The Author

Enthralled by the magic of words since early childhood, Deborah Smith Douglas has always found refuge and strength in reading and writing.

She received degrees in literature and law, which strengthened her love of language and longing for order in human affairs. Raised in the Presbyterian Church in a Mennonite community in central Kansas, spending summers with Lutheran and Baptist grandparents, she began attending Episcopal services and reading Catholic and Jewish theology in college. She is at home in many faith contexts and ecumenical settings.

An Ignatian-trained spiritual director, Camaldolese Benedictine oblate, member of the Episcopal Church and of the Society of the Companions of the Holy Cross, she has taught classes and led retreats across the United States and Britain.

Her essays and poems have been published in Weavings, Commonweal, Spiritual Life, Desert Call, The American Benedictine Review, The Christian Century, and other periodicals.

She is the author of The Praying Life: Seeking God in All Things (Morehouse 2003) and (with her husband David Douglas) the co-author of Pilgrims in the Kingdom: Travels in Christian Britain (Upper Room 2004).

She has been writer-in-residence at the Episcopal Cathedral of All Souls in Asheville, North Carolina; visiting scholar at the Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, Texas; faculty at a writers’ workshop at Corban University in Salem, Oregon; adjunct faculty in the Master’s in Spirituality program at Oblate Seminary in San Antonio, Texas; a keynote speaker at the millennial celebration of the Camaldolese Benedictines at Asilomar, California; and chaplain for The Glen, an artists’ and writers’ workshop sponsored by Seattle Pacific University in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

She and her husband have lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico for more than forty years, They enjoy reading, travel, hiking, and time with friends and family (including five young grandchildren).