Meet Maryanna of Khora Spiritual Companioning
The whole purpose of spiritual direction is to penetrate beneath the surface of a man’s life, to get behind the façade of conventional gestures and attitudes which he presents to the world, and to bring out his inner spiritual freedom, his inmost truth, which is what we call the likeness of Christ in his soul.
Thomas Merton
Rev. Maryanna Stumbaugh has served in the local church for ten years. With a varied denominational background herself, every tradition and denomination is welcome at Khora. Maryanna was ordained in the ACNA as a transitional Deacon in 2022, and serves at a local church as an Associate Pastor. She completed her Masters in Spiritual Formation with an emphasis in Spiritual Direction at Portland Seminary in 2020 and subsequently completed her certificate in Spiritual Direction in 2021. Maryanna and Zack, her husband, and their three children live in Spokane, WA. In her free time she enjoys dancing, songwriting, and all things historical fiction.
Maryanna was introduced to the discipline of Spiritual Direction in 2010 during her undergraduate studies at Biola University. It was the loving and compassionate presence of her first director that impacted Maryanna so greatly that she knew one day she desired to train as a director herself. Presence and deep listening, with an attunement to the Holy Spirit at work in the life of the other, is the gift Maryanna hopes to share in her practice of Spiritual Direction.