In the spirit of renewal, we celebrate the transition of co-directors Stacy, Mark, and Kathie as they conclude their service to Holden Village. To honor this important moment in Holden history, Villagers gathered to celebrate with a weekend of music, dancing, and a blanket ceremony by Vance Blackfox. It was a joyful weekend of celebrating SMK’s leadership and love for the Village!

To reflect on their time as directors of Holden Village, Stacy, Mark, and Kathie each sat down with Creative Tech Ellen Callender to record a special podcast episode. They shared their journey to Holden, favorite stories, hopes for the future, and more. 

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

In the spirit of renewal, we celebrate the transition of co-directors Stacy, Mark, and Kathie as they conclude their service to Holden Village. To honor this important moment in Holden history, Villagers gathered to celebrate with a weekend of music, dancing, and a blanket ceremony by Vance Blackfox. It was a joyful weekend of celebrating SMK’s leadership and love for the Village!

To reflect on their time as directors of Holden Village, Stacy, Mark, and Kathie each sat down with Creative Tech Ellen Callender to record a special podcast episode. They shared their journey to Holden, favorite stories, hopes for the future, and more. 

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

In the spirit of renewal, we celebrate the transition of co-directors Stacy, Mark, and Kathie as they conclude their service to Holden Village. To honor this important moment in Holden history, Villagers gathered to celebrate with a weekend of music, dancing, and a blanket ceremony by Vance Blackfox. It was a joyful weekend of celebrating SMK’s leadership and love for the Village!

To reflect on their time as directors of Holden Village, Stacy, Mark, and Kathie each sat down with Creative Tech Ellen Callender to record a special podcast episode. They shared their journey to Holden, favorite stories, hopes for the future, and more. 

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

The summer theme for 2025 is Life Anew, recognizing all the ways fire is part of a healthy ecosystem and prepares for the future forest. June 29 was the tenth anniversary of the lightning strike that started the 2015 Wolverine Fire six miles east of the Village. Over the next eight weeks the fire would consume 65,323 acres in the Entiat, Lake Chelan and Railroad Creek watersheds. By the end of July 2015, the Village itself was under threat, and the Forest Service ordered an evacuation. 

Roughly 300 people fled the Village during the Wolverine fire. Thanks to determined hotshot crews and Holden's own preventative measures, the Village was spared. 

We sat down with former Holden Village directors Chuck Hoffman and Peg Carlson-Hoffman, Incident Commanders Nancy and Marc Rerucha Borges, and current Holden Village Fire Marshal Jeff Pierce to hear their memories of the 2015 Wolverine Fire.

Experience the story from the people who lived through it in part one of this three-part series.

Holden Village debuts a new vespers this summer. “Isaiah: Is This the Fast We Choose?” is a liturgy composed by John Hermanson and edited and arranged by Maren Haynes Marchesini. The music draws from the Book of Isaiah, a collection of prophetic texts in the Jewish canon. The book is referenced frequently in the teaching of Jesus and reveals that justice, liberation, care for immigrants, release of prisoners, redistribution of wealth and critiques of power are at the heart of our theology. 

During this episode of the Holden Village Podcast, we’re joined by the three musicians who recognized Isaiah’s unambiguous call to justice and brought the text to life. 

John Hermanson is an award-winning songwriter and composer of the acclaimed acoustic duo Storyhill, as well as projects spanning orchestral, world, pop, rock, and indie genres. Raised in the Lutheran church and rooted in prophetic and mystical traditions, his songs raise ancient yet urgent questions about radical love and mutual responsibility.

Maren Haynes Marchesini serves as Director of Worship & Music at Hope Lutheran Church in Bozeman, Montana. Maren is a choral director, cellist, vocalist, composer, and scholar with broad-ranging musical interests. She holds a PhD in Ethnomusicology from the University of Washington where she focused on megachurches, gender, and ritual.

And Megan Makeever lives a multi-pronged life as a professional flutist, multi-instrumentalist, award-winning singer/songwriter, recording artist, and music educator/collaborator. As a performer, Megan plays with various bands, groups, and ensembles in Bozeman, Montana such as the Bozeman Symphony, Montana Ballet Orchestra, Bozeman Chamber Music Project, and the Ellen Theatre Orchestra.

Isaiah was conceived in residencies and commissions in a variety of contexts including Holden Village. It’s available through the Holden store. You can also order your copies here.

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

This episode of the Holden Village Podcast features Kendra Mylnechuk Potter (Lummi); a theatre and film artist, birth+death doula, yoga educator, partner, and mother.

Most of her work centers on the mother/child relationship and embodied storytelling, with an awareness that this precious human form is a sacred gift we get to keep learning through again and again. Since 2021, Kendra has delivered keynotes and Q&As at festivals and conferences around the world with “Daughter of a Lost Bird”, a documentary she co-produced and in which she is the protagonist, about being adopted out and reuniting with her birth mother and Lummi community. Through her company Sister Moon Wellness, she shares yoga and doula support, and runs a yoga teacher training and birth doula training. She lives with her husband and 2 children on Bitteroot Salish land in Missoula, MT.

