Bio

The award-winning writing by Rev. Susan Baller-Shepard, MSW has been published in the Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post “On Faith,” Spirituality & Health, Patheos, Writer’s Digest, and Church & Society, along with a number of newspapers, denominational publications, web sites, and poetry anthologies. Susan is a writer, speaker, and has been an ordained Presbyterian minister for over twenty years. Susan has a Master of Social Work from the University of Illinois and a Master of Divinity from McCormick Theological Seminary. As an undergraduate at the University of Iowa, she was a double major, with religion and English, and part of the undergraduate Writer’s Workshop. She is a parish associate pastor at First Presbyterian Church-Normal, and for thirteen years has been editor of Spiritual Book Club with its blog of over 155 interviews called “Real People, Real Lives, Real Spirituality.” Author of the children’s book Matching Yu, she was interviewed by the PBS program “Thirty Good Minutes“ about the adoption and faith journey http://www.vimeo.com/8769752 . She is completing a non-fiction manuscript which incorporates lessons from the spiritual life and science.

As a speaker with international interests, Susan preaches in a variety of settings, won the Ellen and James Taylor Award for Preaching and the John V. Farwell Award for Scripture Reading from McCormick Theological Seminary, and has served as keynote speaker for various events across the U.S. and internationally at the World Spirit Forum in Arosa, Switzerland. For eight years, she helped facilitate a Presbytery partnership with churches in Natal, Brazil. In 2010, she traveled to Beijing, P.R. China as part of the “Global Leaders for Orphans Initiative.” She also served as the English language editor for German humanitarian Peter Hesse’s book Vision Works, about his twenty-five years of philanthropy work in Haiti, and she traveled to Liancourt and Leogane, Haiti in 2011. The Spiritual Book Club is a partner with the Charter for Compassion, and Susan works to help promote the Charter and its message.

For more of Susan’s writing: