Joanna Arellano-Gonzalez is a proud first-generation Mexican-American, originally from La Villita on Chicago’s South Side. She is a co-founder and currently serves as the Director of Training and Formation at the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership (CSPL), a Catholic and Christian-rooted community organizing coalition that integrates liberation theology, spirituality, and grassroots organizing to advance community transformation.

Joanna holds a Master of Arts in Christian Spirituality from Fordham University, with a concentration in Spiritual Direction.

In addition to her leadership at CSPL, she was a founding board member and served as the founding Board President of The Co-Op Ed Center, a worker cooperative incubator dedicated to supporting communities of color in building cooperative enterprises in Chicago. Her professional background also includes serving as Associate Director in the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office for Peace and Justice, where she managed several justice initiatives. She later spent five years in the labor movement, leading communications and press strategy at both local and national levels, supporting workers to share their courageous stories to the media.

Joanna is deeply committed to developing formation experiences that draw from the breadth of theological and spiritual traditions within the Church, including mujerista, liberation, feminist, and Black Catholic theologies. As an artist, she honors her heritage through embroidery and beadwork, centering her practice on culture, family, and spirituality.