National Project Staff
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OUR TEAM
Board of Directors
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Because you believe that no woman should ever fear pregnancy, could you give right now to help us expand to 50 centers nationwide?
Because you believe that no woman should ever fear pregnancy, could you give right now to help us expand to 50 centers nationwide?
Click each staff members image to read their bio.
OUR TEAM
Click each board members image to read their bio.
P.O. Box 238 • Ironton, MN 56455, United States
The Guiding Star Project is a 501(c)3 non-profit, EIN: 45-4370118
Hailing from central Minnesota, Leah has been working with young people and mothers since 2000. Leah founded The Guiding Star Project in 2011 after feeling called to help women and families by providing resources that honor Natural Law and promote wholistic feminism. She seeks to create Guiding Star Centers to serve as beacons of hope, joy, and truth — safe havens that uphold human dignity in all stages of life. Leah lives in Minnesota with her family and works as a board-certified lactation consultant. As a mother to seven children, she has a special interest in supporting young women as they transition into their roles as new mothers.
Leah has been featured on EWTN, The Catholic News Agency, The Catholic Mom and more.
A mom of 11, Lisa Canning embodies possibility in motherhood. Author of the book The Possibility Mom: How to be a Great Mom and Pursue Your Dreams at the Same Time, Lisa wants women to feel empowered by their ability to conceive, carry and bring new life into the world. As President of The Guiding Star Project, she desires to create the “ultimate village” that every woman wishes she had, one where she wholistically feels supported in mind, body and spirit.
Lisa has been featured on The Today Show, Hallmark Home and Family, The New York Times, The Catholic Channel and more.
Sarah Ward, her husband, and their three children call Michigan home. She has been a licensed massage therapist since 2007 as well as went on to receive her bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design with a minor in photography. She has been self-employed since 2007 and runs both a successful massage therapy practice and graphic design business. She has worked with Guiding Star in some capacity since 2017. She has always been passionate about wholistic women’s healthcare and empowering girls and women through the education of their natural bodily, she looks forward to helping grow and share the mission of Guiding Star with the world.
Angie started working with GSP in September 2022 after meeting Leah at a dinner party and asking if she needed some help with GSP. Leah gave an enthusiastic “yes” and now Angie is the executive assistant. She is very passionate about Wholistic feminism, childbirth, and natural living and aspires to become a Fertility Practitioner and a nurse midwife one day. She is also a homeschooling Mom to five young children and is a registered nurse. Angie and her husband live in central Minnesota with their children and 9 chickens.
Kari Beadner is the Guiding Star Cycle Show National Coordinator. She and her husband Aaron have three living children and call Orange City, IA home. Kari is a certified FertilityCare© Practitioner and has been the Executive Director of Guiding Star Orange City. Kari is passionate about teaching women of all ages about how their bodies work and function naturally while providing all of their options for natural, wholistic, and life-affirming healthcare.
My name is Christina Haug. I live in the beautiful state of Virginia. I am a rising senior at Franciscan University of Steubenville where I am majoring in Political Science and double-minoring in Legal Studies as well as Philosophy. I am beyond blessed and excited to be the Women’s Health Week Coordinator for The Guiding Star and to work closely with the amazing women who are part of this organization.
Patricia de Lara Smith is a Life Science Engagement Manager at the consulting firm, a-connect. Her expertise is in new technology or program value chain analysis and customer experience. She brings a highly international background, having worked with different teams based in 29 countries. As an independent professional, she consulted for the International Institute for Restorative Reproductive Medicine, and she wrote her MSc dissertation on fecundity awareness, contraceptive choices, and (un)informed decision-making, at The London School of Economics & Political Science.
Mary Ferrarelli is the Director of Adult Services for Visitation Home, Inc. for the past 7 years, a non-profit in Central New Jersey that provides day programming and low-income housing for adults with developmental disabilities. Mary decided to do a year of service after being introduced to Visitation Home, where she was a live-in assistant in one of their homes. Quickly realizing she found her dream job, Mary lived at Visitation Home as a “house mom” for 9 years, has worked in the day program, as an assistant director, and now director. Hailing from Ohio and graduating from the University of Dayton with her B.A. in Religious Studies, Mary and her husband Joseph of two years are excited for what the future brings.
Teresa Kenney is a woman’s health nurse practitioner who has been practicing at Saint Paul VI Institute for 20 years. She was born and raised in Omaha, NE and went to the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Nursing where she received a nurse practitioner degree. She is a certified medical consultant practicing the new reproductive health science developed by Dr. Thomas Hilgers called NaproTechnology©. Teresa has been publishing a newsletter online since 2008, called FertilityCare professionals and previously taught the Creighton Model Fertility System as a fertility care practitioner for 7 years. Teresa and her husband Daniel have been married for 20 years and have eight children.
Mark Cavaliere is the Founder and Executive Director of the Southwest Coalition for Life based in the Borderland region of El Paso, Texas & Southern New Mexico. Mark has led thousands to action through 40 Days for Life, developed innovative sidewalk outreach programs, launched a Save the Storks Medical Ultrasound Bus, and has witnessed 3 local abortion facilities close in just over 3 years. Mark credits this success largely to God working through their partnership with Guiding Star El Paso, which he helped launch as a board member in 2017. His experiences with his wife and cesarean section, miscarriages, and homebirths — as well as his countless interactions with women considering and harmed by abortion—have made Mark extremely passionate about wholistic women’s healthcare as the ultimate solution to many of the symptoms we face as a culture an is frequently asked to train pro-life groups across the country He resides in Chaparral, New Mexico, with his wife, five children, along with their numerous chickens and goats.
Arina Grossu Agnew, MA, MS is a Fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism, Founder and Principal at Areté Global Consulting, and News Anchor at Shalom World News. Ms. Agnew worked as a Senior Communications Advisor at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in the Office for Civil Rights, protecting conscience, religious freedom rights, and civil rights in healthcare. She is the former Director of the Center for Human Dignity at the Family Research Council where she was a spokeswoman and policymaker on life and human dignity issues.
Ms. Agnew is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame with a B.A. in Philosophy. She earned her M.S. in Bioethics from the University of Mary and an M.A. in Theology, magna cum laude, from the Dominican House of Studies. She is also certified in Health Care Ethics through the National Catholic Bioethics Center. Ms. Agnew did her training in FEMM, Fertility Education and Medical Management, and is passionate about fertility awareness based methods and advancing women’s health.