Reviews
Jill Shook
Urban Catalyst, Pasadena, California
Jill grew up in Yorba Linda, California. Jill Shook has a unique background as a trained California Credentialed teacher, with a BS from California Polytechnic University in San Luis Obispo, a graduate Certificate from Multnomah School of the Bible, a Master’s in Biblical Studies from Denver Seminary and a doctorate in Transformational Leadership from the Bakke Graduate School in Seattle, Washington. Jill presently resides in Pasadena, California. She was recently married to Anthony Manousos.
Beginning in 1978, Jill joined Missions Door as a Campus Ambassador serving in San Jose and Fullerton, CA, and at a private law school in Salem, OR. From 1986 - 1989 Jill lived in Mexico and Arizona, working with Food for the Hungry International to found and develop a program for church and university work teams from Harvard to Berkeley to serve in Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Kenya. Projects included a solar water system for a village, medical work teams, building a handcraft cooperative from an old mining ruin, and other educational and economic development projects. Jill has also developed workshops on Teaching Like Jesus for teachers and pastors, which she taught in Bolivia and Mexico. In 1996 Jill founded STARS—Students and Tutors Achieving Real Success, a ministry of Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena, where hundreds of volunteers have mentored and tutored low-income students. Having entered the homes of these students, Jill recognized the connection between the long-term success of children and the high cost of housing. The lack of decent affordable housing in good neighborhoods often results in multiple families squeezed into tiny apartments concentrated in one part of town, which often breeds gangs, homelessness, crime and soaring dropout rates. Jill became passionate about finding solutions to this complex issue. This led to writing a book, Making Housing Happen: Faith-Based Affordable Housing Models released August 1, 2006 and reprinted Dec. 2006. This book provides a glimpse into creative ways that churches across the U.S. are addressing this crisis and providing award-winning affordable housing. The book is being used on numerous universities as a text, including University of Georgia, Eastern College, Azusa Pacific University (APU), Fuller Seminary and Bakke Graduate University (BGU).
Jill has been an adjunct faculty member at APU and BGU. As a missionary with Missions Door working area churches seeking ways to retain Pasadena’s racial and economic mix, to house Pasadena’s 1,000 homeless and to address urban violence with city and countywide initiatives like the Parent Project and Family Promise. She participates in Pasadena’s Housing and Homeless Network and the San Gabriel Valley’s Homeless Consortium. Jill’s broad experiences with citywide transformation and with churches across the US as well as her work with small rural villages in Latin America give her a unique voice of hope in our country today.
Jill’s husband Anthony Manousos, a retired Quaker magazine editor and college professor with an Ph.D. in English literature, has edited and authored many books relating to peace, environmentalism, and compassionate listening. Together they have revised Making Housing Happen: Faith Based Affordable Homes which was re-released in September 2012 with Wipf and Stock publishers.
Jill is available for speaking engagements and workshops on the many ways that churches are across the US to address the housing crisis and how your church and community can begin to discern do ways to address affordable housing.
Missions Door, 2530 Washington St., Denver, CO 80205 www.missionsdoor.org
(626) 797-4072 or (626) 675-1316
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