I was born Barbara Louise Standley on June 22, 1942 in Cleveland, Ohio and was raised in the Protestant Episcopal Church. After graduating from high school with both class honors and Ohio State honors, I graduated from Mt. Holyoke College with a B.A. in Religious Studies.

My path was set on civil rights and social justice issues by serving on the college religious activities board as the student director of the college chapel, as a result of which I had the privilege of meeting and eating lunch with Dr. Martin Luther King.

In 1965, I received my MA in English at Case Western Reserve University and taught several members of my own high school class when I became a member of the opening year faculty at Cleveland State University. In the winter of 1966, I was received into the Roman Catholic Church. While I was a doctoral candidate in English at Boston University, I was active in both demonstrations against the Vietnam War and supporting civil rights.

After Dr. King died, I was one of the graduate students called out to keep peace on campus. Also when I was a graduate student at BU, I met a handsome young Quaker who had just competed his Th.M. at Harvard, and in 1968 Ronald Worden and I were married. Our son Mark was born in 1970. Both of us soon finished our Ph.D.’s. We have been married for 38 years and have taught together at George Fox University, Barclay College and now Houston Graduate School of Theology. I have also taught English part time at Houston Community College.

I was recorded as a minister in the Evangelical Friends Church and received my certificate as a Spiritual Director in 1995. I am just completing my involvement with the Miriam Project funded by E. I. Lilly Corporation that supports the ordination of women by producing undergraduate lesson plans in a variety of subjects. I have been a governing board member and bilingual French translator for Friends World Committee for Consultation and Mid-America Yearly Meeting of Friends, and a member of the Faith and Order Commission of the National Council of Churches.

I have also served a variety of Friends and Methodist churches as interim pastor, guest speaker and retreat leader. My hobbies are needlework, free-lance writing and baby-sitting my granddaughter Katlyn.