Author Guide · Spiritual Memoir
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In 1996 Baylor University named Barbara Brown Taylor one of the twelve most effective preachers in the English-speaking world. About a year later she resigned from her small parish in Clarkesville, Georgia, and went to teach religion at Piedmont College, a few miles up the road. The books that made her widely read came after that step: a memoir about leaving the pulpit, a field guide to finding God in ordinary life, and a book in praise of the dark that put her on the cover of Time in 2014. Before them came two decades of sermons, collected in book after book. This guide covers her 13 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 13 key books · 1993–2020 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Barbara Brown Taylor has published about fifteen books. The best known are Leaving Church (2006), her memoir of giving up parish ministry, An Altar in the World (2009), Learning to Walk in the Dark (2014) and Holy Envy (2019). Start with An Altar in the World, a short guide to everyday spiritual practices written for readers inside and outside the church; then follow the order below to see how a preacher became a memoirist.
Where to Start with Barbara Brown Taylor
If you want her most popular book
→ An Altar in the World (2009) — twelve everyday practices, from paying attention to getting lost.
If you want her life story
→ Leaving Church (2006) — the memoir of a priest leaving her parish.
If you want something for a hard season
→ Learning to Walk in the Dark (2014) — a case for the night, caves and not knowing.
If you want to hear her preach
→ When God Is Silent (1998) — her Yale lectures on silence and the limits of words.
13 Barbara Brown Taylor Books, in Order
The Preaching Life
Her first book with Cowley, published while she was associate rector at All Saints’ Church in Atlanta. It is about the work of preaching and the life of the preacher, and includes a selection of her own sermons.
Gospel Medicine
A collection of sermons, published by Cowley in 1995, when she was rector of Grace-Calvary Church in Clarkesville, a small parish in north Georgia that she led from 1992.
Bread of Angels
A further collection of sermons, published by Cowley in the year she left Grace-Calvary and the year after Baylor University named her one of the twelve most effective preachers in the English-speaking world.
When God Is Silent
Based on her 1997 Lyman Beecher Lectures on preaching at Yale, given under the title “Famine in the Land: Homiletical Restraint and the Silence of God”. She asks what preachers should do with a culture drowning in words and with the long biblical stretches in which God says nothing. Kathleen Norris praised its “concise, pithy and challenging prose” in The Christian Century.
Home by Another Way
Another Cowley collection of sermons. The title echoes the Gospel of Matthew, in which the wise men, warned in a dream, return to their own country by another road rather than back past Herod.
The Luminous Web
A short book of essays in which she reads modern science as a non-scientist and a priest, and asks what it suggests about creation and about the God her tradition describes.
Speaking of Sin
An argument that churches should not drop the word “sin” for therapeutic language but recover it, because without a way to name what has gone wrong, people also lose the language of repentance and salvation.
The Seeds of Heaven
Sermons on passages from the Gospel of Matthew, published by Westminster John Knox. It was her last sermon collection before she turned to memoir.
Leaving Church
Her first memoir, in three parts called “Finding”, “Losing” and “Keeping”. She describes her calling, her years in an Atlanta city church and then in Clarkesville, and the compassion fatigue that led her to resign from parish ministry while remaining a priest. It won the Georgia Writers Association’s Author of the Year award for 2006.
An Altar in the World
A field guide to spiritual practices in ordinary life, written for “spiritual but not religious” readers as much as for churchgoers. It grew out of a question a priest asked her: “Come tell us what is saving your life now.” Chapters treat things like paying attention, getting lost on purpose, physical work and saying no. It became a New York Times bestseller.
Learning to Walk in the Dark
She goes looking for what darkness can teach: nights outdoors, a wild cave, moonlight, and the darker stretches of a life. Against what she calls a “full solar” spirituality she proposes a “lunar” one that waxes and wanes. An excerpt was Time’s cover story in April 2014, headlined “Finding God in the Dark”.
Holy Envy
A memoir of teaching world religions at Piedmont College, where she took mostly Christian students to mosques, synagogues and Buddhist and Hindu temples. She describes finding something to admire in each tradition, how that unsettled and deepened her own Christianity, and why she eventually stopped teaching the course.
Always a Guest
Thirty-one sermons she preached as a visiting preacher between 2006 and January 2020, from Chautauqua in New York to Florida, Winchester Cathedral, Ontario, Minneapolis and Portland. Titles include “How to Live with High Anxiety” and “Paralyzed by Polarization”.
In What Order to Read Barbara Brown Taylor
Her books fall into two groups. The first, from 1993 to 2004, are mostly sermon collections and short books on preaching, written while she was a parish priest and published by small church presses. The second, from Leaving Church on, are memoirs and books of practice written for a general readership, and these are the ones most readers mean when they mention her.
Nothing continues from one book to the next, but Leaving Church explains the turn that the later books follow from, so it rewards reading before An Altar in the World if you want the full arc. Read the sermon collections afterwards, when you know her voice and want to hear it in the pulpit.
A reading path
1. An Altar in the World (2009)
2. Leaving Church (2006)
3. Learning to Walk in the Dark (2014)
4. Holy Envy (2019)
5. When God Is Silent (1998)
Everything Else Barbara Brown Taylor Published
Beyond the 13 key books: 4 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Early books and other sermons
2
2 books · 1986–1998
- 1986Mixed Blessingsher first book, published in Atlanta and reissued by Cowley in 1998
- 1998God in Pain: Teaching Sermons on Sufferingsermons on suffering, published by Abingdon
As editor
2
2 books · 1985–2008
- 1985Ministry and Missiontheological reflections for the life of the church, as editor
- 2008Feasting on the Worda multi-volume lectionary commentary, co-edited with David L. Bartlett
The years · 1951–2024
Quick facts about Barbara Brown Taylor
- Known for
- Barbara Brown Taylor is known as an Episcopal priest and celebrated preacher who left parish ministry and wrote memoirs about finding God outside the church, in daily life, darkness and other faiths.
