InterSpiritual Companioning & Counseling Certification
Faculty
ISCC Program Facilitators
Rev. Nathan Brisby: ISCC Facilitator
Rev. Nathan Brisby is an ordained Interfaith Minister and Interspiritual Companion and Counselor. For his primary vocational service, he leads the learning and organizational development functions for a large labor rights organization. As a spiritual teacher, he has led workshops on a variety of topics, including building self-care practices, Biblical studies for the LGBTQIA+ experience, mindful leadership, leading change, compassion fatigue, giving and receiving feedback, meditation as social change, mindful leadership, high impact communication, dismantling white supremacy, and many others. Prior to his service in the labor movement, he worked professionally in the performing arts and animal welfare spaces. Nathan founded a not for profit, Broadway Gives Back, which connects non-profit organizations with the Broadway community. He is also a certified grief counselor He grew up in a deeply evangelical Christian home, going back for generations. He currently lives in Astoria, NY with his husband, Stephen, and their dog, Dewey.
Rev. Dr. Khadijah Matin: ISCC Facilitator
Rev. Dr. Khadijah Matin has established a solid record of commitment to education and faith-based organizations, serving in multiple leadership roles. Building upon her interests in her family history and social justice work, Khadijah’s work looks at the role family and faith history plays as identity and transformation models. Along with her experience in nonprofit governance, and in recognition of her works in intercultural dialogue and civic engagement she was appointed as an Ariane de Rothschild Fellow. Khadijah has an MS from Fordham University; certificates from One Spirit Seminary (2006); ISC Program (2010). She earned her D.Min. In 2012, from New York Theological Seminary, in Multi-faith ministry. Always inspired by her children, Khadijah is called by some as a “woman who walks through walls” and calling as a continuation of her family’s traditions, fulfilling the social justice dreams of her ancestors.
Rev. Dr. Ed O’Malley: ISCC Facilitator
Rev. Dr. Ed O’Malley has been a senior Dean in the One Spirit Interspiritual Counseling Program for the past several years. He is a One Spirit ordained Interfaith/Interspiritual Minister, trained Shamanic energy medicine practitioner and a certified Nature Awareness Trainer. Ed also holds a PhD in neuroscience from Cornell University and board certification in Sleep Medicine and neurofeedback. Ed uses his broad background and training as a way to bring all facets of current knowledge to bear on our spiritual journey. He strives to extend deep awareness of the Natural World and integrate it with our inner world, emphasizing our interconnection with all life and the Spirit that moves through all things. As an ordained Interfaith Minister and Shaman with neuroscientific knowledge, Ed helps people to expand their spiritual awareness by reacquainting them with their own Divinity using practices centered on meeting body, mind and soul in Nature.
ISCC Supervisors
Justin Ferko: ISCC Supervisor
Justin Ferko is an Interspiritual Counselor, Certified Relational Nature and Forest Therapy Guide, and professional chaplain. He is a 2022 New Contemplative with Spiritual Directors International, and a graduate of Oasis Ministries for Spiritual Development (Harrisburg, PA). He celebrates the giftedness of the LGBTQIA+ community and facilitates soul friendship with Mother Earth. He honors and facilitates companionees' embodied relationship with Earth and with each person's beautiful embodiment including gender expression, gender identity, and sexual orientation. These practices of love, eros, deep desire and intimacy with soul and spirit can be healing balm as we experience Climate Anxiety and Eco-Grief. Justin's practice of spiritual companioning is contemplative and interspiritual, drawing on Earth-honoring traditions (Celtic, Slavic), Tibetan Buddhism in the Karma Kagyu Lineage, and the Divine Feminine from Christianity of the desert Ammas and Abbas. He and his spouse Craig live on the banks of the Susquehanna River with their beloved rescue dogs Yeshe and Benny. In other curves of his spiral life path, Justin has been a professional Palliative Care chaplain and Spanish and English Language Learners teacher at the secondary and university levels.
