Meet Becky
Author. Theatre artist. Educator. Listener.
I'm Becky Malas, founder of Akouete Ministries. My work brings together Scripture, storytelling, theatre, education, and intentional listening to create spaces where stories can be encountered, shared, and heard.
Why Akouete Exists
It started with fifteen women willing to listen.
In September 2014, director Tara Brooke Watkins invited me and fourteen other women to gather around the stories of women in Scripture. Each week, we talked about one woman's story, shared pieces of our own, and explored those experiences through theatre.
Those conversations became The Bible Women's Project.
What began as a single production grew into years of performances and touring throughout the United States and Canada, including the New York International Fringe Festival. But what stayed with me most happened after the performances.
Women talked.
They shared stories. They wrestled with difficult passages. They recognized pieces of themselves in women they had encountered in Scripture. And again and again, someone would ask:
"Now what?"
That question stayed with me. What happens after we encounter a story? What changes when we make room to hear someone else's?
Akouete Ministries grew from those questions.
The name comes from the Biblical Greek command Ἀκούετε (akouete): “Listen.”
Through theatrical testimony, devotional writing, workshops, gatherings, and other creative experiences, Akouete creates opportunities to encounter Scripture in new ways, share our own stories, and practice listening to one another and to God.
An Unlikely Combination
Science taught me to ask questions. Theatre taught me to enter a story.
My path to ministry has never followed a straight line. My background spans science, education, instructional design, theatre, writing, and performance.
At first, those worlds may seem unrelated. I have come to see them differently. Science taught me to look closely and ask better questions. Education taught me to create space for discovery. Theatre taught me to step inside another person's story. Scripture continues to teach me what it means to listen.
Akouete lives at the intersection of those practices.
The Invitation
I believe stories can change the way we see Scripture, one another, and ourselves.
Akouete is an invitation to slow down long enough to listen.
~"Your story belongs.
Your voice matters.
I'm listening."~
Wherever you encounter Akouete through a book, a theatrical testimony, a conversation, or a gathering, I hope you leave a little more curious about someone else's story and a little more willing to share your own.