Bethany Welch, Ph.D., the founding director of the Aquinas Center, will receive the 2014 Cardinal Bernardin New Leadership Award.

Welch is being honored for her work to empower immigrants and the impoverished at the Aquinas Center, a community development center created in partnership with St. Thomas Aquinas, a South Philadelphia parish.

Welch will receive the New Leadership Award at a reception during the Spring General Assembly of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops taking place on June 11 in New Orleans.

In South Philadelphia, she pioneered the founding of the Aquinas Center by turning a former convent into a space for community organizing, advocacy, service for the immigrants and more. Welch has also served in numerous positions within the Catholic Church, including service on parish councils, national Catholic organizations, and the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

The Cardinal Bernardin New Leadership Award honors a Catholic between the age of 18 and 40, who exhibits leadership in fighting poverty and injustice in the United States through community initiatives. The award is named after Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, the archbishop of Chicago from 1982 - 1996.