Stubborn Grace: Faith, Mental Illness, and Demanding a Blessing

With unflinching honesty and humor in the vein of Cheryl Strayed and David Sedaris but a raw tenderness all her own, Kate Landis chronicles the hardest parts of her young adulthood as well as her poignant journey to faith and community.

Kate Landis grew up in the American Baptist Church--the child of a music director and a deacon--until she left the church in her late teens after surviving major depression and a handful of suicide attempts. She became an activist, feminist, punk, and self-described rabble rouser. And through activism she found a spiritual community with justice at its core and a faith that could hold it all--her mental illness, her fire, her spunk, and all of her questions--a loving, stubborn grace.

Rev. Kate Landis currently serves as chaplain at Swedish Hospital in Edmonds, Washington. She has previously served as minister at Shoreline Unitarian Universalist Church, as a youth advisor, and GA chaplain. She won the Skinner Sermon Award, presented annually to the preacher of the sermon best expressing Unitarian Universalism's social principles, for her sermon "Resilience and Religious Freedom." She lives with her husband Jay and ornery mutt Wally in Seattle, where she is frequently the oldest person in the mosh pit.