CHI Staff & Board

Rev. Robert Drake, MSci, MDiv, is an interfaith hospice and palliative care chaplain at Pathways Hospice, an educator for Compassion and Choices, teaching California’s End of Life Option Act, and he operates OceanSoulRenewal.us for healing from grief, loss and change. He is a graduate and Governing Board member at CHI and former adjunct faculty of the Graduate Theological Union. Bob has a Master’s Degree in Conflict Resolution and a Master of Divinity from the San Francisco Theological Seminary.

Rev. Lauren Van Ham, M.A., was ordained with the very first cohort of CHI ordinands in 1999, and completed the Interfaith Spiritual Direction Certificate Course in 2006. Before joining the CHI staff in 2010, Lauren served for eight years, as a staff chaplain at St. Mary’s Medical Center in San Francisco. From there, she moved to a corporate environment, where she custom-designed employee programs for multi-national companies committed to sustainability and culture change. As part of her evolving call and commitment to “eco-chaplaincy”, Lauren served as Executive Director for Green Sangha (a non-profit dedicated to spiritually-engaged environmental activism) from 2004-2006; and in 2008, founded Fair Trade Berkeley, a grassroots committee, whose dedication helped make Berkeley,CA the 19th Fair Trade Town in the U.S. She is featured in Renewal, an award-winning documentary, celebrating the efforts of religious environmental activists in groups from diverse faith traditions across America; and authored the chapter, “Way of the Eco-Chaplain,” in a book of collected works, Ways of the Spirit: Voices of Women. Lauren loves to bicycle and, in May, 2015 she rode across her home state of Nebraska to raise 11K on behalf of climate change awareness efforts happening there. Lauren holds BFA and MA degrees from Carnegie Mellon University (1994), and Naropa University (1999).

Read Lauren’s Articles

Jessica is an experienced and certified chaplain, pastoral caregiver, communicator, and leader who has more than 15 years of experience providing dignity, exceptional care, and service to individuals, groups and communities.

Jessica comes to us with a Bachelor of Arts in Theology from Pacific Union College and a Master of Divinity from the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary. She was ordained to ministry by the Seventh-day Adventist church.

Jessica’s experience encompasses Clinical Pastoral Education, POST certified police chaplaincy, traditional pastoral ministry at the local church, various international missions, small groups, and classroom education. Jessica loves the outdoors, music, food, and conversation… and food.

Katrina started her worklife in Expressive Therapies, with a focus on movement forms. As a psychotherapist, she used expressive arts for healing childhood trauma and abuse. Over time, her spiritual focus became primary, so she was ordained at The Chaplaincy Institute in March 2012, and later certified as a Spiritual Director. Raised as a Baha’i, and later diving into shamanism, she particularly loves working with people who are “non-affiliated,” spiritual-but-not-religious, agnostic or atheist. At The Chaplaincy Institute, she is joyfully overseeing the Arts for Awakening curriculum, and envisioning new forms for transformational creativity.

Marcus is an experienced communication and storytelling professional having received education and training from award winning public speaking programs at Los Angeles Valley College, California State University, Long Beach, and Illinois State University.

Marcus joins us after 11 years of applying his ever-growing knowledge about communications and storytelling to help various schools, universities, businesses, and individual professionals achieve success in their communication endeavors.

Having been raised by a friend’s warm-welcoming family, Marcus learned the importance of inclusion, humility, and charity early on. It was this foundation that helped him to excel in communications giving rise to a need to bridge learning and understanding of differences with those he worked with throughout the years. He understands without great communication an interfaith community cannot exist. He is excited to be with us and contribute to the ongoing conversation about transforming the world for the better.

Elly began her career in accounting in the finance department of a startup in the late 1990’s. She took a detour to become a journalist, a career path that allowed her to live all over the country. After 10 years as a photo editor with various major newspapers, Elly returned to accounting and brought her organizational skills and eye for detail to her own bookkeeping business. At CHI , she manages all things finance-related.

Rev. Lynda Elaine Carré is The Chaplaincy Institute’s President, Board of Directors. Informed by her professional experience as Director, Communications and Marketing for two innovative national healthcare organizations, and as Creative Director, in a creative services business specializing in healthcare, education, and spirituality for over twenty years, she brings artistic communications creativity and business acumen to benefit our CHI Seminary & Community and the work we do together in the world.

