About Joan

Joan's life has been about discerning and navigating the movement of the Spirit, in her own life and on behalf of others. After 12 years as a school teacher and guidance counselor while raising a family,Joan established a private practice in career counseling and consulting to non-profits in Vermont.

In the 1990’s, she became an administrator for organizations in transition, including the University of Vermont’s Service Learning program and Farm & Wilderness Foundation in Plymouth, Vt. Simultaneously, Joan served as a spiritual director and retreat leader, which in 1999 led her into interim ministry and ordination in the UCC, an inclusive Protestant denomination in the Congregational tradition. Between 1999-2006, Joan served two small churches in Pittsford and Saxtons River, Vermont, which included a year as a part-time Hospice Chaplain. In 2006, she became a counselor-administrator-cook for Greenfire Retreat in Tenants’s Harbor, Maine. Upon it’s closing, she followed a dream of many years, and opened Healing Soup for a ministry of hospitality and spiritual counsel.

Since 2007, Joan has served as part-time Interim Minister for three Maine churches, including two island churches in partnership with the Maine Seacoast Mission. In the fall of 2012, Joan retired from interim ministry with churches

Joan is a member of Spiritual Directors' Int'l. and an Affiliate of the Northeast Guild for Spiritual Formation in Maine.

Joan’s training includes the following:

• B.A, Political Science and American Literature, Middlebury College, Vt.
• M.Ed., Organizational and Human Resource Development, University of Vermont
• Advanced Human Development study including:
  • The National Multicultural Institute in Washington DC
  • Clinical Developmental Institute in Boston, Mass.
  • Power Equity training with Equity Associates in Laconia, NH.
• Spiritual Development study included:
  • Coolidge Colloquium Fellowship, Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Mass.
  • Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation, 2-year ecumenical program, Md.
  • Preparation for Ordination in UCC, United Church of Christ, liberal Protestant denomination in the Congregational tradition.
  • Independent courses with Harvard, Bangor and Andover Newton Seminary
  • Clinical Pastoral Education, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Hanover, NH, Palliative Care Team