Emily Zinsitz on Developing a Personal Vision for Ministry

Emily Zinsitz’s career in the corporate world got off to an impressive start with a job at a business software company soon after graduating from the University of Houston.

The idea of heading off to a seminary in the Northeast for a calling to serve vulnerable communities would have seemed unlikely to the native Texan and budding content strategist.

But this May, a decade later, Zinsitz graduated from Princeton Theological Seminary, marking a milestone in a remarkable life journey.

“I was looking to reframe my life,” said Zinsitz, who received the Master of Divinity and Master of Arts in Christian Education and Formation dual degree. “Seminary provided the place where I found people with similar commitments and values and who aspired to higher calling even if it didn’t lead immediately to profit.”

Zinsitz, who identifies as nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, had long felt drawn to a spiritual calling. But having been raised in the Churches of Christ tradition that does not ordain women, there was no clear path.

Still, even while working at the software company in Houston, Zinsitz practiced Zen, studied yoga, and joined a small, struggling Christian community populated by many homeless and mentally ill people in the neighborhood.

Zinsitz found the day job unfulfilling but agonized over leaving it.

Then a weeklong silent retreat at a Jesuit center in Grand Coteau, La., provided a new, fervent focus.

“After that, I knew God was real and I knew that God loves me,” they said. “It felt like now there was a space to jump off and follow my own spiritual longing in a way that I previously did not have the faith or the trust to do.”

Zinsitz eventually found the Johnson Service Corps, which sets up yearlong programs for young adults to live communally and do social justice work. Zinsitz signed up, moved into a house with five others in Durham, N.C., and began working for the Center for Responsible Lending.

The experience felt deeply satisfying and served as a signpost for what to do next.

"I got to know a lot of people who had these eclectic careers driven by passion for meeting the needs of those around them," Zinsitz said. "I thought, ‘That’s where I belong.'"

That realization led to Princeton Seminary, where Zinsitz soon found space both inside and outside the classroom to develop a personal vision for ministry. A key mentor was Bo Karen Lee, an Associate Professor of Spiritual Theology and Christian Formation who specializes in contemplative theologies. Zinsitz enrolled in many of Lee’s courses, diving into topics such as Christian pilgrimage, the Ignatian tradition, and contemplative listening.

“This was the core spirituality that I started and ended with, and the engine of everything else I have done,” Zinsitz said of contemplative theology.

But the “everything else” also covered a lot of ground. Over the course of four years of study, Zinsitz forged close ties with the seminary’s LGBTQ community, serving on the board of the Gender and Sexuality Association for Seminarians; led the Women*s Center; and helped revitalize the campus deacon program to make deacons more present in students’ lives.

Zinsitz’s fieldwork assignment, meanwhile, seemed like an answered prayer: An internship at the Westminster Presbyterian Church of Trenton. The venerable congregation supports LGBTQ communities, takes on issues like mass incarceration, and develops innovative programs, such as microloans for former inmates who run small businesses.

“I felt like God was calling me to this church,” Zinsitz said.

The rich and varied experiences at seminary leave Zinsitz well prepared for whatever comes next, which could include starting a nonprofit.

“I came to seminary very interested in community life, building relationships, and creating systems of care,” Zinsitz said. “The wonderful thing about seminary was that it gave me a chance to practice ministry with the people I felt called to care for.”