The Journey So Far | 8 Years of Eden Invitation Timeline

“Anna and I were going to watch season 6 of Parks & Rec (I needed to catch up!)” Shannon remembers. “Before we put on the show, we just started chatting about life. We had been friends for a while, and she seemed really excited about an idea. She started sharing the background of it– her own experience of same-sex desires. I immediately stopped her, shocked to find another peer who was both a faithful disciple AND open about her experience of same-sex desires, exclaiming "me too"! We ended up sharing our stories and talking about needs in the Church for over 3 hours! I knew God was doing something different; I wrote the date down, December 21st, 2016 --"LIFE IS FOREVER CHANGED" and it was!"

"I was in the process of discerning speaking and writing around sexuality and the whole person,” Anna remembers. “I'd spoken to Shannon's college campus ministry students, and I wanted her opinion on the idea. Once I started sharing the topic though...her jaw dropped. I could have sworn I'd told her about my experience of same-sex desires. Whoops! I guess not. So that cracked open a whole new type of conversation, and I guess now the rest is history."

FUN FACT | We hold Saint Peter Canisius as one of our patron saints in part because this first conversation happened on his feast day! St. Peter Canisius (1521-1597) was a Jesuit Priest during the Counter-Reformation. He traveled throughout Europe, sharing the love of Christ and the truths of the Church through his writing and preaching. He is a Doctor of the Church and is also known as "the second apostle to Germany" for his ministry. His method of ministry? Finding common ground with Protestants and starting the conversation there. We ask for his intercession as we step into conversations about LGBTQ+ experiences and faith in a similar way.

You can hear more about it from Pete himself in the video below!

Now the post lives on our own blog– you can read it here!

FUN FACT | Because the blog was launched on her feast day (and she’s a personal favorite of Anna’s),  Saint Catherine of Siena is another patron saint of Eden Invitation! Catherine of Siena (1347-1380) was a mediator and mystic who traveled throughout France and Italy to meet with both secular and church leaders to settle disputes. She was later one of the first women to be named a Doctor of the Church. She is a patron for our mission because of her example of strength in Christ and her desire for peace through mediation.

While the blog itself was posted through NET Ministries, we also launched a very simple landing page, inviting others with LGBTQ+ experiences to reach out. Anna and Shannon immediately started receiving emails, and people were hungry to connect even more. “We didn’t have anything formal yet– we would just give out our personal numbers to receive these people’s stories,” Anna remembers. These first actions, to extend an invitation and to receive the whole person, are still present in our mission today. These encounters, which were once done by just two working women in their free time, are now offered by our trained Story Call volunteers. You can meet some of these community volunteers in this Good Fruit interview!

Many people without an LGBTQ+ experience who wanted to accompany others began to reach out as well. For example, Amy Roza reached out within the first week of the blog launch and is still walking with us on our Retreat Team today! 

Filmed our first video– Anna’s Story– that summer. Anna and Shannon covered some of the costs out of their own pockets, but thankfully, our first donors covered the rest and made this beautifully done invitation video possible! You can still watch it and more testimony videos on our Stories Page.

We launched our social media pages (Facebook and Instagram), and the blog got attention from many news sites and podcasts. You can find more of our interviews from over the years on our media page.

The demand to connect with us became so great that Shannon chose to leave her ministry job to work for Eden Invitation. At first, she also drove for Uber to make ends meet during this transition period. Thankfully, many of her support team continued to walk with her and began donating to Eden Invitation. We’re so thankful for these and all of those early supporters who began monthly donations to sustain this mission! 

The first conference Anna and Shannon attended to start networking with other leaders and offer our resources to young adults was FOCUS’ SEEK conference. We still go to SEEK and other conferences when we can! Shannon reflected on that first conference and the most recent one in this Good Fruit story: “Go Forward Bravely”

A growing number of people desired to go beyond the Story Call and dive deeper into understanding the intersection of faith and their experiences of sexuality, and so Book Clubs began! The first Book Club, led by Anna and Shannon, had just 7 participants and read Can You Drink the Cup? by Henri Nouwen. The group stayed in contact over email and met on Zoom.

