This fall our Parish began work with the Southeast Organizing Cohort. Our leadership has been through trainings like this several times now, most recently with the Parish Collective cultural lab program in late 2019. Our hope in joining this time was to have a chance to connect with other churches in our neighborhood and to reflect on what God is calling us to now, especially when it comes to our idea to start an entrepreneurial, mission based business to achieve sustainability as a parish.
Our first step in the program of organizing is to set up a variety of conversations called 1 to 1s, often written as 1:1. These conversations are about relationship building. They are exercises in deep listening. I love this idea as it is a ways to practice the holy work of incarnation, of being present. You get to ask people cool questions like what do you dream for the neighborhood or what untold stories of our community should be heard. It’s a type of engagement that is so different from the transactional encounters that mark so much of our society. The entire purpose of a 1:1 is simply to connect.
The next step of organizing is holding house meetings. These are small meetings around a set topic. For example when we were thinking about starting Steele Street School we held a series of these listening sessions around the needs of children in our neighborhood and engaged in asset based community mapping to contemplate the resources we held as a community to address the needs of children. House meetings remind me of the early church. Small ground of people who were determined to love their neighbors and used what they had to do so!
From here it’s time to take action. Maybe that’s engaging in advocacy like writing letters to the editor or testifying in front of law makers. Sometimes it’s starting a ministry or a program like Steele Street School or a community garden. Sometimes it’s connecting others to build relational capacity. There are lots of possible expressions. I always think this is like the holy spirit rushing in like on Pentecost, filling the people with fire so that they could speak with and transform the world.
And then it’s time to go back to 1:1s. This is a cyclical way of being. It’s a constant pattern of connection, collaboration, and change. It is such a holy, person-centered way to relate to the places where we live and it matches so much the ways of the early church.
The coolest thing to come out of this latest iteration of our work in organizing so far has been a connection with the pastors of All Saints Episcopal (Andria Skornik) and Moreland Presbyterian (Brian Marsh). We have decided to meet quarterly to talk about ministry in the neighborhood and how our 3 faith communities can walk together. I am excited to see what God is unfolding in this new connection.
-Eilidh
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