Spirituality

Growing up in the Bible Belt, religion played a significant role in both my upbringing and the cultural landscape of the South.  Like many people, this foundation was both crucial to how I came to understand the world and at times difficult to reconcile with how I hoped the world would and could be.  Wrestling with these questions at first drove me further into my religious commitment until I reached a point at which the institutional church no longer made sense to me, at which time I began to pull away from religion as a whole.  

In my early 30s, I leveraged my interest in theology to land a desk job at a seminary and soon after found out that I was pregnant with my first child, something I’d been told was not possible (more on that here).  My spiritual life went into overdrive not long after this miracle baby’s birth, as it turns out she is special in more ways than one. Alongside my personal experience, I was also witnessing the compelling stories and deep spirituality of the seminarians I began to know and love. All of this slowly wooed me back to the life of the church and a sincere commitment to Christian practice.  I explored this sense of call further by leading an intentional Christian community for young adults called AYAVA House over a period of six years, and went on to co-found a project called The 787 Collective that focused on developmental work with congregations that hoped to grow their communities through earnest and creative engagement with young adults.  Helping congregations and young adults claim or re-claim what it means to live a life of integrity with one’s faith has become a passion of mine, and I love any chance to consult, facilitate or strategize with groups, individuals or leaders who find themselves on this path and are seeking support in either discernment or expansion.