Stella Zuniga Burkhalter was born and raised on a ranch just on the edge of Laredo, Texas. She is the youngest of 10 children, which gives her lots of good stories.
Stella graduated from St. Augustine High School and The University of Texas at Austin, where she earned a BS with honors in Advertising from the School of Communication. She is married to Hunter Burkhalter, with whom she ventured west and lived in El Paso, Texas for 6 years working in the nonprofit world. She has two adult children who were raised in Austin. Stella was a stay-at-home mom for 10 years, engaging in free-lance copy writing.
Stella attended Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, where she earned a Master of Divinity degree in 2010. She was ordained in the United Methodist Church and has served as pastor at Oak Hill and Covenant United Methodist Churches in Austin, Texas, and currently serves at Kyle United Methodist Church.
Stella loves to write and preach. She produced a weekly blog for several years as well as a series of virtual pilgrimage videos on Facebook. She loves the outdoors and spends as much time as she can at the Burkhalter cabin at the edge of Art, Texas.