Kaitlyn Finchler
Staff Writer
When the women in a community are invested in, the community will thrive — and for those putting in the effort, their work can make a difference.
Becca Stevens, founder and president of Thistle Farms, will deliver her lecture, “The Alchemy of Theology: The Magic of Love,” at 2 p.m. today in the Hall of Philosophy for the Week Nine Interfaith Lecture Series theme, “Past Informs Present: Traditioned Innovation in Spiritual Life.”
“I think there’s a lot of people who have a lot of worries about our society (and) our culture right now,” Stevens said. “They want to have some hope and to believe what it is that we do can make a difference.”
In her lecture, Stevens said she hopes to inspire the audience, give them some practical takeaways and share hope through the stories of Thistle Farms.
Thistle Farms is a global movement for women’s freedom founded by Stevens in 1997 in Nashville. It started out with residential communities and then grew into a global marketplace for women artisans.
“I started Thistle Farms in 1997 in Nashville, Tennessee, to offer long-term free housing for women survivors of addiction and trafficking,” Stevens said. “Early on, I learned that most of the women who were survivors of childhood trauma, one of the main things they needed was practical economic help along their journey to recovery.”
This is when Stevens started manufacturing bath and body care products, opened a cafe and started a national network and global marketplace — which is now the largest national network for free, long-term beds for women.
“It is the largest justice enterprise run by women survivors in the United States,” Stevens said. “Along the way, we started working with women in all kinds of countries who are experiencing the same universal issues on their backs.”
International work first started in Rwanda, then “moved out from there,” especially for women who were affected by war or were refugees, she said. This is why Stevens shares stories from around the world — they share the same themes of “how love heals” and “how love is a strong force of change.”
“I was inspired by a number of things to start Thistle Farms, including my own story — which is a survivor story from early childhood,” Stevens said. “(There are) so many beautiful people in history who have worked in community to create change in the world.”
Women survivors are “one of the oldest” topics and a universal topic, Steven said.
“When you heal women, you heal communities,” she said. “When you rape women, you kill communities. That’s just fact, and all the data supports when you invest in women, you really are impacting a whole community of people.”
Stevens also said she hopes to make some friends through the lecture, because creating relationships is “how Thistle Farms continues to grow.”
“I hope that maybe some of the ideas that I share might spark something in people that are already on that path of wanting to have a positive impact on the world,” Stevens said. “I also hope that people go back into their own communities and share our story as an advocate and as a Thistle Farmer.”
