Writer and teacher Debie Thomas will be the guest speaker at this year’s Michigan Annual Conference, set for May 30 – June 1, 2025.
JAMES DEATON
Content Editor
Save the date for the 2025 Michigan Annual Conference, which will begin on Friday, May 30, and conclude on Sunday, June 1. The Clergy Session will be held on Thursday, May 29. This year’s theme is “Unfinished: Growing Up and Into Christ,” taken from Ephesians 4:15-16.
Registration opens at 9 am Eastern / 8 am Central on Saturday, March 1. More details are forthcoming. Be sure to bookmark this website, which provides pertinent event details.
The Michigan Conference is excited to welcome Debie Thomas, a lay Episcopal teacher and author, as the guest speaker. She will speak during the laity event on Friday and then lead a teaching session on Saturday morning.
Debie is a sought-after speaker on Scripture, faith, writing, and spiritual practice. She holds a master’s degree in English literature from Brown University and an MFA in creative writing from The Ohio State University.
From 2014 to 2022, Debie worked as a staff writer for Journey with Jesus: A Weekly Webzine for the Global Church, and from 2014 to 2024, served as a lay minister for formation at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Palo Alto, California. Currently, Debie is a seminarian at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in Berkeley, California.
Debie is the author of A Faith of Many Rooms: Inhabiting a More Spacious Christianity (2024) and Into the Mess & Other Jesus Stories: Reflections on the Life of Christ (2022). She is also a columnist and contributing editor for The Christian Century.
Debie and her husband, Alex, have two grown children and live in northern California. She was born in Kerala, South India, and raised in Boston, Massachusetts. Like many children of immigrants, she grew up juggling a complicated and often confusing mix of identities: South Asian, New England suburban, evangelical, and feminist. In the murky “in-betweenness” of those identities, she learned that life is far more varied and messier than neat or certain and that faith is about delving deeper into mystery rather than finding once-and-for-all answers.
Debie Thomas sat down with MIconnect to discuss her life and faith as she prepares to join us in May. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
You’ve lived in different parts of the country, but do you have any Michigan connections?
I don’t have direct Michigan connections, but I had the wonderful privilege of teaching at the Bay View Association (a Chautauqua — Methodist! — on the banks of Little Traverse Bay) a couple of summers ago. I will say that I fell in love with the area — the lake and those stunning sunsets! It was a lovely week.
So, being invited back to this area to speak at the 2025 Michigan Annual Conference is an honor. I received Nancy Arnold’s invitation last summer and was very happy and honored to accept it. I’m looking forward to a rich time of conversation and community with you all.
You have spent considerable time in the Episcopal/Anglican tradition, which Methodism grew out of. Are there aspects of Methodism that inspire, challenge, or make you wonder?
I am intrigued by the fact that Methodism developed as a revival movement within Anglicanism. I think it’s healthy and productive for different Christian traditions and denominations to learn from each other. That is, to look critically at our faith expressions through the lenses of our siblings in Christ who might worship and practice differently than we do. For example, we should always be open and attentive to the possibilities of revival. So, I’m sure there are helpful conversations to be had about the revivals that first birthed Methodism in the eighteenth century. In the spirit of ecumenism, I’m also very hopeful and excited about the recent movements within our two traditions to develop a closer relationship, moving toward full communion.
You’re a layperson who is going to seminary. What are your plans post-graduation? Where do you feel God is leading you?
I am in my second year of seminary, working on my master of divinity degree. I’m currently a “postulant,” which is one of the stages of discernment for ordained ministry in The Episcopal Church. I do feel a call to the priesthood, and I’m continuing to pray and seek counsel about what that vocation might look like once I finish school.
You last worked as a lay minister for formation. Could you say more about that role? How did your approach to faith formation evolve over that decade? Name two or three things you learned.
I started as the Minister for Children and Family Ministries in 2014 and then transitioned into adult formation a few years later. In the latter role, I worked with the clergy and other staff at St. Mark’s to develop and teach formational programs. These included forums on topics ranging from prayer and spiritual practices, Scripture study, topics in theology, lament and hope, evangelism, and intersections between faith, justice, reconciliation, and contemporary life in Silicon Valley. I also led some small groups (for example, for people transitioning from conservative evangelical/fundamentalist traditions into The Episcopal Church) and helped teach newcomers classes and confirmation and baptism preparation classes.
What I’ve learned (and continue to learn) as I work in formation is that God meets people in diverse and sometimes surprising ways. For some people, the sacred resides and speaks very powerfully in liturgy and ritual. For others, it’s sermons, choral music, small group Bible study, meditation, or justice-oriented service practiced in community. What’s important is to watch and listen closely for what “shimmers” in each person’s life and lead accordingly, without assuming a one-size-fits-all approach to spiritual growth and deepening.
I’ve also learned to be patient and take the long view. Formation is about planting seeds. We might never see the fruit of some of those seeds we labor over — and that’s okay. God will complete what God begins — in God’s own time! Our work is cultivating healthy soil, choosing seeds carefully, and doing whatever “watering” we can. But the harvest belongs to the Spirit, who blows where She wills.
What are your initial thoughts on our theme, “Unfinished: Growing Up and Into Christ”? How might you encourage those attending to prepare for this time together with you?
I absolutely love this theme! One of the most unhelpful stances we can take as Christians is a stance of “arrival” or “finishedness,” as if there is nothing more to be learned. Faith becomes much more vibrant, joyful, and invitational when we commit to lifelong conversion and recognize that Christianity is a long, winding journey — a path to keep walking. Among other things, this perspective affords us so much more grace. So much more permission. Permission to try, fail, try again, make discoveries, explore, ask questions, and wonder. It gives us permission to remain young at heart as believers — to become a beginner over and over again, with all the wonder and curiosity that beginners bring to their endeavors.
I’m still formulating the content for the sessions, so I can’t offer many “teasers” for what I’ll present. But I love to teach by delving deep into the stories of Scripture to see how a particular narrative, character, or interaction in the Bible might encourage, console, or provoke us in our own faith adventures. In terms of preparation, I invite everyone to come in a spirit of openness and curiosity so that we can learn together as the Spirit leads us.
As a writer and teacher, what books and authors have you been drawn to lately? What stories are inspiring you and giving you hope these days?
Since I’m in seminary, a lot of my reading is for school, which is fine. I’m a bit of a church nerd, and I love digging into theology and church history! When I do have spare time, I enjoy reading spiritual memoir. For example, I’ve been savoring Cole Arthur Riley’s amazing book This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories That Make Us, which weaves a lived and embodied theology into the author’s own story. I also love fiction. The last novel I fell into completely was Abraham Verghese’s The Covenant of Water, which centers around a beautiful Christian community in South India, where my family is from.
Last Updated on February 3, 2025