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

To kick off this season of the Holden Village Podcast, Ellen is joined by Meisha Wangerin and June Thomassen, co-facilitators of a condensed version of the transformative Basic AVP workshop, designed to provide practical tools for conflict resolution, personal growth, and building peaceful communities. The Alternative to Violence Project (AVP) is rooted in experiential learning, offering participants a chance to explore nonviolent communication, self-awareness, and strategies for resolving tension in constructive ways.

Meisha Wangerin (she/her/Queen) is a passionate and driven leader with over 15 years of experience in non-profit and higher education administration. Meisha’s core skills—storytelling, empathy, and relationship-building—are central to her approach in fostering inclusive and transformative environments. She is a Senior Facilitator for Projects for A Civil Society, where she leads Alternatives to Violence (AVP) workshops in local high schools, jails, and maximum-security prisons, focusing on trauma recovery, building self-esteem, improving interpersonal relationships, community building and resolving conflicts verbally.

Eleven years ago in Fairbanks, AK, June Thomasson co-led a revival of the Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP) in her Quaker meeting, as an outgrowth of the Quaker understanding that there is “That of God” in everyone. After retiring from 30 years of work as a Physician Assistant in Alaska, she returned to Western Washington, where she has been facilitating AVP ever since. June is now the coordinator for AVP in the Monroe state prison complex. She is also on the committee leading the Western WA AVP group, Projects for a Civil Society. 

To learn more about AVP, visit https://avpusa.org/

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. 

For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

In the midst of the energy and heat of Abriendo Caminos, two of our teaching faculty, Emilie and Armando, their friend Flor de Marquez, and Kathie Caemmerer-Bach, one of Holden’s Co-Directors join in conversation discussing the Church, Holden and Emilie and Armando’s organization SICSAL. In this episode, Emilie also acts as a Spanish translator for Armando.  

Emilie Teresa Smith is an Argentine-born, Canadian-raised, Anglican priest, community activist and writer. She has lived in relationship with peoples of Abya Yala (Latin America) for almost 40 years. As co-president of the Oscar Romero network (SICSAL) she has spent time and supported communities in every region of the south and central continent, and in the Caribbean. Her heart commitment is to the full liberation of all people — and the joy to be found therein!

Armando Marquez Ochoa has been a practitioner of popular education since the birth of the church of the poor in El Salvador in the 1970s. As a young man he accompanied Oscar Romero, and since Romero’s death, Armando has dedicated his life to compiling and sharing the teaching of the now-saint. Armando is the director of the Brother Mercedes Ruiz Foundation, a support network for El Salvador’s Christian Base Communities (CEBs) and co-secretary of the Oscar Romero Network (SICSAL). 

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

Many things about Holden have changed since the mining days, but one thing remains the same, even in the heat of summer, the pool hall remains cool--an excellent place to escape the midday heat.  Nestled in a back room away from the joyous sounds of children bowling and playing ping pong, Elli, a long-term staff member and Elisabeth Cherland, a guest musician from summer 2024 teaching faculty discuss cyclic music, and the humanness of singing and how good it is for our bodies. 

Elisabeth Cherland is a fourth-generation choral conductor as well as professor, singer, song leader, violinist, and Lutheran church musician. As Director of Choral Activities at Minnesota State University, Mankato, she teaches courses in choral methods, conducting, private voice, and conducts the Concert Choir and Chamber Singers. Prior to her appointment at MSU she was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Music at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minnesota. Dr. Cherland earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Choral Conducting at the University of Washington, a Master of Music Education with Certification degree from VanderCook College of Music, and a Bachelor of Arts in Music and English from Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota. From classical to folk to hymnody, Elisabeth is most at home singing and playing collaboratively. She lives with her partner Kent and their two sons, Elijah and Leif, in St. Peter, MN. She loves storytelling and story-hearing, doughnuts, bubble tea, laughing, knitting, running (when the temperature is perfect and the course is flat), and sunshine when it’s available.

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].

This episode is a conversation between Holden Villages Naturalist Nic Caddell and a member of our summer 2024 teaching faculty Pamela Adams, a self-appointed freelance beaver detective. Nic and Pamela discuss the importance of beavers and other keystone species and the art of noticing. At the time of this recording, cottonwood fluff floats in the air and villagers take refuge from the summer heat in our beloved Railroad Creek. We hope you enjoy this snapshot of Holden's summer community.
 
Pamela Adams is an advocate for beavers rights and riparian and wetland habitat health. As a 2020 graduate of the Beaver Institute’s BeaverCorps national program, she works with non-profits, municipalities, and landowners to develop coexistence strategies such as installing devices that allow humans and beavers to live more harmoniously. Pamela’s own organization, BeaverInsights, utilizes non-invasive videography to gather information about beaver families for educational research. Locations under study include the nearshore of The Elwha River, Olympic Peninsula, Bend, and Corvallis, OR, Seattle, WA, and West Brattleboro, VT. Most currently, Pamela is focused on her two year-long research of the four beaver families living in Longfellow Creek-a 3 mile urban watershed with documented high levels of stormwater pollutants yet full of beavers and wild salmon species currently coexisting for the first time in recent memory.

To learn more about Holden Village, visit: http://www.holdenvillage.org or to listen to more audio recordings visit: http://audio.holdenvillage.org. The Holden Village Podcast is accessible through Apple iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, iHeart Radio, and most podcast apps. For questions and inquiries, contact [email protected].