About
The People Behind LTP
Meet Laura Brand and Colorado collaborator Sara Sophia Haynes.
Laura Brand — Founder, Speaker & Theological Educator
Laura has a genuine love for Jesus and His Church, and you can see it in everything she does. She is incredibly knowledgeable and well-prepared, but what has touched us the most is her heart. She truly listens, encourages, and meets people where they are, always pointing them back to Christ with kindness and wisdom.
Meet the Founder
Laura Brand
Laura Brand grew up in the Lutheran church as a child and found herself struggling with belief in God throughout her early college years. She met her now husband, Darren, while in college, and credits his steadfast commitment to the Church for her eventual return to God. They were married at Our Lady of the Mountains in Estes Park, CO in 2006 and both of their sons were baptized in the Catholic Church when they were a few months old.
Laura turned to the Church for answers after the children were a few years old. Her husband was exploring a job change to a town in Utah. As they considered what this move might mean for their family, Laura found herself confronting a question she had never seriously considered. With the strong presence of the Latter-day Saint faith there, she realized that her sons could very well grow up, be influenced by their friends and community, and eventually become Latter-day Saints themselves. What unsettled her most was the realization that although her children had been baptized Catholic, Laura herself did not really know what the Catholic Church taught or why it mattered. She had not been living the Christian faith in a way that could meaningfully form her children.
They remained in Colorado, yet this struggle presented the invitation Laura needed to learn about the Church through RCIA. What began, in part, as a desire to be able to give her children something solid became something much more. Her experience in RCIA was life-changing and life-giving. Laura entered into full communion with the Catholic Church and describes the experience simply: she fell in love with Christ and His Church.
She fell in love with Christ and His Church.
Study & Parish Ministry
Laura then went on to receive her Bachelor of Arts in Theology from Catholic Distance University in West Virginia (now known as Catholic International University). Her theological studies also led her more deeply into parish ministry, where she serves as Director of Religious Education for Our Lady of the Visitation Parish in Kiowa, CO. Laura will receive her Master of Divinity from St. Bernard's School of Theology and Ministry in May of 2027. Her studies at St. Bernard's have deepened both her theological formation and her pastoral care for souls.
Parish ministry has a way of shedding light on the reality that many Catholics live without really understanding the depth of God's love and action in their lives. On a daily basis, she encounters people who are hungry for a relationship with God, who desire to live holy lives, but who also struggle to understand the rich inheritance they have received through Holy Mother Church. Those encounters eventually gave shape to The Living Tradition Project. Laura's hope and prayer is that through these formation experiences, people will find themselves encountering Christ in new, deeper, and lasting ways.
The Work Today
Today, Laura serves as a Catholic speaker, retreat leader, and theological educator. With a gift for making rich theological ideas accessible without diminishing their depth, Laura works with parishes, dioceses, catechists, and Catholic leaders through retreats, conferences, formation days, and missions, helping them recognize the Christian life as a lifelong participation in the mystery of Christ. Her work is shaped by the Church Fathers, the liturgical tradition, and the theological vision of figures such as Joseph Ratzinger, Henri de Lubac, and St. John Paul II, while remaining deeply rooted in the pastoral realities of parish life.
She lives in Kiowa, CO with her husband, Darren, and their two sons. They have homeschooled their children with the support of the Catholic homeschooling community of Colorado. They live on a small homestead with their three dogs, two cats, and a rather large flock of chickens.
Meet Our Colorado Collaborator
Sara Sophia Haynes
Sara Sophia Haynes is a wife and mother of 4, living in the beauty of rural Colorado where the antelope roam. She is proud of her multicultural heritage and her childhood as a military brat which has contributed to a very rich life in the beauty of humanity. She is a cradle Catholic whose receptivity of Christ's love for her increased a hundred fold when she said yes to discerning a Religious vocation for a year with the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia in Nashville Tennessee. What a gift that short time in community life has continued to be in the lives of her family and friends.
She is here to encourage others to be open to the beauty and richness of God's love for each of His children and loves to accompany others in this wild journey of life.
Sara Sophia Haynes — Colorado Collaborator & Podcast Co-Host
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