It was at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Lansing, where she remains an active member, that Ingells found a better fit. In 1973, after her daughter Melissa was born, Ingells took a position as the Christian education director.

Her husband Norris, a writer and photographer at the Lansing State Journal who died three years ago, was a cradle Episcopalian. She wasn’t.

“I grew up in a very anti-Catholic home and I’ve always been curious about the Roman Catholic Church, but yet I couldn’t quite be one,” Ingells said. “The Episcopal Church was a good bridge. With its freedom of thought I didn’t have to conform much at all and that appealed to my rebellious nature.”

Ingells was confirmed at St. Paul’s in 1968 by Bishop Richard Emrich. “I remembered him from when I was a little girl. He used to have a radio program on WWJ,” she said. “I knew his name as long as I could remember, and I felt like this celebrity was confirming me.”

During the 1970s and 1980s, Ingells was active in the diocese as well as her parish, with stints on Executive Council and its Human Resources and Development Committee, the Parish Education Task Force, and the Camp and Conference Board.

She became a postulant for Holy Orders in 1984, “but the way didn’t seem to open to go to seminary at that point, with a child in college, and I didn’t want to leave my husband behind,” she said.

Instead, in 1985 while program director at the Michigan Ecumenical Forum, Ingells felt drawn to seek training in spiritual direction. She attended Shalem Institute in Washington, DC.

“The training confirmed, more than trained, the call to spiritual direction,” Ingells reflected. In the years that followed, she discovered she was more suited to spiritual direction and teaching than the priesthood.

“Though I agonized over it for many years—I even tried to go back and start over at one point—but life’s give and take didn’t make that possible,” she said. “I finally came to peace with that and am grateful, actually. I think I did the right thing, for me.”

Ingells served as hospital chaplain at Ingham Regional Medical Center, in which she found great joy. But after 15 years, “I felt a strong sense that God wanted me to leave the hospital and be on my own, to offer spiritual direction and lead retreats,” she said.

Ingells began a private practice in spiritual direction and regularly leads retreats and workshops on spirituality, prayer and meditation in Michigan and in other parts of the country, including Ghost Ranch in New Mexico where she’s served as spiritual director in residence.

“I believe listening carefully is one of the greatest gifts one person can give to another, to oneself and to God. People seem to feel safe in confiding to me,” said Ingells. “I have strong empathy and a desire to help others heal, grow, live fully and come to know God and themselves at a deep level.”

[Visit Carol Ingells’ blog, Prayer, Play and Politics HERE.]