Conference 2025 Presenters
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Presenters
Meet our 2025 conference keynote presenters!
To learn about our workshop and interdisciplinary companionship presenters, please visit the Workshops page.
Rt. Rev. Michael Curry
Keynote Presenter
Thursday, May 29 - 10:30AM
The Rt. Rev. Michael Bruce Curry served as the 27th presiding bishop and primate of The Episcopal Church. At the church’s 78th General Convention in June 2015, he was elected to a nine-year term in this role and installed in November of that year.
Throughout his ministry, Bishop Curry has been a prophetic leader, particularly in the areas of racial reconciliation, climate change, evangelism, immigration policy, and marriage equality. The animating vision and message of his ministry is Jesus of Nazareth and his way of radical, sacrificial love, and he regularly reminds Episcopalians they are “the Episcopal branch of the Jesus Movement.”
Bishop Curry was ordained a priest in 1978 and served parishes in North Carolina, Ohio, and Maryland until his 2000 election as bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina. He graduated with high honors from Hobart and William Smith Colleges and earned his Master of Divinity degree from Yale University. Bishop Curry is the author of five books and a regular guest on national and international media outlets. He retired in 2024.
Lucy Abbott Tucker
Keynote Presenter
Thursday, May 29 - 8:45AM
Lucy Abbott Tucker has been a member of SDI since its inception. She began her ministry of spiritual direction at the Institute for Spiritual Leadership, Chicago. She worked there preparing women and men for the ministry for 32 years. Since 2015 she has been doing freelance work in spiritual direction and supervision. She believes spiritual direction has the power to help heal our world and values the opportunity to support spiritual directors in this work.
Sara Critchfield
Keynote Presenter
Saturday, May 31 - 9:45AM
"Re-Sourcing" the Movement
Sara Critchfield is the Vice President of Global Outreach at the Fetzer Institute, where she leads communications and a media portfolio advancing spiritual solutions to social challenges. A former faith-based activist, editor, and consultant, she helped launch Upworthy.com and has championed projects across nonprofit, corporate, and startup sectors. She holds degrees from the University of Pennsylvania and Drexel, and is a certified spiritual director. She lives near Los Angeles, where she enjoys art, pilgrimage travel, and cycling.
Mirabai Starr
Keynote Presenter
Saturday, May 31 - 8:45AM
Mirabai Starr is an award-winning author, contemporary translator of sacred literature, international speaker, and world-renowned teacher of contemplative practice and inter-spiritual dialog. A certified bereavement counselor, Mirabai helps mourners harness the transformational power of loss. Her book, WILD MERCY: Living the Fierce & Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics, continues to sell widely and has been translated into multiple languages.
Pat McCabe
Keynote Presenter & Conference Ritualist
Saturday, May 31 - 10:45AM
Pat McCabe (Weyakpa Najin Win, Woman Stands Shining) is a Diné (Navajo) mother, grandmother, spiritual companion, activist, artist, writer, ceremonial leader, and international speaker. She is a voice for global peace, and her paintings are created as tools for individual, earth and global healing. She draws upon the Indigenous sciences of Thriving Life to reframe questions about spirit, sustainability and balance, and she is devoted to supporting the next generations, Women’s Nation and Men’s Nation, in being functional members of the “Hoop of Life” and upholding the honor of being human.
Her primary work at the moment is:
- The reconciliation between the masculine and feminine, Men’s Nation and Women’s Nation
- Remembering, recreating or creating anew a narrative for the Sacred Masculine
- Addressing the Archetypal Wounding that occurred in our misunderstanding and abuse of technology in prayer, ceremony and science
Rabbi Dr. Tirzah Firestone
Keynote Presenter
Friday, May 30 - 8:45AM
Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, Ph. D., is an author, Jungian psychotherapist, a leader in the international Jewish Renewal Movement, and a renowned Jewish scholar and teacher. Widely known for her groundbreaking work on Kabbalah, depth psychology, and the re-integration of the feminine wisdom tradition within Judaism, Rabbi Tirzah lectures and teaches internationally about spiritual and ancient wisdom practices that are honed to assist us at this critical time in world history. Her latest work, Wounds into Wisdom: Healing Intergenerational Jewish Trauma (Monkfish, 2019) is the recipient of the 2020 Nautilus Book Award Gold in Psychology and the Jewish Women’s Caucus of the Association for Women in Psychology 2020 book award.