Rev. Dr. Ruqaiyah Nabe: ISCC Supervisor
After more than three decades as a Registered Professional Nurse, and more than twenty years as
adjunct faculty in a college setting, Rev. Dr. Ruqaiyah Nabe answered to a different calling.
She graduated from the One Spirit Interfaith Seminary where she was ordained an interfaith/inter-
spiritual minister (2006), and an interfaith/inter-spiritual counselor (2009). She volunteers as a
mentor in the One Spirit mentoring ministry program (since 2006); has appeared in a video for
Spiritual Directors International (SDI), wrote two blogs, and conducted a workshop, Sowing Seeds of
Love: Reaping Blossoms of Compassion, which was followed by an article of the same title for the
Presence journal of SDI.
Rev. Ruqaiyah also completed her doctorate in multi-faith ministry in 2010 from the New York
Theological Seminary (NYTS) where she was one of the first two Muslim women to earn the doctor of
ministry degree in the seminary’s one hundred and ten year history (2010). At least two additional
Muslim women followed suit. She is also the first One Spirit graduate to earn the doctor of ministry
degree from NYTS. Her doctoral thesis, Faith to Faith: Spiritual Direction with a Multi-faith Context,
focused on a Muslim spiritual counselor offering service to devotees of other faiths traditions and
spiritual practices. Rev. Ruqaiyah served on five site teams for doctor of ministry candidates of NYTS, one of which she
served as advisor. She received from the Rev. Dr. Eleanor Moody-Shepherd’s Women’s Center of
NYTS, the award, Women on the Front Line.
As an independent practitioner, Rev. Ruqaiyah responds to requests to speak at houses of worship;
colleges, universities and community organizations, and panel discussions/round tables. In addition,
she presides over rites and rituals of life-cycle events, and is a contributing author to two
anthologies—Embodied Spirits: Stories of Spiritual Directors of Color, and Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody
Turn Me Around: Stories of Contemplation and Justice
Dr. Ruqaiyah Nabe holds memberships in several organizations, and is involved in community
activities. She recently appeared in the podcast, Voices of Hagar, the story told from the perspectives
of the three Abrahamic faiths of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
Rev. Christopher J. Portelli: ISCC Supervisor
Rev. Christopher J. Portelli (aka Rev. Chris) is a Supervisor in the Interspiritual Companioning and Counseling program (ISCC) at the One Spirit Learning Alliance. He was ordained an interfaith and interspiritual minister by One Spirit Interfaith Seminary in 2016, and he completed the Interspiritual Counseling program (ISC) there in 2018. In 2019, he served as a Dean of the first year seminary program at One Spirit. He performs weddings, baby blessings, house blessings, funerals, and memorial services, and offers individual and group spiritual counseling. Raised Roman Catholic, he studied and followed the spiritual teachings of Teilhard de Chardin, Thomas Merton, and Dorothy Day. Today he studies and practices Effortless Mindfulness with contemporary Buddhist scholar Loch Kelly. Rev. Chris lives with his husband, Dr. Wai Khoo, in Jersey City, NJ. He is also a supervising attorney at the non-profit New York Legal Assistance Group (NYLAG) in Manhattan. In 2010, he founded the Economic Justice Clinic at NYLAG. The clinic trains law students in poverty law and allows them to provide free legal services to low income and homeless New Yorkers with attorney supervision. Rev. Chris earned his BA in Philosophy from DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, his JD from New York Law School, and a Masters of Philosophy in Public and Urban Policy at The New School. He has taught courses in law and public policy at Brooklyn Law School, St. John’s University School of Law, The Milano Graduate School (The New School) and New York Law School. His previous teaching experience includes interdisciplinary courses at New York University, St. Peter’s University (Jersey City), and American University (Washington, DC).
