Nicolette Rohr
Cohort Coordinator- Thriving Leadership Formation
Some time in 2019, I saw a Facebook post (probably shared by Terri Robertson – thanks, Terri!) about a new program called Thriving Leadership Formation. The call was about a grant-funded program looking for church leaders to lead small cohorts designed to offer community and connection and help the church and its leaders thrive. I noticed the call was open to lay people.
I wrote to Desta Goehner, who I did not then know, for more information. I wanted to be in a cohort, not lead one, but before long I had a Zoom meeting scheduled with Desta and Ray Pickett, the Rector at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary. I would estimate this was the second Zoom meeting of my life to that point. After our meeting, Desta and Ray invited me to the retreat, which was scheduled from a Tuesday to a Thursday. For me, as a lay person whose paid work was outside of the church, that meant missing some work time and rearranging my schedule. I hesitated, but something told me to say yes.
In February of 2020 I went to the Thriving Leadership Formation training at a retreat center in Malibu. On the drive there I went through all the questions I had, all the things I hoped we’d talk about, my own frustrations, all the insights I was ready to share about being a lay person, all the things I thought we needed to do at this time for the church. Then I got there, and most of the time, we sat and stayed quiet, using spiritual practices – most new to me – to connect with God and with ourselves. When we shared, we refrained from responding to others, simply thanking them for what they shared and leaving space before speaking. We didn’t air grievances or share best practices or add to our to-do lists. The message became clear: sometimes, the church and its leaders don’t need more programs, more ideas, more items for our to-do lists – we know we have a lot to do, but to do it well, we need to commit to the time and space to connect with God, ourselves, and with others, so that we are centered and grounded and able to act from a place of understanding, intention, and love. It was an important few days for me and I came home eager for more spaces like this and ready to form my cohort of lay leaders. A few weeks later, in March of 2020…well, you know what happened.
Thriving Leadership Formation helped me to center quiet, contemplation, and rest in a time that became more anxious and uncertain than I could have known. It helped me be vulnerable in trusting spaces with other Christians. It helped me build community over Zoom. It helped me lead and serve in ways that were unexpected.
I was uncertain about how to go about forming a cohort of lay people in Regions 1 and 2 of the ELCA (ELCA Regions were also new to me),but I soon heard from well over 40 people interested in being part of a small group capped at 12. In the past, I had shied away from ever being the one to offer an opening or closing prayer, but working with the TLF curriculum helped me feel more comfortable leading. I was impressed by how quickly people connected and shared. I also looked forward to the time gathering with the other cohort leaders, mostly pastors I had gotten to know in Malibu before everything changed. I was glad I had said yes.
In the summer of 2021, after my cohort had ended, I had an email from Desta asking to talk. I had no idea what she was going to say, and I was surprised when she asked if I would be willing to do some work for TLF over the summer. At the time I was an adjunct professor teaching remotely and taking on part-time jobs as a public historian. A job in the church sounded interesting, especially with this program from which I had gained so much. I said yes again, and I learned so much working behind the scenes to recruit cohort leaders, plan cohort leader training, and support the next rounds of cohorts. I was really surprised to be doing that work but also really enjoying it.
Now, we have had over 70 cohort groups and offered more spaces for spiritual practice and connection to God, others, and ourselves. I am surprised that I have led some of these spaces, that I have helped train cohort leaders, that I lead Lectio Divina some weeks, and frankly I am surprised that I even attend! My yes to TLF helped me see more clearly what I valued and wanted to say yes to in the church and in community. Yes to contemplative action, yes to openness, yes to centering spiritual practices in all we do, yes to sacred space, yes to checking in with ourselves and others, yes to going slow. As is often the case, my yes has also led to some nos, and given me clarity about moving away from some spaces and about where I want to invest my energy.
These experiences influenced my leadership as Vice President of Pacifica Synod and support for spiritual direction, coaching, and lay leadership. They contributed to my role in planning Taizé worship in my community and to my efforts to offer faithful witness in the face of injustice. And TLF has shaped my teaching and parts of my daily life.
One of our goals has been creating different kinds of spaces where people feel centered, connected, and nourished in a way that may influence how they then show up in other spaces. Much of our culture is shaped by a focus on productivity – what are we accomplishing? – and most of us feel stretched thin, rushed, and like we’re falling short. As Christians we are called to be countercultural, but that takes noticing, work, and often some measure of courage to go against the grain – when and where and how do we reject what is not the way of Jesus and embrace what is?
We hope people notice that when we gather as TLF, we ground ourselves first in our space and our connection to God, we check in with one another, we are intentional about sharing and listening, and we close in prayer. These are small practices, but they can take us out of our busy days and anxious thoughts and offer moments of connection, rest, or a reminder of our belovedness that might open us and shape how we go about the rest of our days. Many people notice how together these small practices create different spaces than those we find ourselves in on a given day.
One of our joys is hearing from people who have used the TLF curriculum or implemented some elements of how we gather into other spaces they are leading. Some participants have used the practices or abbreviated the sessions for use with youth groups. Church councils have adapted for opening devotions. One person shared that they used the manual as part of their leadership in a political organization – we love to hear it! In my classroom, I started to build in more time to welcome students and begin our time together with some kind of check-in. Just like I say in TLF meetings, sometimes when we’re asked to share how we come to this space, it’s a chance for us to check-in with ourselves – How am I? What is impacting how I show up here? What’s on my mind? We rarely leave all of this behind just because we enter a meeting or a classroom, but we can be more present if we acknowledge whatever we are carrying. Between reading our evaluation reports for our cohort program and reading my teaching evaluations, I realized that my experience with contemplative practices, cohort groups, and different kinds of spaces in the past few years impacted my teaching in small but meaningful ways. In class discussions, I am more comfortable with silence and name for students that awkward silence is not always awkward – usually it means we are thinking and preparing to speak thoughtfully (a good thing!). I am sure some students in the class where I started asking everyone to join me in taking a deep breath find me kind of weird, but I see how my experience led me to create just slightly different spaces for others, and perhaps those others will take a deep breath now and then, and I trust good will come from that.
One of my favorite TLF stories is the unexpected gift of our Nigerian cohorts. Sabi, a pastor’s wife in Nigeria who had completed a certificate with PLTS, reached out to us about being a cohort leader. She would join our meetings in spite of the significant time difference, and worked hard to connect with leaders in Nigeria in spite of the difficulty of Internet connection for members of her cohort there. The following year, there was still interest in a Nigerian cohort but we needed a cohort leader based in the U.S. for payment purposes. I asked a pastor I knew and thought might be available and interested, and she said absolutely, but also, “Do you know Pastor Ayodele?” Soon I was talking to a pastor from Nigeria who lived just a short distance from me and was serving in the United States but willing to lead a cohort of siblings in Christ in his home country, using the TLF curriculum. God is so surprising!
This is the spirit with which I say goodbye to this phase of Thriving Leadership Formation. I hope that we will see our congregations and synods support spiritual direction for leaders and make more space for vulnerability and spiritual practice, including silence. I hope we’ll all take some deeper breaths. And I trust good will come from it all.
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Nicolette Rohr led one of the first Thriving Leadership Formation cohorts in 2020 and has been part of TLF ever since, coordinating the cohort program and leading Lectio Divina and contemplative practices. She served as Vice President of Pacifica Synod from 2021 to 2024. She holds a Ph.D. in History and is a Visiting Assistant Professor of History at Pomona College. She has contributed to numerous public history and historic preservation projects; her work has been published in The American Historian and Journal of Popular Music Studies; and she was a Visiting Scholar at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Library and Archives. She enjoys books, walks, and her twin nephews.
