Conversation Circles
Being Chaplains in a Climate-Changed World


Mondays Circle Participants

Carol Bono

I am a native Californian who spent her first 10 years of childhood moving around the United States. Unchurched, and from a religiously divided parentage, I found my way to Jesus through the ‘The Christian Club’ at my high school. This did not sit well at home. I’m the oldest of three. Mom died (dementia) 7 years ago at 94 after 6 years in a nearby nursing home. I took care of her needs as dementia encroached upon her days for 15 years. My dad died at age 70 some time ago. I have undergraduate degrees in Religious Studies and Cellular Biology and did graduate work in Biology in the early 80’s when AIDS had just arrived in this country. My M.Div. is from San Francisco Theological Seminary.  I have personal background in Twelve-Step programs, attempting to live by the spiritual principles therein. I lived a year in a Hindu ashram in Minnesota prior to seminary and taught yoga classes. I’ve practiced Active Imagination, dreamwork, shamanism and Processwork and find myself, from my early years, still very much Jungian at heart.

I’ve made only 2 trips out of the US – the first with a seminary study group for 3 weeks in 1993 to Israel, Egypt and Jordan and, in 2017, Beth and I went on a pilgrimage to west Ireland with a group from the Sacred Art of Living Center. I had just graduated after four years in their Anamcara Apprentice program. I spent the next 4 years engaged in griefwork, ritual practice, and personal growth, studying with Francis Weller, participating in his in-person Grief Ritual Leadership Training just before the pandemic. 

I am part of several online groups including my Anamcara Ceil De (Circles of Trust) and a Healing Circles Global circle ‘Talking About Death.  As Climate Change took a more central place in my consciousness, I’ve had several Work That Reconnects learning experiences and explored church resources primarily through Green Chalice. Due to the challenges immediately facing us, and my own age and spiritual path, I am more committed to local neighborhood Refugia-type chaplaincy work than I am to formal faith-based ministry.  I’d like our small home to become a ‘retreat’/refugium

 I live near San Francisco in a racially diverse area, with my wife of 24 years, Beth. We raised her mixed-race son, Martin, together. I have a family of choice in Texas, due to a Big Brother/Big Sisters relationship started 40 years ago when my ‘daughter’ was 7. From that relationship I have 4 grown grandkids.

I’m white, live on unceded Ohlone land, and talk with ancestors when I remember to. Currently I no longer serve as a hospice volunteer, am retired from per diem hospital chaplaincy, am retired from work as a paraprofessional special education aide at a nearby (80% Hispanic/Latino population) High School, (I still substitute), and I am about to not-be-pastor of a small, long established, house church congregation (Disciples of Christ). I enjoy sewing, gardening, and folk-singing.

Karen Baisinger

Karen is a retired United Methodist clergywoman living on the coast in Coos Bay, Oregon with her husband Alan and their two fur-babies, Minnie Pearl and Waylon Willie. They have 3 adult children and 5 grandchildren between them. Karen has served 1/2 her ministry in private practice as a Pastoral Counselor and the other half as a local church pastor.

Lauralu Saba Bach

 

Murhula Christian

Murhula Christian is a faith-driven humanitarian and environmental advocate from the Democratic Republic of Congo and living in Uganda as a refugee. As the founder of the Youth Up Foundation, he empowers refugee and host communities in Uganda through skills training, education, and peaceful coexistence initiatives. Rooted in his Christian faith, he champions gender-based violence awareness and youth involvement in decision-making. Christian is also a strong advocate for good environmental practices and climate change action, promoting renewable energy and sustainable living to build safer and more productive communities for vulnerable populations. 

