Vanessa Rush Southern is the senior minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco and has served congregations in Boston; Washington, D.C.; and Summit, New Jersey. She is the author of two books, This Piece of Eden and Miles of Dream, and has been published in the Dallas Morning News, Scroll India, and Woman’s Day Magazine. She is married to Rohit Menezes and mother to Leila Menezes.