Rachel comes to Creation Care work having spent most of her life in the tidal flats of the eastern shore of Maryland, where the blue crabs and herons captivated her attention. That awe and fascination with the world led her to deeper questions about God and encouraged her to shape a life close to the land here in Vermont.

Previously, she has worked with Mission Farm in Vermont, the Church of the Woods in New Hampshire, the Retreat House at Hillsboro, and as a Region Missionary for the Episcopal Church in Connecticut. Her work focuses on building emerging ministries and networks.

She is an experiment manager for Try Tank and the Owner/Co-Director of Heartberry Hollow Farm & Forest, a regenerative farm and retreat center in central Vermont.

Deb first felt a call to advocate for her kin in creation as a child, when Ranger Rick magazine invited readers to write to Congress and the President about an endangered fish, the snail darter. Her love of nature and spirit of activism stayed with her, leading her to earn a Master’s degree in Science Communication and Public Engagement. For her dissertation project, she engaged folks in the Episcopal Church of New Hampshire with Sustaining Earth, Our Island Home, the carbon footprint tracker and an early climate advocacy tool for Episcopalians.

Deb is also a poet whose work often reflects her love of creation. She has been a companion to two parishes in our recently completed Pilot Program. As Project Coordinator, she will develop and support networks of parishes and companions who participate in the Path.

John is an iconographer, liturgist, and parish priest on his way to start a long-time dream of a family homestead and little permaculture farm in the backwoods of Downeast Maine this summer.

His first career was in animation, web development, and software design, with a side of marketing. Through a sustained encounter with a wider world of culture, creation, and crisis, he migrated from a fundamentalist (and anti-environmental) upbringing to discernment in the Diocese of Arkansas.

His journey so far has taken him from the river-side suburbs of Virginia to the mountains of West Virginia to a river valley in Western Massachusetts, where he collaborated with Margaret, creating a Liturgical Guide for the Season of Creation, and then joined the Path as project manager.

Alli serves as our website and content designer for the Path, and our token west coaster. She is the Communications Director for the World Forestry Center.

She has lived, worked, and led worship at Bryce Canyon and Mt. Rainier National Parks with A Christian Ministry in the National Park (ACMNP). She also has clocked in over 1,600 miles along the Appalachian Trail, the majority of which was in a thru-hike attempt. Her love of the wilderness fostered a lifelong desire to help other feel connected to God beyond the walls of a church building.

She lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband, curious son, and two cats.