- 1951
- Born in Lafayette, Indiana
- 1984
- Ordained an Episcopal priest
- 1996
- Named one of the 12 most effective preachers
- 2006
- Leaving Church
- 2024
- Georgia Writers Hall of Fame
- Born
- 21 September 1951, Lafayette, Indiana
- Education
- Emory University (BA, 1973); Yale Divinity School (MDiv, 1976)
- Ordained
- Episcopal deacon 1983, priest 1984
- Parishes
- All Saints’, Atlanta (1983–1992); Grace-Calvary, Clarkesville (1992–1997)
- Taught
- Butman Chair of Religion, Piedmont College, from 1997
- Honours
- Time 100 (2014); Georgia Writers Hall of Fame (2024)
- Lives
- On a farm in the foothills of north-east Georgia with her husband, Ed
The red mark is 2006: Leaving Church, her memoir of giving up parish ministry.
How Barbara Brown Taylor Writes: A Preacher Outside the Pulpit
She learned to write by writing sermons, and it shows. Most chapters are built like a good sermon: a concrete scene or object, a passage of scripture or a question, then a turn toward what it might mean for the reader. Most of her books before 2006 are sermon collections or lectures, and even the later memoirs keep the length and rhythm of something meant to be heard.
From Leaving Church on, the material is her own life. She writes in the first person about specific places, her farm in north Georgia, a cave, a mosque visited with her students, and lets the spiritual point come out of the physical detail rather than from doctrine. An Altar in the World was written explicitly for readers who do not go to church.
Her recurring subject is the line between sacred and ordinary, and her habit is to question it: she treats sin, silence, darkness and other religions as places where God might be found rather than avoided. Readers who come to her through memoir often go on to Anne Lamott, Kate Bowler and Annie Dillard.
Frequently asked questions about Barbara Brown Taylor’s books
How many books has Barbara Brown Taylor written?
About fifteen as author, plus two works she edited or co-edited. Thirteen key books are on this page, from The Preaching Life (1993) to Always a Guest (2020); the others are her first book, Mixed Blessings (1986), and God in Pain (1998).
What are Barbara Brown Taylor’s books in order?
The Preaching Life (1993), Gospel Medicine (1995), Bread of Angels (1997), When God Is Silent (1998), Home by Another Way (1999), The Luminous Web (2000), Speaking of Sin (2000), The Seeds of Heaven (2004), Leaving Church (2006), An Altar in the World (2009), Learning to Walk in the Dark (2014), Holy Envy (2019) and Always a Guest (2020).
Where should I start with Barbara Brown Taylor?
An Altar in the World (2009). It is short, it needs no church background, and each chapter stands alone as a practice you can try. If you want her story first, start with Leaving Church.
What is Barbara Brown Taylor’s most famous book?
Leaving Church (2006), her memoir of resigning from parish ministry, which won the Georgia Writers Association’s Author of the Year award. An Altar in the World (2009) was a New York Times bestseller, and Learning to Walk in the Dark (2014) reached the cover of Time.
Why did Barbara Brown Taylor leave the church?
She left parish ministry, not her faith or her ordination. In Leaving Church she describes compassion fatigue after some fifteen years of parish work and a wish to be part of a congregation rather than in charge of one. In 1997 she left Grace-Calvary Church in Clarkesville to teach religion at Piedmont College, and she remains an Episcopal priest.
Is Barbara Brown Taylor still an Episcopal priest?
Yes. She was ordained a priest in 1984 and kept her ordination after leaving parish work. She still preaches as a guest; Always a Guest (2020) collects sermons from those visits.
What is Holy Envy about?
Holy Envy (2019) is a memoir of teaching world religions at Piedmont College in Demorest, Georgia, where she took mostly Christian students to mosques, synagogues and Buddhist and Hindu temples, and of how finding things to admire in other faiths changed her own.
Why was Barbara Brown Taylor on the cover of Time?
In April 2014 Time ran an excerpt from Learning to Walk in the Dark as its cover story, “Finding God in the Dark”. The same year the magazine included her in the Time 100, its list of the world’s most influential people.
Is Barbara Brown Taylor still alive?
Yes. She was born on 21 September 1951 in Lafayette, Indiana, and lives on a farm in north-east Georgia with her husband, Ed Taylor. In 2024 she was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.
Is Barbara Brown Taylor a good preacher?
She is widely regarded as one of the best. In 1996 a Baylor University survey named her one of the twelve most effective preachers in the English-speaking world, and she gave Yale’s Lyman Beecher Lectures on preaching in 1997, published as When God Is Silent.
Footnotes
- Barbara Brown Taylor — Wikipedia
- Barbara Brown Taylor — Georgia Center for the Book
- Barbara Brown Taylor explores the dark, on the cover of TIME — Yale Divinity School
- For priest turned professor, ‘Holy Envy’ is key to appreciating world religions — NPR Fresh Air via WJCT, 2019
- Leaving Church: A Memoir of Faith — Bookreporter review
- Barbara Brown Taylor, far from home — Spectrum, 2020
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Being in charge was the only way I could learn how much I wanted to be in community.”
— Barbara Brown Taylor, Leaving Church (2006)
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