Mary Jo Leddy

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Mary Jo Leddy, CM (born 1946) is a Canadian writer, speaker, theologian and social activist.

Leddy is widely recognized for her work with refugees at Toronto's Romero House. She began working for the centre as a night manager in 1991, and has been its director since then. After thirty years, as a member of the Roman Catholic Sisters of Our Lady of Sion, she left that congregation in 1994.

In 1973, she was the founding editor of the Catholic New Times. She is author of the books "Say to the Darkness We Beg to Differ" (Lester and Orpen Denys, finalist City of Toronto Book Award), Reweaving Religious Life: Beyond the Liberal Model (Twenty Third Publications, 1990), At the Border Called Hope: Where Refugees are Neighbours (HarperCollins, 1997 and finalist for the Trillium Award) and Radical Gratitude (Orbis Books, 2002).

The recipient of a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Toronto, studied under the direction of Emil Fackenheim, she is currently an adjunct professor at Regis College, the Jesuit theological school at that university.

Leddy received the Human Relations Award of the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews (1987), the Ontario Citizenship Award (1993), and the Order of Canada (1996). She has received several honourary doctorates: L.L.D. York University, DHLett (Mount Saint Vincent), L.L.D. Windsor, D.Lett Waterloo, D.D. St. Andrew's