It all started with a conversation between Aquinas College President Alicia R. Córdoba, D.M.A., and Guiding Light Executive Director Brian Elve about how both organizations strive to help people find the best in themselves.
“It’s like the Holy Spirit was guiding everything that we were saying,” Dr. Córdoba recalled.
Soon it became clear that the first female president of the Catholic college — which was founded by women, the Dominican Sisters — had an opportunity to support another first.
Guiding Light was launching a residential recovery program for women, Kendra’s House. But it needed a place where clients could go during the day to day to attend class, meet with life coaches, therapists and spiritual directors.
“We had extra space that we weren’t using. Guiding Light needed something,” Dr. Córdoba said. “It fit our mission to serve and to be part of community. And sure enough, here we are.”
“Here” is a comfortable home that Guiding Light is renting on the tranquil Aquinas campus, a place where women can feel welcome and safe as they work toward long-term sobriety.
The partnership and Guiding Light’s Christian-based work is a natural fit with what the Dominican Sisters envisioned for Aquinas, Dr. Córdoba said.
“We’re just continuing the path,” she said. “I think Guiding Light and Aquinas are really good at finding that space in which people can explore all the sides of themselves, find all those good things, and then do something with them for not only their own betterment, but to reach out to everybody else.”
To learn more about the mission of Aquinas College and its history in Grand Rapids, visit www.aquinas.edu.
