Ginny Baxter is a former journalist and public relations professional whose passion is writing. A graduate of Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, Ginny majored in English with a focus on journalism. She later studied public relations at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. She comes from a progressive Christian family and has been an active church member since childhood.
Ginny has been writing for Patheos since July 2022 and finds it a challenging and richly rewarding experience. Her religious tradition was Baptist during childhood and Methodist as an adult. Ginny’s interests in writing and religion developed in her teens. but didn’t converge until later.
“When the COVID quarantine hit, I found myself searching for meaningful ways to live my life in retirement. I talked to God quite a bit and prayed for a better understanding of the Christian faith. Mostly, I wanted to find ways to make a difference through my faith.”
“God answered rather quickly in two surprising ways. One was an unexpected invitation from my class to teach Sunday School. My silent reaction was, ‘You’re joking.’ They weren’t. The other was Patheos. I hadn’t mentioned my prayers to anyone, but my granddaughter suggested I might be interested in writing for Patheos. Thankfully, they accepted me.”
Ginny enjoys that Patheos gives her opportunities to write about the things she loves, expand her horizons and learn new things about Christianity and faith traditions other than her own. “I’m solidly Christian, but I think the world would be better for everyone if we opened our eyes to people and beliefs that are different from our own. We may not agree with everything we learn, but we can respect people’s right to have their own ideas.”
Ginny’s advice to new Patheos writers is to write about things that interest you and will potentially interest your readers. Use catchy headlines and sprinkle “hooks” throughout your articles. Subheads make excellent “hooks” to draw readers into the next section of your articles and keep people reading.
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