Civility seems like a low bar for our common life together, and yet it also seems that often we can’t even reach that. We struggle to be kind to one...

I love stained glass. I love the artistry, the history embedded in small fragments we piece together, and how it calls us into prayer. But when I walked into a...

It's about friends. I have been thinking a lot about how we have grown Thistle Farms and Thistle Farms Global into a movement for women's freedom. It didn't happen by finding a life coach, a...

The latest incarnation of #metoo unfolded recently at a megachurch in Chicago, and my thoughts have been with the woman who brought her dark secret to light. I am in awe...

It is a gift in the season of Thanksgiving to show up to wherever you are, with gratitude. It makes all the small irritations fade into sweetness like marshmallows on...

I was born barefoot and, God willing, I will die with bare feet. When I read the story of God telling Moses to take off his shoes because he stands...

Recently I sat with 13 women from the U.S. and Ukraine in a small town in Poland.

Kristin McWilliams, a talented organizer, leader, wife and mom, reflects in the following blog on her first year as an Executive Assistant to me at Thistle Farms. Read on to...

This has been a summer of travel, work, and high altitude dreams. From the Sleeping Giant Volcano in Hawaii, to Porter's Cabin 10,000 feet up in Idaho, to the shrine on the mountain...

“Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb...” — John 20:1

Ty in Manufacturing (Photo Credit: Peggy Napier) I was recently given the assignment to interview one of the amazing survivor leaders at Thistle Farms, and I am so grateful to be...

None of the women of Thistle Farms made it to the streets or prison alone. It took a bunch of failed systems and communities to help them get there

Abi, the Director of Thistle Farms Global, just returned from the Syrian Refugee Camp in Ritsona, Greece, where the women of The Welcome Project are still leading with strength, grace, and hope in...

Mark 9:2-9 We hear the story of the Transfiguration twice a year in church. The first is the last Sunday of Epiphany and then again at the feast of the...

Deuteronomy 18: 15-20 Mark 1:21-28   I know it’s important to know when to be quiet. One time when one of my kids was little and had done something horrible,...

We all need to be safe and grounded in our actual body if we want to be at peace in our work or home life.

Recently, I was sitting in the airport, and the departure board flashed the saddest word of all: "Delayed." Nothing else in my day was delayed but the flight. Not the speech,...

It is a misconception that the stress we feel today is because of the current pace of life, the spread of technology, or the political turmoil we see around us...

A sweet reminder from a photoshoot we did a few years ago “But whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first...

It’s hard to entrust our faith to another generation, as happy and thankful as we are for their willingness to pick up their cross and follow love!  It’s always been...

Sometimes in the middle of Nashville, TN, when the air is thin and the nights are long, I can picture an African Sky over the Kalahari Desert.