Anti-Racism

We denounce white supremacy. As a diverse community, we are committed to practicing anti-racism.

We are learning how institutional racism has corrupted our freedom and sabotaged loving relationships with our neighbors. Together we read books, watch films, and listen carefully to understand the systemic injustice that Black, Indigenous and People of Color have experienced and continue to experience daily and unrelentingly.

Learning, we act to change our personal ways of thinking, our institutional inertia and our unjust social policies.

We protest the unfair treatment of BIPOC by marching, sitting, voting, writing and singing.

We practice resistance through generous conversation, sharing food, and singing joy and lament.

We do community as an endeavor of making a new world. What Jesus called the Kingdom of God calls for uprooting toxic traditions, calling out offensive language and putting ourselves in the way of the culture.

We try things and make mistakes. We fail and feel stupid, we apologize and grow.

As long as whiteness is considered normative and the central locus of power, we are explicitly called to these commitments.

Feminism

As a diverse community, we are committed to practicing active feminism.

Our society values men more than women, boys more than girls. Men’s fear and hatred of women’s power, bodies, giftedness and influence seems archaic, yet whether it’s on the playground, in the workplace, in the public media, in legislation, or in church we acknowledge how patriarchy continues to be at work in insidious and powerful ways.

In resistance, we educate ourselves, listen carefully to one another, celebrate the feminine and check our behavior against unfair or patronizing traditions of the past. 

In conversation and formal gatherings, we practice language that affirms the feminine alongside the masculine. Speaking of hypothetical or unknown persons, we practice not defaulting to “he.” We employ a wildly creative range of models and metaphors for the Divine and enjoy using both gendered and non-gendered pronouns.

Understanding the injustice to women and girls, we speak, we sing, we pray, we march, we sit, we write, and we vote— striving to shape the world with the influence of girls and women.

As long as maleness is considered normative and the central locus of power, we are explicitly called to these commitments.

Full Celebration LGBTQIA+

As a diverse community, we are committed to full celebration of those of us identifying as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, gender fluid, non-binary, asexual, pansexual or any other description they choose. 

We recognize the injustice, hatred and violence that our society has imposed on the queer community. From disrespectful portrayals in the media to national legislation, we’ve lived in an intolerable culture of intolerance.

As a community, we strive to be way beyond “tolerance,” beyond “acceptance,” beyond “inclusion,” beyond “welcoming," to embody a full celebration of and deep gratitude for LGBTQIA+ folx.

As long as hetero-sexual, cis-gendered identity is considered normative and the central locus of power, we are explicitly called to these commitments.

Anti-Consumer

We live in a society that values individualism, productivity, consumption, greed, and status. 

We protest consumer culture by living the ongoing practice of giving ourselves to one another in community. Shalom is a Hebrew term for shared prosperity and holistic well-being. We practice shalom by recognizing we are connected; each of us has a stake in one another’s goodness of life.

We practice generosity in sharing time, energy, attention, and resources. 

We encourage one another to live in a sustainable groove of work, play and rest. 

In big and small ways, we make efforts to mitigate the divide between rich and poor and use language that carries dignity for every person.

Amid action and public doing, we also practice being as a way of liberation.

As long as our society is driven by the crushing expectations of consumerism and individual productivity, we are explicitly called to these commitments.

Creation and Ecology

As a diverse community, we are committed to living as good neighbors with complex ecosystems of soil, sea, and sky and the many species that live in and among them.

As a matter of tradition, humanity has placed itself in the center of the world, making decisions for its own good often at the expense of other species’ livelihoods or existence. Policies and practices of our state and federal government continue to ignore the destructive effects of human imposition on life all over our small planet.

We are even accustomed to considering the non-human natural world “the environment,” as if our creaturely neighbors and ecosystems were so much staging for our species’ spotlight.

We educate ourselves about the ramifications of choices, current legislation toward change, and new and old ways to live well.

We practice choices that help sustain our planet for coming generations of humans, dragonflies, gorillas and blue whales.

As long as the interests of the human species are considered normative at the expense of the whole of creation, we are explicitly called to these commitments.

Non-Jerk Christianity

As a diverse community in a pluralistic world, we are committed to respecting religious traditions (and no tradition) other than Christianity. 

Particularly, as of the writing of this charter, we have in mind our beloveds of Islam, Judaism, and non-religious traditions such as agnostic and atheist persons.

Christianity has historically been intolerant of other religions. For good reason, Christians have a reputation for holding a violently superior attitude over people of other traditions. From the crusades centuries ago to today’s headlines, there is evidence of the Christian church and her members being among the most destructive, judgy, unkind forces on our planet. 

We educate ourselves in the ways the Christian faith has been misinterpreted by politics, power, fear and greed to diminish the dignity of people who were not raised in a Christian context.

We recognize the harm that has been done and try our best to heal through conversation, education, art and a culture of generous orthodoxy. 

We practice a theology that celebrates Imago Dei, the divine image in each and every element of creation.

We cultivate and practice a Jesus Way that is distinctive and not imposing on others. This Way calls us to bless our neighbor’s traditions, spiritual practices, ideas, thoughts, feelings, and experiences. The Jesus Way is incompatible with superiority, greed, and agendas for conversion. Instead, the Jesus Way leads us to humility and to be in friendly relationship.

As long as the perception of Christianity is considered normative, dominant and the central locus of power, we are explicitly called to these commitments.