 

Rebecca Schillenback

Hello fellow Earthlings!  I am Rebecca Schillenback.  Fun fact:  me and my beloved spouse made up our last name when we got married in 2007 by combining my last name (Nellenback) and his last name (Schillinger) to form a new one.  We live with our two teenagers in the Finger Lakes area of New York State, in the place where the Cayuga Lake Watershed meets the Susquehannah watershed, a place where the first nations people from the south and the north would also meet along the waterways.  I make my living as a hospice chaplain.  I am a recorded Quaker minister in the New York Yearly Meeting and one in a collective of Friends bringing regular ministry to my monthly meeting community of faith and practice.  I believe in compost, photosynthesis, flowers, seeds, soil, and the presence of the Sacred in all beings.  I love to grow potatoes and eat them all winter long.  Winter is also for cross country skiing, my favorite way to get exercise other than swimming.  I'm learning how to quilt and cane chairs, and I can play 'You are My Sunshine' on the harmonica.  I take a cold water dip in Cayuga Lake every Friday.  My neighbor and I are elders for the Congregation for Sacramental Healing, a free church dedicated to sacramental use of entheogens.  My kids are 14 and 16 and I'm trying to remember that they just need my presence and love. I forget and remember and forget and remember to practice breathing, listening, being, and belonging.

 

Sarah Gridley

Sarah Gridley is the author of four books of poetry: Weather Eye Open; Green is the Orator; Loom; and Insofar. She taught creative writing and literature at Case Western Reserve for fourteen years. She has a BA in English from Harvard, an MFA in poetry from the University of Montana, and an MA in Theology and Religious Studies from John Carroll University. She is currently a Chaplain Fellow at the Louis Stokes Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Cleveland, OH, specializing in expressive arts, whole health, suicide prevention, and moral injury. She is a member of the Cleveland Religious Society of Friends Meeting and will be pursuing endorsement and ordination from the Order of Universal Interfaith. With nine fellow researchers, she recently concluded a two-year project titled, Finite Futures: Imagining Alternative Ways Forward in the Anthropocene.

 

Susan Alker

Susan is a retired corporate lawyer who recently moved from California to Connecticut. She is a student at Yale Divinity School, where she is researching eco-spirituality and considering the possibility of ministry in the United Church of Christ. Susan is already an ordained interfaith minister, and she is presently acting as the (volunteer) Earth Chaplain at Fairfield University, where she is also an Adjunct Professor.

Sarah Gridley is the author of four books of poetry: Weather Eye Open; Green is the Orator; Loom; and Insofar. She taught creative writing and literature at Case Western Reserve for fourteen years. She has a BA in English from Harvard, an MFA in poetry from the University of Montana, and an MA in Theology and Religious Studies from John Carroll University. She is currently a Chaplain Fellow at the Louis Stokes Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Cleveland, OH, specializing in expressive arts, whole health, suicide prevention, and moral injury. She is a member of the Cleveland Religious Society of Friends Meeting and will be pursuing endorsement and ordination from the Order of Universal Interfaith. With nine fellow researchers, she recently concluded a two-year project titled, Finite Futures: Imagining Alternative Ways Forward in the Anthropocene.

Suzanna Barrett

Suzanna Barrett (she/her) I am completing a dual Master of Arts in Chaplaincy and Interreligious Studies at Hartford International University for Religion and Peace. I am director and editor in chief at Wesleyan University Press, and a volunteer at Cat Tales cat shelter and for DS ACT (Down Syndrome Association of Connecticut). I am currently doing field ed exploring ecospirituality with a UCC church.

Tracy Methe

I serve as missioner for baptismal living for the Episcopal Church in Colorado, helping empower and equip lay leaders for ministry. As part of the formation team, I also love to accompany people on journeys of faith at retreats, pilgrimages, and diocesan-wide hybrid deep dives. One of my passions in my role is resourcing people to lean into our six “realities of today,” realities like race injustice and the climate crisis, and this involves serving on our wonderful diocesan creation care team. Outside of work, I serve circles of children as a Godly Play mentor, and in 2021 I became a Godly Play Foundation trainer. I mention these different roles, because in working with people of all ages I feel the anxiety, grief, and sense of powerless people are experiencing, and I hope to better equip myself to walk with them in this time of rapid change and loss.

I have lived in Colorado for almost two decades, although I consider Michigan my heart home. My husband and I live in Denver with our two cats, and we have two grown daughters. Outside of work I love reading, walking and cycling, and in general being outdoors as much as possible.