sanctuaryoversystems

Hello! My name is Marissa.

I’m a pastor, therapist-in-training, and someone who is deeply passionate about the intersection of faith and mental health.

For years I’ve served in ministry, all while walking through my own and others questions, pain, healing, and realities of life. Especially the realities that don’t always “fit” into the systems that have been built. The structures and patterns that surround us play a far greater role into our mental health and spirituality than I believe we acknowledge. There are countless obstacles that stand in front us, yet there is a place we can retreat, a place of refuge, a place of safety and restoration. I’ve become more aware of the tension that often exists between faith, mental health, and the systems within both.

Sanctuary Over Systems was born from that tension.

This is a space for honest conversations about faith, mental health, ministry, healing, and hope. A space for those who love God but may have felt unseen, misunderstood, or unsupported by the systems around them. A place to wrestle and process, grow and find your olive branch on the other side.

Faith and counseling are not enemies. God meets us in the process, He invented it!

You will not find perfection here. You’ll find my thoughts and my experiences, but you’ll also find safety and truth. I seek to be as vulnerable as I can as I reflect my wins and failures from ministry, lessons from my journey becoming a counselor, conversations about mental health in faith spaces, and honest thoughts on whatever comes to mind.

“When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth.” Genesis 8:11 NIV

Maybe it’s the flood, maybe it’s after. My hope is this: that this space feels like a sanctuary.