John Spalding

John Spalding is Director of Partnerships and Communications at the Insight Meditation Society (IMS) in Barre, Massachusetts. Prior to joining IMS in 2018, John had a 27-year career in publishing, working for houses from HarperCollins and Globe Pequot Press to Shambhala Publications. A former freelance writer covering religion and spirituality with a masters from the Harvard Divinity School, John has written for, among other publications, the Los Angeles Times, The Week, Maxim, The Christian Century, Commonweal, Harvard Divinity Bulletin, and Beliefnet.com, where he wrote “The Sick Soul” humor column for seven years. John is the author of A Pilgrim’s Digress: My Perilous, Fumbling Quest for the Celestial City (Harmony Books), which Elle magazine called, “a quirky, comic postmillennial trek through some of America’s more exotic embodiments of faith, from the Christian Wrestling Foundation to The Garden of Eden, a Bible-based roadside attraction in Kansas, shedding light all the while on the author’s dual affinity for the holy and the down-home.” He is currently writing a book exploring family and faith.