Make A Donation
Click Here >
1001 new worshiping communities
1001 New Worshiping Communities hosted a conversation for online and hybrid church leaders at the Wild Goose Festival in mid-July. Started in 2011, the four-day spirit, justice, music and arts festival took place at VanHoy Farms Family Campground in Union Grove, North Carolina.
The creativity, resilience and commitment of new immigrant churches in the PC(USA) are reasons to celebrate. Since the success of a conference focused on new immigrant worshiping communities in Atlanta held in 2023, 1001 New Worshiping Communities has been planning opportunities for regional gatherings of immigrant church leaders.
“What’s the worst that could happen?” musician Ike Sturm asked his co-composer and bandmate, Jesse Lewis, as they stood with their instruments and recording gear on top of a glacier in Alaska.
Lewis answered, “There’s a lot on the line, actually.” Sturm and Lewis make up the atmospheric jazz and folk acoustic duo Endless Field. Lewis, a guitarist, and Sturm, a bassist, compose and record songs out in the wild.
Sturm is also the convener of a new worshiping community that meets in the Times Square neighborhood of New York City. He is the latest guest on the 1001 New Worshiping Communities movement’s podcast, “New Way,” hosted by the Rev. Sara Hayden and produced by the Rev. Marthame Sanders.
The Rev. Neema Cyrus-Franklin, Around the Table’s project coordinator for its nationwide initiative supporting faith practices in the home, recently appeared as a guest on the “New Way” podcast.
“Finally!” was all my United Methodist friend had to text me when I asked how their General Conference was going. While I echo their relief, I know the recovery period for my LGBTQIA+ siblings is far from being final. Presbyterians stand as proof that the vote is sometimes the easiest part of change
The latest installment in the “New Way” podcast of the 1001 New Worshiping Communities movement includes a conversation about the formative years experienced by Minister Antonia Coleman, who works in the PC(USA)’s Office of Innovation and its Center for the Repair of Historic Harms. Listen to Coleman’s discussion with “New Way” host the Rev. Sara Hayden here.
“We don’t rise to the level of our goals; we fall to the level of our processes,” says the Rev. Dr. Jason Whitehead, a pastor and social worker who has co-created the Daily Ripple app as a model for spiritual formation and the meeting space of a new worshiping community.
“I was raised to see that faith and justice were completely linked, and so I just think it’s about living out one’s faith,” says the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, who talks with the Rev. Sara Hayden on the New Way podcast about being raised by an activist mother and where she is finding hope and challenge in her own activism and motherhood today.
The Labyrinth Café and Gathering Place is a campus ministry for Tulane University and the University of New Orleans in uptown New Orleans. “It’s a community center where people can gather and ask deep questions about life and faith,” said the Rev. Zoë Garry, campus minister and director of the Labyrinth.
When it comes to “Spirit-inspired worship,” the Rev. Veronica Cannon sets a very high standard and advises that churches and the people who attend them not compromise.
