Stickney has also been the head coach of the Malibu High boys and girls tennis teams for five years
The Rev. Dr. Joy Stickney preached a message of togetherness to the congregation of St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church of Malibu on a bright and clear Sunday.
“This morning, Jesus looks at each of us. As he did at those who were sitting around him,” explained the minister of over two decades. “He reminds us and explains, ‘Here are my mothers and brothers, whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister and mother.’ So take heart and look around at each other. Here are your brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers. This is your family on way of love.”
Stickney explained chapter three of the Bible’s book of Mark in her sermon. She led the gathered church members and visitors in song, prayer, and communion during the June 9 service in St. Aidan’s worship hall. Stickney mingled with parishioners as some drank coffee and munched on snacks after the service. Her husband of 10 years, Paul Brady, and some of their nine children were also present.
Stickney, 54, is in service of people she is striving to know.
“I’m at a place of giving back and gleaning from other religions, other cultures, and trying not to be judgmental,” she said. “I’m not at a church that is conservative. Everything is about God’s grace and love.”
Preaching is one of Stickney’s major callings in life. Another involves her stepping away from the pulpit and removing her clergy wear to adorn athletic gear, pick up a tennis racket and step on the court. Yes, the minister is also a talented tennis athlete, who plays at least twice a week. Stickney has also been the head coach of the Malibu High School boys and girls tennis teams for five years.
Stickney, an avid tennis player since she was youth, coached the Sharks’ girls squad to a second-place finish in the Citrus Coast League during the fall season. She guided the Malibu boys group to a league title in the spring.
Stickney has a fluid leadership style and loves teaching high schoolers the game she enjoys.
“These kids are just the best,” she detailed. “That is really why I do it. They are open to me being a part of their lives. They love the sport. They keep at.”
Rev. Ed Mikovich, St. Aidan’s associate priest, said coaching and preaching involve being genuine and gaining trust.
“Once you do that — I think her players would agree with me — she is never condescending,” Mikovich, also a baseball coach, said of Stickney. “She builds positives while showing you your faults in technique. It’s all based in this positive attitude.”
Athena Ram, a standout singles and doubles player for the girls team during her high school years, said Stickney knows how to adjust her coaching style for individual players.
“I’ve always found her supportive, even when correcting, and always willing to take as much time as needed to improve our individual skills and have the team function as best as possible,” she said. “I think she cares about us asmore than players, but as people and that definitely shows in her coaching.”
Stickney was born in Boston, but lived in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and the Philippines as a youth because of her father Robert Stickney’s work in appropriate technology.
Her desire to help others and road to eventually donning a pastoral robe began while living in the Philippines for six years.
“I saw how I was so privileged,” Stickney said. “I had all my needs taken care of. I had parents who loved me, an amazing home, family, and a loving life. There was nothing I did to earn that.”
She, one of three siblings, worked at a settlement home in Manila, the Philippines’ capital, where she helped take care of young children and babies, whose parents didn’t have the means to raise them.
“It broke my heart,” Stickney said. “I thought, ‘Why was I born who I was instead of someone else?’”
Stickney’s dad and her mother, Lyn Stickney, played tennis, so when she was a sixth-grader, they enrolled her in tennis lessons.
“I just loved going there,” she said of her early tennis lessons on a clay court. “Ever since then I have played.”
Stickney played high school tennis at an international school and college tennis at Oberlin College and Conservatory in Ohio.
She studied theology in graduate school for her own personal growth and worked at church in her early 20s. An introvert, Stickney had no desires to serve and volley toward the pulpit even though fellow churchgoers urged her to go into ministry.
“People challenged me,” Stickney said. “I didn’t like speaking in public. I ran out of excuses as to why I wasn’tqualified. Eventually, the question wasn’t, why didn’t I want to do this, but why not.”
Stickney became an ordained minister in 1999. The next year, she was the rector at St. Augustine by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Santa Monica. The reverend moved north in the summer of 2005 after she interviewed for an open position in the pulpit at St. Aidan’s.
Stickney fell in love with the church’s members immediately. She recalled dining with three St. Aidan’s worshippers at a Zuma Beach restaurant.
“We saw these dolphins in the ocean,” Stickney remembered. “That is always a sign of God’s creation and positivity. It resonated with me being close to the ocean, nature. I was sold.”
The preacher brought her tennis racket to Malibu. Stickney started serving, backhanding, and smashing tennis balls at the Malibu Racquet Club around a decade ago. After two of her daughters graduated from Malibu High five years ago, Stickney missed being at the school. The school happened to be looking for a tennis coach, so Stickney was hired.
Stickney has coached the Sharks boys and girls teams to league championships and CIF tournament appearances in her years as coach. She isn’t shy about getting on the court with the Sharks to play doubles during practices.
Stickney also plays with tennis teams in Westlake Village and Calabasas.
Stickney and her husband have fostered numerous children and adopted four. She said being a mom, preacher, and tennis coach cause her to have a busy schedule, but she is meant to work hard.
“I’m called to do all I can in this life,” Stickney noted. “I don’t believe I was created to just benefit myself.”
She said her roles meld together.
“I look at the big picture as a tennis player,” Stickney said. “Who is the strongest player in doubles? How did I earn my last points? If it is not a positive experience,why am I out here?
“[It’s] The same with ministry. It needs to be about joy and working together for the betterment of everybody. It relates to family also. The thing I have gleamed more now is to stay calm and be patient and you will figure it out. Some grace or divine intervention will help you figure it out.”
Mikovich said Stickney exudes the love of Christ.
“She allows everybody to feel the welcome we proclaim on all of our signs,” she said. “We go out of our way here to make sure ‘All our welcome’ doesn’t mean, ‘All our welcome who agree with me.’ Joyce personifies the idea that inclusion is love.”