Rev. Carolyn Cammenga was born in Oak Park, Illinois and raised in nearby Riverside, where she graduated from Riverside-Brookfield High School. She holds a B.A. degree in speech and drama from Monmouth College, a M.S degree in guidance and counseling from Illinois State University, a Master of Divinity degree from Calvin Theological Seminary and a post-graduate Master of Theology degree also from Calvin Theological Seminary. She taught in Egypt, Germany, Mississippi; Illinois and Michigan. Following her ordination in 1980 as a pastor in the Presbyterian Church USA, she served churches in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida. In 2005 she was ordained in the Christian Reformed Church and served as a chaplain at Blodgett Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan and as an associate pastor at Plymouth Heights CRC also in Grand Rapids until her retirement in 2012. She and her late husband, Bill, were leaders in planting churches in Morton, Illinois and Cascade, Michigan. Her first book, WHAT OTHERS REJECT, GOD ACCEPTS, her autobiography, was published in 2021.