Rev. Salima Ira Swain: ISCC Supervisor
Salima Ira Swain is a music educator, opera singer, poet, author, Therapeutic Touch practitioner
and Spiritual Counselor. She has a Bachelor of Music Education and Master of Music in vocal
performance and is ABD toward a Doctorate of Musical Arts. She traveled throughout Europe
and The United States performing Opera as well as Classical Music Recitals of English, French
and German Art Songs Sacred Music and African American Art Songs and Spirituals. Ms. Swain
was a Therapeutic Music Specialist for Long Term Care patients and she is a retired NYC music
educator. She teaches private voice and piano lessons to students of all ages and levels of
performance. Salima facilitates ACIM study groups, Weight Loss and Spirituality Groups and she
is an active participant in Sufism and InterSpiritual daily practices. Ms. Swain serves on the
Board of Directors of “Opera On Tap”, a music education and performance organization. She is
an advocate for the elderly in her personal community and takes Joy in communicating and
assisting with their needs.
Her experience with One Spirit began with ordination in 2004. The devastation and isolation of
the COVID Pandemic inspired her to reconnect with One Spirit so that she could become an
effective Spiritual presence for her personal community and others who seek professional
Spiritual Counseling. She started with Companions in Care and realized that ISCC would provide her with more
experience in Spiritual Counseling competencies. The realization that there is a
“Companionship” with the Counselor and the Counselee was one of her most important
lessons. Salima was honored to be chosen as the speaker for the first ISCC graduation class of
2022. Her Spiritual and personal oath since ordination, “I will live my life in the Truth that
Everything is in Divine Perfect Order” continues to be her life’s guiding principle.
Rev. Heidi Tessmer: ISCC Supervisor
Reverend Heidi Tessmer, BA, MBA, is an ordained interfaith/interspiritual minister of the One
Spirit Interfaith Seminary (OSIS) graduate Class of 2020. She holds a BA in Economics from
the University of Vermont and an MBA from Northeastern University. She is a certified Spiritual
Director from Still Harbor, where spirituality meets social justice. In December 2020, she
completed the Companions in Care program from OneSpirit Learning Alliance. Currently, she is
a candidate in the Thanatology certificate program from the Art of Dying Institute at OneSpirit.
Heidi’s spiritual path began with twelve step spirituality. She agrees with Richard Rohr that,
“The twelve steps is America’s most significant and authentic contribution to the history of
spirituality.” It is by utilizing these principles with an intersection of compassion and justice that
she ministers to individuals. As the activist and educator, Ruby Sales asks, “Where does it
hurt?” Getting to people's heartbreak is the key to reaching their spirit. Heidi believes the
human soul needs to be witnessed and listened to with an open heart filled with compassion.
She is an active member of OneSpirit in Action (OSIA) and has participated in co facilitating the
series of “Remembering our Forgotten Community, Our Brothers and Sisters Behind the Bars.”
Since 2020, she has been an active member of Transforming LIves New York, a writing
mentorship program with incarcerated citizens. Heidi currently resides in Amesbury Massachusetts.
Rev. Wendy Van Allen: ISCC Supervisor
Rev. Wendy Van Allen is a 2014 graduate of One Spirit Learning Alliance's Seminary and a 2019 graduate of the Interspiritual Counseling program. She received two bachelor's degrees from Rutgers University, and will graduate with a Master's in Clinical Counseling degree from Saint Bonaventure University, Olean, NY, in August of 2023. Wendy is also a certified Intuitive Consultant from the Holistic Studies Institute, New York, NY. In addition to supervising students at 1Spirit's ISCC, Wendy teaches and serves students at Grace Theological Seminary, an independent Catholic online seminary incorporated in Florida. Wendy’s spiritual traditions are Earth-based and include initiation and practice of Wicca, Lukumi, and Spiritism. As a former archaeologist, Wendy has a strong interest in the intersection of culture, spirituality, religion, evolving human consciousness, social justice and environmental concerns. She lives in Kingston, New York, and offers private interspiritual counseling services, classes and workshops from her home, Soul Blossom Center. She is the author of Relighting the Cauldron: Embracing Nature Spirituality for the Modern World, published by Llewellyn’s Worldwide Publications in early 2023.
We create transformative, resilient new realities by becoming transformed, resilient people.
- Krista Tippett