among others.

In 2023, James was elected Southern Regional Representative for the Catholic Media Association. He chairs the CMA's Membership Committee and serves on the Communications Committee. A winner of numerous CMA awards, including third place in “Writer of the Year” and honorable mention in “Photographer of the Year,” James holds a BA in Communications and Catholic Studies from the University of St. Thomas in Houston.

James is passionate about building connections between young and experienced media professionals and looks forward to continuing his contributions to the CMA and the broader media community. In addition to his professional work, he spent a decade in youth and young adult ministry in Louisiana and Texas. The son of Filipino immigrants, he is a member of Asian American Journalists Association, National Press Photographers Association is an American, Catholic Creatives, Young Catholic Professionals and the Knights of Columbus.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

Today’s Catholic media has the opportunity —and obligation— to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ to a world wearing noise cancelling earbuds and browsing AI-powered newsfeeds. Through Gospel-driven authentic storytelling and reporting, Catholic media can bridge the gap between individuals swayed by the shadows of a curated world and the beautiful universality of the Mother Church and her wide breadth of faith communities.

Catholic media, before only a press machine and a delivery truck, has grown to reach nearly every touchpoint and facet of a modern person’s faith journey. Adult converts can encounter the faith through a podcast or a YouTube video before they ever step foot into a church. Even as staff, resources and budgets dwindle, the work of and need for Catholic media continues to grow, offering new opportunities to spotlight Jesus Christ and His salvific message. The stories are often not easy to share; full of suffering but also full of grace, the work becomes like an intricate stained glass window that tells the story of a soul’s encounter with the Risen Lord. Expanding smart use of new digital channels, Catholic media can only benefit from sharing these stories unique to each local Church.

In a chaotic world of viral transient content, Catholic media are often like altar servers and sacristans doing quiet work before the hours-long Easter Vigil Mass. As Catholic media who are learning and growing together in communion with each other, we are in each moment behind the scenes helping the Church build an eternal home for all.

Marnie McAllister has worked in the Catholic press for 23-plus years. She leads a staff of seven as the editor of The Record. The Archdiocese of Louisville’s weekly newspaper has a circulation of 57,000 in central Kentucky. She manages the news and advertising departments, as well as the website and print and digital production. 

With the support of her team and archdiocesan leadership, McAllister has navigated the challenges facing newspapers today, including the shrinking presence of quality presses, the growing burden of postage costs, dramatic shifts in the advertising landscape as well as the opportunities presented by digital media. 

Under her leadership, The Record staff has won dozens of journalism awards from the Catholic Media Association and the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ). 

She currently serves on the CMA’s education committee. She is also wrapping up a second term as secretary of the board of the SPJ—Louisville Pro Chapter and works on its awards, communications and education committees. She also serves her parish, St. Frances of Rome Church, as a sacristan and is a wife and mother of three.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

Catholic media must engage new generations of Catholics while continuing to serve our traditional audience. This presents an ever-changing balancing act between print and digital resources and revenue to effectively reach Catholics wherever they are. While there’s no road map for this, we can learn from one another. The Catholic Media Association provides an avenue to share our successes — what was effective for you; how did you respond to this challenge? We need to lean on one another if we want to see diocesan news media thriving in the future.

What remains the same is our mission to inspire, educate and inform our readers by providing quality, well-researched content – and we can’t compromise this to gain clicks. Pope Francis asked Catholic communicators on Jan. 29 to be worthy guests of the people who welcome them into their homes. This resonated with me; I often think of the people who’ve called or written to provide their feedback when I’m writing or editing stories. Communication is so personal, and communication about our faith is even more so. We must keep our brothers and sisters in mind with every decision, whether it’s an editorial decision, design decision or a business decision. And most of all, we need to be accessible to them all.

Emily Sanna is an award-winning editor and strategic leader in Catholic media, with more than a decade of experience. As managing editor of U.S. Catholic magazine, she oversees the editorial direction of one of the nation’s leading Catholic publications. Under her leadership, U.S. Catholic has received numerous honors from both the Catholic Media Association and the Associated Church Press, including multiple Magazine of the Year awards and Best in Class for denominational magazines.

Emily has played a key role in expanding U.S. Catholic’s reach through digital innovation, podcast production, and integrated multimedia strategy. She launched and co-hosts Glad You Asked, a theology podcast that answers listener questions with intelligence, curiosity, and pastoral care. She also led the successful redesign of uscatholic.org and developed the magazine’s first comprehensive digital engagement strategy, resulting in significant audience growth across platforms.

A strong advocate for editorial excellence and collaboration, Sanna mentors staff and freelance contributors and has helped cultivate an inclusive editorial voice that resonates with contemporary Catholic audiences. She brings a forward-thinking approach to Catholic publishing, balancing tradition with thoughtful innovation.

Sanna holds a Master of Divinity from Yale Divinity School and a B.A. in religion from Oberlin College. She currently serves on the board of the Catholic Media Association. She lives in Western New York State with her husband and preschooler.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

Catholic media plays an essential role in helping the church understand and respond to the world. We cannot apply Catholic social and moral teaching if we don’t know what’s happening in our communities, in our parishes, and in society at large. At its best, Catholic journalism connects the dots: between policy and people, theology and daily life, local ministry and global impact.

