Tara’s Bio

I coauthored my first book with someone who was one of my closest friends. Ironically (and that’s using the true sense of the word ironic), even though she and I were both Certified Christian Conciliators with The Institute for Christian Conciliation, we got into a terrible conflict while we were writing the book Peacemaking Women. So we had to hire two mediators (one of whom we had trained on how to be a Christian mediator!) to mediate this book. Life is so crazy sometimes!

You can read all about our conflict, mediation, and reconciliation in the Conclusion of the book.

Tara Barthel

Tara Klena Barthel has served as a Christian lawyer and mediator for almost twenty-five years. Prior to leading the Institute for Christian Conciliation during its tenure under Ken Sande, Tara lived in Chicago and focused her practice in the area of high net worth (charitable) estate planning. Tara is the author of the peacemaking women’s video series Living the Gospel in Relationships and the ASL-translated women’s video series Becoming Who You Already Arethe co-author of the books Peacemaking Women and Redeeming Church Conflictsand she continues to accept occasional speaking invitations and mediation cases as her schedule so allows.

Tara earned her law degree and M.B.A. from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and her B.A. in psychology from Augustana College (Illinois). Currently enjoying courses at Reformed Theological Seminary, Tara delights in serving her family as a homemaker and her community as a Rhetoric teacher. To learn more about Tara, please visit her website at: www.tarabarthel.com or friend her on FaceBook.