About Rita Taylor
There are a lot of ways I could introduce myself.
Preacher. Author. Advocate. Strategist. Grief Doula. Public servant. Teacher. Missionary. Speaker.
All of those things are true. But none of them, by themselves, tell you who I am.
I am someone who believes deeply in people. I believe people deserve to be seen before they are judged, heard before decisions are made about them, and loved without first having to prove they deserve it.
That belief has taken me into some very different rooms.
My story has never followed one straight line.
I've spent more than two decades in corporate leadership. I've taught middle school. I've preached, organized, advocated, written, traveled the world doing ministry, worked in government, and stepped into elected public service.
I've sat at tables with policymakers and beside people experiencing some of the deepest grief of their lives. I've worked with young people finding their voices, women navigating their purpose, educators fighting for their communities, and leaders trying to figure out what comes next.
Those experiences taught me something important. The room may change. The people may change. My purpose doesn't.
I want to help people find their voice, understand their power, navigate what hurts, challenge what is unjust, and imagine what could exist on the other side of what is.
A Faith That Makes Room
I've been in ministry since 1996.
For more than 20 years, I served as a student pastor. My ministry has included youth and women's ministry, preaching, teaching, pastoral care, and missionary work throughout the United States and in other countries.
Nearly three decades of ministry have also shaped how I understand faith.
I don't believe my faith calls me to determine who deserves to belong. My faith requires me to make room.
I believe every person deserves dignity. Every person deserves to be seen. Every person deserves to know they are worthy of love.
Sometimes ministry happens behind a pulpit. Sometimes it happens at a graveside. Sometimes it happens thousands of miles from home. Sometimes it happens sitting beside someone whose life has changed in ways they never expected.
And sometimes ministry begins when someone finally feels safe enough to say:
“I'm not okay.”
And that sentence changed my life.
I Am Not Okay started as a challenge to write a novel in 30 days.
It didn't stay fiction for very long.
What came out instead was truth about grief, relationships, faith, womanhood, strength, loss, survival, and what happens when the person everyone expects to be okay finally admits that she isn't.
The challenge became a book. The book became a ministry. The ministry became a mission.
Today, I serve as a grief doula because I know grief is about so much more than death. We grieve relationships. Dreams. Careers. Friendships. Churches. Communities. Expectations. Identities. Opportunities. The people we used to be. The futures we thought were guaranteed.
Sometimes people don't need someone to fix what happened. They need somewhere they don't have to pretend.
I want to help create that somewhere.
My grief and healing work makes space for people who need permission to feel what they feel, tell the truth about what hurts, and know that healing does not require pretending everything is fine.
Sometimes the most honest thing we can say is, “I am not okay.”
And that is an acceptable place to begin.
Equality Isn't My Finish Line
My advocacy is rooted in equity, diversity, justice, and a fundamental belief that people affected by decisions should have meaningful opportunities to influence them.
Equality says everyone gets the same thing. Equity is willing to ask whether the same thing actually gives everyone what they need.
My work has centered racial and social justice, public education, community organizing, government relations, leadership development, and creating pathways for people whose voices have historically been ignored, marginalized, or excluded.
Coalition building is at the heart of much of that work.
I bring together educators, advocates, faith communities, nonprofits, civic organizations, policymakers, community leaders, and everyday people around issues bigger than any one person or organization. We do not have to agree on everything to recognize the places where our interests, communities, and responsibilities intersect.
I believe some problems are simply too big for silos.
People Come Before Property
That same philosophy follows me into government and elected public service.
As a member of the Evansville City Council, I believe government should be understandable, accessible, responsive, and accountable to the people it serves.
I also believe people come before property.
Communities should grow, but the people already living in them should benefit from that growth. Development should improve people's lives, not simply change skylines. Budgets should reflect human priorities. Residents should understand the decisions being made in their name and have genuine opportunities to participate in making them.
A thriving community is not measured only by what gets built. It is also measured by whether people can afford to live there, whether children have access to quality education, whether neighborhoods are safe and supported, whether people can access opportunity, and whether residents believe their voices count.
For me, equity isn't something we sprinkle over the work after everything else has been decided.
Equity is the work.
So, Who Is Rita Taylor?
I'm still all of those things from the beginning.
Preacher. Author. Advocate. Strategist. Grief Doula. Public servant. Teacher. Missionary. Speaker.
But underneath the titles, I'm a woman who has lived enough life to know that two things can be true at once.
You can have faith and questions. You can be grieving and healing. You can love people and still challenge systems. You can be strong and still need somewhere safe to fall apart. You can appreciate how far we've come and still demand that we go further. And you can discover that the parts of your story you once wanted to hide may become the very things that allow you to reach somebody else.
I don't enter every room with all the answers. I enter believing that people are worth listening to, truth is worth telling, difficult conversations are worth having, and meaningful change is worth working for.
That's a little more of who I am.
Now I'd like to know who you are.
Let's Connect
Whether you found your way here because of a book, a sermon, a workshop, an advocacy space, a grief journey, a community issue, or simply because something I said resonated with you, I'm glad our paths crossed.
If you're looking for someone to speak, preach, facilitate, strategize, officiate, create, or help make room for an important conversation, you can learn more about working with me on the Book Rita page.
If you're here because you're navigating grief or healing, explore Ashes & Glory.