In this intimate conversation, I sit down with my mother, Astrid Tuminez, to talk not about her public life as a university president, executive, and leader, but about the private spiritual story underneath it all.
She reflects on growing up in poverty in the Philippines, the early images of God that gave her structure and safety, and the ways religion shaped her sense of goodness, ambition, fear, and belonging. From Catholic childhood to Mormon certainty, from intellectual awakening to devastating grief, she traces a faith that has not stayed fixed, but has expanded.
What emerges is a conversation about surrender, suffering, death, motherhood, and love. Not the polished kind of faith that avoids doubt, but a faith tested by loss and reshaped by it. A faith less interested in certainty than in presence. A God less brittle, less punitive, and far larger and more mysterious than the one she first inherited.
May this conversation be a light along your own path.
If this conversation stirred something in you around your relationship with God, grief, surrender, or the body, I offer free consult calls for people curious about ongoing 1:1 Somatic Soul Care sessions. A consult is a simple way to connect, share what you’re carrying, and feel into whether this work might be a supportive fit. You can schedule a call here.
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