“True sanctity is precisely drinking our own cup and trusting that by thus fully claiming our own, irreplaceable journey, we can become a source of hope for many.”

| Henri Nouwen

In June of 2018, we hosted “Patio Chats,” which were more “drop-in” style calls. We hosted calls for those with LGBTQ+ experiences and for those working in ministry looking for accompaniment resources. Elements of these chats informed what we now offer through Porch Events– events are hosted by our Hearth Groups as a way to get to know one’s proximate Eden Invitation community in a more casual and social setting.

More people connected with Eden Invitation and wanted to join the Book Club. The first community volunteers were trained– Book Club Guides– to accommodate more groups. Want to learn more about this team of volunteers? Some of them shared more in our Good Fruit Newsletter in 2023.

After the Book Club season ended, people would stay connected via a larger email chain. This quickly became inadequate for our growing community. Shannon had used Slack at a previous job, so we chose it for the first iteration of our Online Community. Community Members could join after they’d completed a Story Call and a Book Club. Our Online Community started with just 16 members, but by 2019, we had over 90 members.

We’ve since had many more share their stories, both as blog posts and in art! Check out more on our Stories Page, Community Gallery, and YouTube

We had 28 participants and 6 Retreat Pastoral Team members. Many of these people are still deeply involved in our community today– like Peter and Angie, who first met on this retreat, and David Neira, who is now our Community Coordinator!

We’ve continued to have Retreats open to both community members and new people with LGBTQ+ experiences, and they have become a key moment for our mission and community every year. You can see more on our Retreat page!

Encountering God in the context of nature has been a particularly fruitful experience for many Eden Invitation members. The “WONDER” backpacking trip was the first Encounter we had, with 10 participants, Anna and Shannon, a Chaplain, and 2 Wilderness guides in the beautiful Wyoming Mountains. Our second Encounter was canceled due to the 2020 pandemic, but we have never lost our desire to bring people away from the screen to encounter God in His creation and walk side-by-side in person.

While standing in a Wyoming parking lot on the way to the WONDER Encounter, Anna called to give her two weeks' notice to her contract writing job. Both co-founders were working full-time for Eden Invitation barely 2 years after founding the ministry.

During the COVID lockdowns, many had the opportunity to dive deep and reassess their lives. Many people reached out for Story Calls and joined Book Clubs. Our community members also used our online platform to show up for each other, organizing fun digital hangouts, and some members even started a resource pool for those who needed extra support during that time.

We needed to build more regular funds to maintain our operations, especially amidst the rapid expansion of our community and mission. Anna and Shannon printed and folded everything themselves, and trained some community volunteers to help with a phone-a-thon.

The Anniversary Drive remains a vital part of our development efforts, giving us the resources to keep things free or low-cost for any striving disciple with an LGBTQ+ experience who wants to walk with us.

Raquel was one of the first community members to join Eden Invitation. She was working part-time as an intern for EI while finishing her Master's in Theology (Fall 2019 - Spring 2020). Then she served as our Mission Engagement Coordinator, engaging new program participants and bringing new donors into our mission. You may also recognize her from our Porch Series!

Josh's career has taken him to Catholic parishes and dioceses, managing teams and directing faith formation. An alumnus of NET Ministries and Franciscan University, he innately understands accompaniment and evangelization. Josh provided strategic vision, operational acumen, and an eye for our broader church impact as our Director of Operations & Special Projects.

We’re so grateful for the dedication of this early team, supporting our community and mission during a time of expansive growth and scouting out a path for us to continue on this journey in mission!

You can watch our pitch to the judges and the moment we won in the video below!

While our regular programs– Story Calls, Book Clubs, and our Online Community– continued to grow through the rest of 2020, our staff prayed with and built out the materials to make these initiatives a reality in the coming year.

This was a key step forward for our Hearth Initiative. Hearth Groups are a gathering of committed community members who meet monthly to share life– to pray with scripture, build friendships, and encourage each other as we walk with Christ. And we empowered community members to lead these groups!

“Once we met in person [at retreat], it was like night and day; it was amazing...The idea of having something more permanent with people close to us, that was community-led, seems like a natural thing to aim for.”

| Mikayla, one of our first Hearth Group Coordinators (You can read more about her and the launch of Hearth Groups here!)