Ordained by CHI in 2015, Rev. Lynda Elaine Carré, completed her Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE year residency) as Interfaith Palliative Care Chaplain at UCLA Hospital and earned certification as a Death Midwife & Home Funeral Guide through Sacred Crossings in Los Angeles, CA, before moving to Upstate New York and establishing her private practice, Wellspring Passages. Among other services, she provides personal and community education about Dying & Death, Palliative & Hospice Spiritual Care and Healing Arts, Home Funeral & Green Burial Guidance, and Life Rituals. Topics include “Perspectives on End-of-Life: “Spiritual, Emotional, and Existential Issues” at Bard College; Healing Circles for caregivers; “Wisdom Arts for Dying” experiential retreats for chaplains, social workers, medical professionals, death doulas, hospice personnel, and family caregivers. Please see Wellspring Passages for much more.

Rev. Jennifer Bernstein was ordained an Interfaith Minister by The CHI Community in 2014, and received her certificate from CHI as a Spiritual Director in 2017.

Jennifer has been the Campus Volunteer & Guest Relations Manager at Guide Dogs for the Blind for over 16 years. She is currently creating the field of Veterinary Chaplaincy, offering pastoral care to people who are dealing with end-of-life issues for their companion or service animals. Jennifer also volunteers at Halleck Creek Riding Club, a facility that offers equine therapy to people on the autism spectrum and with other cognitive differences.

Jennifer lives in Petaluma with her daughter and their animals.

Don uses a mix of business development skills, strategic management, and daily practices to assist people and organizations to bring more simplicity into their lives. The result is a reduction of the daily struggles that block profitability, effectiveness, and enjoyment.

Don has served as an Executive Director in 3 social service nonprofit organizations, one of which tripled in size over 5 years employing over 400 people, and serving thousands of families in 6 San Francisco Bay Area counties.

Don’s commitment is to build the daily practices, capacity, and resiliency of people and organizations to more naturally thrive through times of growth and change. His unusual mix of senior management experience, spiritual leadership roles, and personal mindfulness practices of over 20 years, gives him special skills to partner with leaders to evolve their organizations into greater effectiveness and profitability.

He has served as an ordained minister in both Unity and the Centers for Spiritual Living. He is a certified counselor and coach with extensive experience speaking, teaching, and facilitating retreats. He has served in interim senior director roles creating effective transitions for several organizations.

Don presently works with Simplicity Partners, A consultancy applying the principles of simplicity to bring increased effectiveness, profitability, and ease into the workplace and personal life.

The Reverend Ineda P. Adesanya, M.A., M.Div., DASD is an ordained American Baptist minister and spiritual director. Her divine call is to make the world better by using her spiritual gifts to help others live more abundantly and to experience truth, joy and justice by surrendering all to the Spirit. Rev. Adesanya’s theology of ministry seeks to assist Christians to lift themselves up through knowledge, encouragement, and spiritual guidance. With an inner conviction that spirituality and justice go hand-in-hand, the goal of her ministry is to communicate the ideals of the faith, enabling Christians to mature and become confident disciples, spiritually healthy, able and willing to follow Christ in providing and advocating for those who are oppressed and marginalized.

Rev. Adesanya received both her Master of Divinity with concentration in Christian Spirituality, and her Diploma in the Art of Spiritual Direction from the San Francisco Theological Seminary in San Anselmo, California. She earned a Master of Arts in Religion and Psychology from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California where she is currently earning a PhD in Historical and Cultural Studies of Religion. Rev. Adesanya holds a BA in Architecture from the University of California at Berkeley and worked as a land-use planner, facilities professional, and construction industry executive for twenty-five years. She serves as a pastoral counselor for the Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary.As Minister of Spiritual Life for the Allen Temple Baptist Church in Oakland, California, Rev. Adesanya provides individual and small group spiritual direction, leads contemplative retreats, teaches seminars and short courses on various aspects of Christian spirituality, hosts and facilitates the quarterly Spirituality and Hermeneutics Forum, and authors a weekly column/blog entitled “Spiritual Life Note” for the congregation and community. She is a contributing author Embodied Spirits: Stories of Spiritual Directors of Color and Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Stories of Contemplation and Justice both by Morehouse Publishing.Rev. Adesanya is founder and proprietor of WJoy – A Spiritual Care Ministry providing spiritual direction and care for faith-based institutions, clergy and lay members of the community at-large.