In an era when secular journalism is underfunded and religion reporters are increasingly rare, Catholic media fills a critical gap. We provide context and clarity about what’s happening in the church and why it matters. We tell the truth, whether good or difficult, because honesty is a core value of both journalism and our faith.

Catholic media should not serve as public relations for the institutional church, nor should it be driven by political or ideological agendas. Our role is to speak truth to power with integrity, balance, and care. We need both investigative reporting and pastoral storytelling. We need to amplify the work of ordinary Catholics and examine how major decisions—like Supreme Court rulings or papal encyclicals—affect real lives.

The witness of figures like Oscar Romero reminds us that telling the truth, especially when it’s inconvenient or risky, is a moral act. Catholic journalists are called to that same courage, not to shape the narrative, but to report it faithfully.

Marybeth Hicks joined FAITH Catholic as Director of Strategic Communications in 2015 to lead the company’s internal marketing efforts, as well as consult with its many publishing partners to develop strategic integrated marketing and communications plans. In addition to her role within the company, she serves as managing editor of Content Evangelist, FAITH’s magazine for Catholic communicators.

Prior to joining FAITH, Marybeth was a successful parenting author, columnist, and speaker whose feature, “Then again…” ran in newspapers, magazines, and online. Marybeth also appeared on national television outlets including ABC News, Fox News, EWTN, the Christian Broadcasting Network, and on dozens of national and regional radio programs, including for several years as a regular weekly guest on Relevant Radio’s “Morning Air.” She was also a frequent guest host for the late Al Kresta on Ave Maria Radio.

Marybeth began her career as a writer in the White House, and later was a communications specialist in the educational, healthcare, and corporate sectors. She and her husband Jim are the parents of four young adults and grandparents to one grandson. They make their home in Florida and attend St. Joseph Catholic Church in Bradenton.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

Catholic Media — and by extension the Catholic Media Association — play a crucial role in the fundamental mission of the Church: fulfillment of The Great Commission. Historically, the Catholic press did this by keeping adherent Catholics apprised of news and information that impacted dioceses and parish communities, as well as connecting Catholics with the larger national and international Church. At a time when American Catholics suffered discrimination and Catholic beliefs were mischaracterized and misinterpreted, the Catholic press also helped to illuminate the truth about Catholic doctrine and teaching. Those priorities were essential in tearing down barriers to evangelization for the Church. The historical role of the Catholic press built a strong foundation on which Catholic media rests today.
 
But I believe the role of Catholic media has evolved and must continue to adapt to the apostolic age in which we now find ourselves. With such a small percentage of Catholics involved in the life of their parish, our role must be to engage the disengaged with inspirational, evangelizing content. We’re still responsible for reporting and sharing news, to be sure, and doing so with time-honored journalistic ethics and standards. But we also need to recognize that people don’t engage with content they don’t care about. In a secular world where “nones” are the fastest growing religious affiliation, evangelizing content that connects people with Jesus and his Church ought to be a primary focus. In my ten years at FAITH, I’ve seen dioceses and Catholic organizations do this to great success, using print, digital, video, audio, and social media to inspire, educate, form, inform, and evangelize their audiences toward a greater sense of missionary discipleship.
 
I believe Catholic media is an essential part of the institutional Church; one that articulates the pastoral priorities of our bishops, facilitates the work of important ministries, and creates opportunities for connection and evangelization between Catholics and the larger community. I’m a marketer at heart, and I know some people are a little offended at the idea of using principles of marketing and strategic communications in service of the Gospel. But what is evangelizing but marketing the greatest story the world has ever known: the Gospel of Jesus Christ? As a Catholic communicator, I believe our mission is nothing less than the salvation of souls. In that sense, Catholic media is the media that matters most of all.

Elisha Valladares-Cormier is senior editor of Columbia, the monthly magazine of the Knights of Columbus. In addition to writing, editing and assisting with the magazine’s layout each issue, Elisha contributes to the publication of related digital content, including social media and a weekly newsletter.

As a journalism student at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Elisha first experienced the benefits of the Catholic Media Association by participating in the Student Journalism Awards program. He wrote his senior thesis on the role and importance of the diocesan press. A contributor to the Catholic press since 2015, he interned for the Catholic Sentinel in Portland, Oregon, and worked as a communications coordinator for a local Catholic parish and school before joining Columbia in 2022.

He lives in northwestern Ohio with his wife, Chloe, who also works in Catholic media, and their two young daughters.

Describe the importance of Catholic media:

I first became passionate about Catholic media and journalism through the diocesan press, which is equipped to do what no one else can: to tell the story of the local Church. I believe it’s our job as Catholic communicators to share stories of hope and charity, as well as news both good and bad, bringing the perspective of faith to people both in and out of the pews. By covering the issues and stories that impact not just the lives, but also the faith of our audiences, our work becomes a means to inform, inspire and evangelize.

The association’s members have audiences that range from local to international, but we all share in a mission, as Pope Francis said in his message to communication professionals earlier this year, to produce work “capable of focusing on beauty and hope even in the midst of apparently desperate situations, and generating commitment, empathy and concern for others.”

Voting open through May 10 - must be logged in