Rev. James Martin
Keynote Presenter
Saturday, May 31 - 9:15AM
Praying the Examen
Learn about the Ignatian method of praying the “examination of conscience” as a way of seeing where God has been in your day.
Fr. James Martin, SJ, is a Jesuit priest, editor at large of America magazine, consultor to the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, and author of the New York Times bestsellers Learning to Pray, Jesus: A Pilgrimage, and The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything. Father Martin is a frequent commentator in the national and international media, having appeared on all the major networks and outlets, like The Colbert Report, NPR’s Fresh Air, The New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal.
Keith Kristich
Workshop Presenter
Thursday, May 29 - 2:15PM
Rooted & Reaching: Living in Sacred Tension
We are like trees: rooted in one divine Source, yet each growing in our own direction, reaching and branching into an ever-changing world. In this session, we’ll explore the sacred tension between being and becoming, between the still, rooted place where we are already one with the Ground of Being, and the endlessly changing world that invites us to stretch, grow, and be pruned. Through meditation, reflection, and small group conversation, we’ll look at how contemplative practice grounds us in Being while also opening us to transformation, especially during the inevitable storms of life. As spiritual companions and directors, the lens of rooting, branching, and pruning invites a deeper discernment — for ourselves and those we journey with — into what we are being called to root into, grow toward, and let go of.
Keith Kristich is a writer and retreat leader bringing an interspiritual approach to spiritual teaching, integrating wisdom from various contemplative traditions while highlighting the often-forgotten mystical teachings of Christianity. Keith is a commissioned Presenter of Centering prayer through Contemplative Outreach, trained with the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation in Leading contemplative prayer groups and retreats, and is a certified teacher of meditation and the Enneagram. Keith Kristich is the founder of Closer Than Breath, an online interspiritual community dedicated to the teaching and practice of contemplative prayer.
Harry Pickens
Musical Spiritual Companion in Residence
Harry Pickens is an award-winning musician, educator, and life transformation coach. He holds practitioner and trainer certifications in EFT and Spiritual Technology and a Certificate in Applied Positive Psychology from the Flourishing Center. He is the developer of the From StageFright To Standing Ovation™, From Burnout To Bliss™ and Rewire Your Brain For Inner Peace™ Workshops, and creator of Emotional Empowerment For Personal Mastery™, a step-by-step protocol that is designed to help his clients quickly and easily release the pain of the past, fully embrace the miracle of the present moment, and consciously create their best possible future. Harry was a recent presenter in the SDI Trauma and Wellness Course for Spiritual Directors and Companions.
Dr. Jamie F. Eaddy-Chism
Workshop Presenter
Thursday, May 29 - 4:00PM
Spiritual Awakenings in Grief: Helping Others Locate Their Path at Life’s Crossroads
Grief often brings us to a crossroads, where loss reshapes our understanding of self, community, and the sacred. This session explores how grief can be an invitation to spiritual awakening, reorientation, and transformation. Through a culturally attuned and justice-centered lens, we will discuss ways to companion others in grief, honoring their unique experiences while helping them locate meaning, agency, and connection along their journey. Participants will engage in reflective practices that integrate spiritual care, embodied awareness, and ancestral wisdom to support those navigating loss.
The Rev. Jamie Eaddy-Chism, DMin, works with people’s healing and well-being, perhaps especially with navigating trauma, loss, and grief. Her work intersects justice, theology, and thanatology, and she incorporates art, music, and movement when providing education and care. She is a 2015 Princeton University Black Theology and Leadership Institute Fellow. She received her Master of Divinity from The Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology at Virginia Union University, and is a certified trauma professional (CTP). She is a certified thanatologist through The Association for Death Education and Counseling (ADEC). She founded The Remembering Station, a 501C3 committed to providing resources to those navigating grief, whether finances for funerals or resources for doulas.
Affectionately known as Dr. J, she facilitates sessions on the intersection of Trauma, Black Grief, and White Supremacy throughout the United States and abroad. Dr. Jamie is the author of Getting Naked to Get Free and curator of the “The Ratchet Grief Project™.
Please note that while most of our keynote presenters for the 2025 conference will be participating in-person, a couple will join us remotely.