Position: Chair

Jim brings 40 years of non-profit leadership in the international development sector, including World Vision and Children Believe, to the Emmaus Board of Directors. Jim is a resident of Mississauga, and attends Clarkson Community Church with his wife, Dorothy.

Linda is a graduate of Emmaus Formation Centre’s Spiritual Direction program. She has over thirty years of leadership experience in corporate and Church ministry settings. She practices Spiritual Direction from her home in Ajax, Ontario and currently serves on the Intercession team at her Church. Married to Tim for almost fifty years, Linda enjoys spending time with family. She has two children and six grandchildren.

Michelle Shockness, MSW, PhD is a non-profit organizational specialist and consultant with NP Org Worx Inc in Toronto, Canada. She brings over 30 years of experience to her role with Emmaus, including previous roles as a social worker, therapist, and program director, and more recently, as an assistant professor, sessional instructor, and lecturer in the human/social sciences and leadership studies. She continues to volunteer and to remain involved with academic committees and research initiatives.

Michelle’s interest in participating on the Emmaus board stems from her own contemplative journey in stumbling into a whole other way of being present with God.

She continues to learn what this means daily and seasonally, and from many wise and surprising sources.

Michelle counts it a privilege to join such a special gathering of people at Emmaus and looks forward to the journey ahead, and to all the learning and community this will entail.

Carol VanRavenstein’s passion is listening prayer and the healing and change that Jesus brings when we hear Him speak. She attends Clearview Christian Reformed Church in Oakville, where she has been an elder for the past 5 years and part of a prayer team for much longer than that. She has been using her spiritual direction training, both in ministry and individually, at the church. Carol recently acquired her own bookkeeping business and is looking forward to seeing how God will use her spiritual direction training in this. She has been married to her husband John for 33 years and they have one married daughter and two grandchildren.