How Catholic Nuns Use Shareholder Activism to Drive Corporate Reform

Among the most persistent shareholder activists in corporate America are about 80 nuns living in a monastery outside Kansas City.

Set among rolling farmland, the Benedictine sisters of Mount St. Scholastica have challenged major companies such as Google, Target and Citigroup. Their shareholder proposals have called for measures ranging from oversight of artificial intelligence to pesticide measurement and stronger protections for Indigenous rights.

“Some of these companies really hate us,” said Sister Barbara McCracken, who coordinates the sisters’ corporate responsibility program. “We’re small—just like a little fly in the ointment—trying to nudge them.”

Sisters choose companies that align with religious ideals—and some that don’t

At a time when activist investing has become politically charged, the sisters are not afraid to make their views public. They recently attracted attention for criticizing the commencement address delivered by Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker at Benedictine College, a school the community helped establish.

When Butker suggested that the college’s women graduates would most cherish their roles as wives and mothers, the nuns—who are neither wives nor mothers—objected to what they called “the assertion that being a homemaker is the highest calling for a woman.”

Education has long been central to their mission: the community founded dozens of schools, and many sisters hold advanced degrees. Their ranks have included a physician, a canon lawyer and a concert violinist, and they have historically pooled and shared earnings and resources.

The sisters invest modest sums in companies that reflect their religious and ethical values, and they also retain small positions in corporations that don’t align with those values in order to press for change from within.

This spring and summer, when many companies held their annual shareholder meetings, the sisters filed a series of resolutions tied to small holdings—some as little as $2,000. Their requests ranged from asking Chevron to review its human rights policies to urging Amazon to disclose lobbying expenditures. They encouraged Netflix to adopt a more detailed code of ethics to promote non-discrimination and board diversity and urged certain pharmaceutical companies to revisit patent practices that can contribute to higher drug prices.

Faith-based shareholder activism dates back to 1970s

The sisters’ investment activity increased in the 1990s when the community began setting aside funds to care for an aging membership. “We wanted to do it responsibly,” said Sister Rose Marie Stallbaumer, who served as the community treasurer for many years. “We didn’t want to collect money for ourselves at the expense of others.”

Faith-based shareholder activism traces its roots to the early 1970s, when religious groups pushed companies to withdraw from South Africa in protest of apartheid. In 2004, Mount St. Scholastica joined the Benedictine Coalition for Responsible Investment, an umbrella group organized by Sister Susan Mika, who has worked in shareholder advocacy since the 1980s.

The Benedictine Coalition collaborates closely with the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility (ICCR), which acts as a clearinghouse for faith-based shareholder resolutions and coordinates efforts among dozens of Catholic orders and other religious groups to advance social justice-oriented corporate policies.

Tim Smith, a senior policy advisor at ICCR, said the Benedictines have been influential within the organization. Advocacy can be slow and discouraging, he noted, but “the sisters have the endurance of long-distance runners.”

Resolutions submitted by faith groups rarely pass, and when they do they are often non-binding. Yet they serve as educational tools that raise awareness inside corporations. Over time the sisters have seen support for some of their proposals grow from single digits to 30% or even a majority of shareholders.

Environmental concerns and human rights issues have gradually gained traction among investors, even as opposition to ESG (environmental, social and governance) investing has grown in some circles. “We don’t give up,” Mika said. “We keep persevering and raising the issues.”

For McCracken—an experienced peace activist who files the Kansas nuns’ resolutions—public protest is familiar territory. “There’s not a protest she wouldn’t go to,” said Sister Anne Shepard, noting McCracken’s long involvement in anti-war, anti-racism and labor solidarity actions.

McCracken entered the Benedictine community in 1961 and spent a decade at a Catholic Worker house; she describes herself as the “odd extrovert” in monastic life who “hates to miss a party.” The sisters live by the rhythms of monasticism, praying and chanting multiple times each day in the chapel, following practices their order has upheld for centuries.

They adhere to the Benedictine principle of “pray and work.” The sisters pool salaries, retirement accounts, inheritances and donations to support ministries and investments aimed at the common good—the belief that resources should be shared more equitably to benefit the whole community.

“To me, it’s a continuation of Catholic social teaching,” McCracken said, describing their approach to activist investing as rooted in that tradition.

Climate change is among sisters’ top targets for shareholder resolutions

Catholic social teaching resists simple political labels: it opposes abortion and the death penalty, advocates for the poor and immigrants, and—under Pope Francis—has placed renewed emphasis on caring for the environment. The Mount St. Scholastica community has long prioritized ecology; one of the college’s notable alumni was Wangari Maathai, the late Kenyan environmentalist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

Climate change is a frequent focus of the sisters’ shareholder proposals. On their 53-acre property they practice sustainability through composting, solar panels, community gardens and an apiary—18 beehives produced about 800 pounds of honey last year.

Their activism draws criticism from some who perceive them as politically liberal. Part of that perception stems from the fact that the sisters do not position themselves as leaders of anti-abortion activism, even though they adhere to church teaching on the subject. With many Catholic groups focused on that issue, Mount St. Scholastica often directs its energy toward other causes.

The controversy over the commencement speech prompted angry messages to the monastery and stung because the sisters are devoted local sports fans who often attend chapel dressed in team colors on game days. Sister Mary Elizabeth Schweiger, the prioress, drafted the community’s statement rejecting a narrow definition of Catholic identity and defending inclusivity in response to remarks critical of diversity, equity and inclusion.

“It came from a basic understanding of who we are and what we value,” Schweiger said. “We believed that voice needed to be heard.”

By speaking boldly on contested issues, the sisters have both lost and gained supporters over the years. “Living according to the gospel… will inevitably intersect with politics and economics,” McCracken said. “It’s the nature of being an engaged citizen.”

Now nearly 85, McCracken acknowledges she cannot be as active in street protests as before, but shareholder activism offers “a sit-down job when you can’t go to the streets.” The sisters rarely speak of retirement; “If we still have enough wits about us, we just keep going,” she said.

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