The Inheritance Blog Series explores the ways we receive our human experiences, particularly those of us with LGBTQ+ experiences. We have to take stock of these to understand how the Lord is calling us to steward them on this Journey to Heaven.

The blogs were paired with “drop-in” style discussions for those with LGBTQ+ experiences in our community and those looking to learn more. 

All of these materials were made in the hope of inviting striving disciples with same sex desires, gender discordance, or any other LGBTQ+ experience to receive God’s love during a particularly tense time between secular culture and the Church.

"Our inheritance from God is simpler than it may appear. Thanks to Jesus Christ, our inheritance is wild, gratuitous, undeserved grace. Our inheritance is the promise of the Kingdom of Heaven, a final destination and yet, somehow, revealed in the here and now. And you aren’t disinherited if you’re queer.

Let me say that again. Your sexual orientation cannot separate you from the love of Christ. The degree to which you feel at home in your biological sex cannot separate you from the love of Christ. Whether or not you experience sexual desire at all cannot separate you from the love of Christ. No matter your experiences of desire or gender—or any quality that makes you feel out of place—God has space for you in His Heart.”

| Anna Carter, Inheritance Blog Series

When we launched Hearth Groups, we started with locations and regions where we already had a critical mass of members. Now, as of this writing, we have Local, Multi-Site, and Regional Hearth Groups spanning the United States and several countries:

This is one of the fruits of our Porch Initiative– beautiful, invitational testimony videos from our community members and discussion guides. Find more on our Porch Series webpage. 

These 75 community members committed to 6 weeks of daily prayer and weekly formation on discernment practices. Then, in March 2022, 33 of those community members gathered in person for our Rooted & Free Retreat. On the retreat, they were joined by priests and spiritual mentors to step into deeper prayer and discernment for the growth of Eden Invitation. The goal of the retreat wasn’t to come up with answers for every question, rather, it was to open ourselves to God and receive His will for this mission and community. By the end of the 4-day retreat, the notes from the prayer and discussion were distilled down into a series of questions for even further prayer and discernment– questions like “How can those who share our charisms but don’t live with an LGBTQ+ experience (like priests, family, friends, mentors) participate?” and “How do we form more layers of membership–to make space for those committed to the Church’s teaching as well as for those who are still wrestling with those questions?”

After the retreat, community members nominated those who would continue to pray with the findings of this retreat for the next year or more. You can read more about the work of our Rooted & Free Implementation Committee in this Good Fruit article from 2023.

While our core values– Beloved Unrepeatability, Mutual Belonging, and Joyful Hope– had been shared and referred to in community during retreats, this was our opportunity to share more broadly the values God has inspired us to hold at our center. We still use these blogs as part of our Book Clubs, required reading for those who wish to walk with us in our Hearth Groups. These deeply inform how we move through this mission, and they’re good food for prayer, no matter your experiences of sexuality, gender, or desire! You can read the whole series on our blog here.

Eden Invitation has been largely a digital ministry, but that was never the end goal. “So much of our mission and values are about living our faith in an incarnate way. It almost felt like [staying as a remote team] wasn’t true to our identity as an organization.” Shannon shared. “Part of what stirred us to make this decision [to move to an in-person staff] was realizing how difficult the work of Eden Invitation is and how much more difficult it was to do the work in isolated cells…We felt convicted that, since we are trying to move our community to an incarnate, lived sense of belonging, that should be manifested in our staff too.” And so the EI Home Office moved to Saint Paul, MN, with the official welcome of Archbishop Hebda!

As Josh and Raquel each had their own growing families rooted in other locations, they continued on to other professional opportunities. Anna, Shannon, and our Board discerned that the best way forward was to create 3 new positions that would report in person at the MN office. By June, Andrew Reinkemeyer, David Neira, and Bernadette O’Keefe (all community members) were hired and began fundraising to support their new roles.

They met on our first retreat and invited our whole community to attend. You can read their story in our April 2025 Good Fruit article. 

A Community Weekend is organized by and for Hearth Group members in a given region or location. They are a time for community members to share quality time and pray together, and maybe go on an adventure or two! As of this writing, several of our Hearth Groups have a Community Weekend at least once a year– West Coast (regional), Denver (local), Great Plains (regional), Michigan (multi-site), South Bend (local), Appalantic (regional), and Florida (multi-site).

