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FIELD
Kathleen is a 2010 graduate of Hartwick College, located in Oneonta, New York.  Throughout the latter half of her college career, she was increasingly convicted of the need for real fellowship and Christian encouragement. In January of her senior year, Kathleen began attending Campus Ambassadors and was astounded by God’s power to transform uneasiness into friendship and darkness into light. 

She is very excited to be jumping into the challenges and blessings of campus ministry.  Increasingly God convicts her of the Gospel’s mission of seeking out, recognizing, and healing the brokenness of the world. She is humbled to be functioning as an active instrument of God’s healing love through ministry.     

FAITH
Kathleen was raised in a church-going family and was confirmed in the Methodist faith as a young teenager. Yet, in many ways and though she did not realize it at the time, her faith was markedly immature, if not entirely absent.

“As a young person, I understood God within the context of established religion—its structures, ideas and history—not personally. Indeed, I really didn’t think about having a personal relationship with God or why a person would want to. It just never flew up on my radar,” says Kathleen.  “I understood God intellectually, not personally. I thought being a Christian meant knowing about Him rather than knowing Him. Since then, I have found that being a Christian has much more to do with the heart than with the head.”   

Upon entering college, Kathleen developed an interest in theology. After two years’ study at Hartwick, she decided to spend a semester abroad at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.  It was there, 3,000 miles from home, that Christ “rugby-tackled” her—revealing Himself in a real and vital way that could no longer be overlooked by distraction, arrogance or apathy. Transformed for a lifetime by her three-month visit, Kathleen was sent home to the U.S. “kicking and screaming” to discover the true expanse of God’s power. 

“After all that had happened in St. Andrews, I didn’t want to leave. My Christian family was there, my comfort was there. At the time, going home looked like death to me,” she says.

However, since returning to Hartwick, Kathleen has seen her faith grow tremendously through the fellowship she has found in Campus Ambassadors. More importantly, she gives thanks, retrospectively, for the trials of uncertainty she has faced, for they have illustrated to her, far better than any intellectual endeavor, the truth of God’s promises.          

FAMILY
Kathleen springs from an eclectic upbringing. Her mother’s family attended the local Methodist church for generations and ran the annual chicken barbeque. Being a quiet and reserved bunch, faith was not discussed as much as it was lived.  Kathleen says, “My grandmother, or someone she appointed, prayed over every family meal. It was very evident that God was important, but finding out exactly who He was and why that mattered personally was something that could not be accomplished through a surrogate. I had to do it on my own.” 

Since being rugby-tackled by Christ, Kathleen has been especially thankful for the mentorship of her great grandmother, whose encouragement and guidance has imparted her with much strength and hope.