Rev. Tonetta Landis-Aina

Rev. Tonetta Landis-Aina is a North Carolina native who came to Washington DC in 2004 and kept finding reason after reason to make that beautiful city her home. She holds degrees in history, English, and international affairs in addition to a Master of Divinity from Wesley Theological Seminary. Rev. Tonetta is passionate about helping marginalized people find their own stories in scripture, and she is convinced that the gospel is good news for BIPOC folx and for liberation movements everywhere. She believes the church still owes the world a more honest shape—and a more beautiful gospel—than the one too many of us inherited. She is also convinced that BIPOC people hold the truths and practices the whole church needs for a more beautiful, more genuinely Jesus-following Christianity—and that any church worth its future will be queer in posture. She is a lover of Washington DC: not the Capitol, but the city of neighborhoods once known as Chocolate City.

Tonetta is happily married to her wife, Bukola, and is outnumbered at home by two kids who keep her on her toes. In addition to being Co-Lead Pastor at The Table Church in DC, she is a facilitator, teacher, writer, strategist, instigator of ritual, gatherer of the sacred, lingerer with beauty, and lover of good humor, good food, and good whiskey. In all things, she hopes to make "the revolution irresistible," as the great Toni Cade Bambara put it.