About

Janay Garrick writes from her grandmother’s pink secretary desk in Northern California. Awarded support from the Community of Writers in nonfiction/memoir and the Collegeville Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research, her work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Newsweek, Narrative, TriQuarterly, Fourth Genre, Eclectica, and The Fourth River among others. Janay holds an M. A. in Cross-Cultural Studies with a research emphasis in Children at Risk from Fuller Theological Seminary and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Seattle Pacific University.

Influenced by the poetry of witness and resistance writing, Janay desires her art to speak back to the centers of power. She finds herself returning to stories centered around religion, gender, and power. Writing at the intersection of Heaven and Earth, her work moves among sacred texts, theology and poetry, and the dusty human stories of Earth. Janay’s story and advocacy work have been featured in the New York Times, NPR, Mother Jones, and the Chicago Reader.

In Janay’s ongoing gender discrimination lawsuit against her former employer, she is represented by Americans United for the Separation of Church and State and supported by the ACLU, ACLU Illinois, and the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission — together they are fighting for the rights of women and minoritized voices working in religious settings. There are 1.7 million of us.

Currently, Janay is writing her first book, a memoir.