*This is an estimated number because we often have people share their stories with staff or community members at conferences or other events. Sometimes, these individuals choose not to give further contact information. Our posture is always invitational, so we only ask for more contact information to facilitate next steps when that individual has expressed interest in walking with us.

She has a vital role in keeping our day-to-day operations smooth and freeing up our team to dive deeper into their roles!

One fruit of our 2022 Rooted & Free Retreat was naming the need for a layered community in Eden Invitation– spaces to welcome seekers (Porch) and committed community members (Hearth). Over the summer of 2023, our staff and a team of community volunteers began to build an online platform that could house this unique, layered community. Not only does our new platform allow for several layers of community at different levels of engagement and commitment, but it can also host our Book Club calls, Digital Hearth Groups, Retreat information channels, and so much more. But how does this all work? You can get a unique look into our community through our Virtual “Open House”– our Good Fruit feature from February 2024.

As of this writing (May 2025), we have 243 Hearth members and 76 members in the Porch and Threshold layers.

Priest Companions are priests who are trained to accompany our Hearth Groups, and they are available for spiritual guidance, to administer the Sacraments, and to build community together. It’s not just walking in “mountain top” or “deep dark valley” that people often experience at a retreat,  it’s accompanying others in the day-to-day of discipleship.

“Eden Invitation is a community united by the singular purpose of serving and following Jesus Christ together, a body of people walking the same path, hoping in the promises of Jesus, promises that cannot fail. In short, Eden Invitation is like a little church, sort of like a parish, spread throughout the US and the world. Yet the people in Eden Invitation know each other, love each other, show mercy to each other, and laugh with each other far more than many communities I have encountered. From my perspective, that just says that E.I. is what the local Church ought to be.”

| Fr. Raphael Mary Salzillo, OP, Priest Companion

After a Story Call but before someone participates in an Eden Invitation activity, we offer an info night to give them the lay of the land and what they can expect regarding our Statement of Belief and program practicals. This offers greater comfort, clarity, and a more regular entry point for new community members!

Over 60,000 people had access to our resources and could speak to our staff and community volunteers at our booth.

One of our community members, Joshua, was a Perpetual Pilgrim for the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage! He shared more of his experience and how Eden Invitation empowered him as a pilgrim in this historic moment for the Church in the USA.

Anna Carter gave a breakout session at the Congress: “Broken & Blessed: Sex, Gender, & a Sacramental Worldview.” The pre-registration for the talk reached capacity just weeks after registration opened for the Congress! Missed the session because it was full? You can listen to the whole talk right here!

We’re not here to aimlessly wander through the wilderness– we’re on a pilgrimage to Heaven.

In late September, we lost a dear friend and community member, R*. Even as we mourn R’s death, we have hope that our brother is with Christ, who is the Fulfillment of all Desire and the Goal of this earthly pilgrimage. And we see a deepening of our hope through his witness– that God does have a plan to use every moment to bring us another step closer to Himself.

In his final hours, community members flew in and drove to pray over R*, and many more gathered in online prayer calls for him and his family. Over 30 of our community members and supporters came from across the country for his funeral – that’s more than were on our very first retreat. We are deeply grateful for the gift of his life, both what he carried with us and how he let us carry him. We continue to pray for the repose of his soul and the comfort of his family.

You can read more about the impact he had on the Eden Invitation community here.

*As he didn't directly share his involvement in our community with his wider circles during his life, we are maintaining his confidentiality.

At our Barefoot Royals Retreat, 94 striving disciples with LGBTQ+ experiences and 21 support team members gathered from across the United States and even from as far away as Mexico, England, Australia, and India, to "remove their shoes" before the holy ground of the Lord and each other. This is our largest retreat to date! See Retreat through our eyes in the retreat recap we shared with our Magdalene Givers back in November 2024.

This new layer allows for our Priest Companions, Retreat Pastoral Team members, and spouses of Hearth-level community members to be more connected with our community. We’re so grateful to be on this Journey together!

As the staff prayed with the upcoming year’s theme, we’ve realized that Eden Invitation has a fourth core value– one that comes before the other three (Beloved Unrepeatability, Mutual Belonging, and Joyful Hope) and ties them all together… but more on that in June 😉