Invested Faith Advisor
De’Amon Harges
De’Amon Harges
De’Amon Harges is excited about the creative possibilities at Invested Faith.
“Invested Faith is an attempt to use our imagination to see a theology lived out,” he notes. Harges’ creative work as a faith-based community organizer and speaker reflects his attempt to live out his own theology through connecting neighbors, building community, and ultimately influencing public policy.
A friend coined the title “Roving Listener” for the work Harges does in his community of Indianapolis, Indiana. His gift is listening and discovering the strengths, passions and dreams of his community and finding innovative ways to use those gifts to improve the quality of life for all residents there.
Harges believes in helping people fall in love with each other.
““Stories are powerful in helping shape an image and when we can tell stories that make people want to be with each other, to not see other people as a burden, in that, there’s a possibility for people to love one another. It’s the antithesis of what’s told now. It’s not churches helping those poor folks that is the story. Now, it’s these groups of people who have agency doing God’s work. Let’s bear witness to that and support that. It helps people fall in love with each other.””
Harges is a faculty member at the Asset Based Community Development Institute at DePaul University, and a founder of the Learning Tree, an association of neighbors in Indianapolis that uses ABCD principles to build community. He is frequently asked to speak about ABCD in communities around the world and also puts those principles to work as a layperson at Broadway UMC in Indianapolis, IN.
Featured in the new documentary “The Antidote: On Kindness in America,” Harges is a TEDX speaker, as well as an artist and poet. In 2012, the Kettering Foundation named Harges a social innovator and one of the eight most influential neighborhood organizers on the ground.
Harges describes his role as a “social banker.” His work is based on bringing neighbors and institutions together to discover the power of being a good neighbor. He builds on the strengths that are already present in the neighborhood and uses those assets to empower and connect rather than working from the community’s needs and deficits.
Community development was learned intuitively from his family. His grandfather was an artist who never threw anything away, looking for beauty in broken and reclaimed materials. “We joked and said he did that with people. So I kind of grew up like that. My granddad was like that and my grandmother and so that’s how I really got into it. Even in high school, My sister and brother, we would just always look for people who sat on the other side. I grew up doing it, not necessarily knowing it, but just taking care of people and being a good neighbor.”
As his work developed, Harges made his neighbors his business partners, eventually creating the Learning Tree, and began to get the attention of people at the community and city level. He and his band of “Roving Listeners” found that they could shape the decision-making matrix around public policy in the local community and the city. “We were able to help make visible what was once invisible in low-income neighborhoods.”
Harges met Amy Butler when they shared a panel on faith and finance at the SOCAP conference in San Francisco in 2019. He sees the work of Invested Fatih as an attempt to change two things: philanthropy and the model we use to look at the contribution of God’s kingdom. “Most of that isn’t in the church. A lot of it is in the church but it doesn’t happen on Sunday. Where does it happen? I think Amy has challenged us to go seek.
“And once you seek, you know, it will be a sin to not invest in what’s beautiful. We’re gonna celebrate what people are doing out in the world. It’s a reciprocal contribution, not hoarding all the giving for ourselves. ”
He differentiates between social innovation and social entrepreneurship and cites Nikola Tesla as one of his favorite social innovators. “Social innovators are social inventors. One of my favorite quotes is a 1919 quotes from Tesla. He said ‘The progress of humanity is all dependent on its invention.’ Social innovators are really social inventors.”
Social entrepreneurs are social bankers. “Social entrepreneurs are people who have ideas and they use currencies that aren’t just physical currencies. They are like social bankers. They have this idea that there are things that are important besides physical currencies. They use imagination as a currency, they use stories. Social entrepreneurs are good at telling stories. They’re philanthropic. They actually give without even thinking about reward. And they always gather people.”
The Invested Faith model brings social innovators and social entrepreneurs to the table together. “Here’s a model you can do small things with. It decentralizes the church,” says Harges.
Harges sees beauty in the unknown and undiscovered. “Amy is a great connector. What she's asking people to do is to stop and listen. Not just to give but act and celebrate together. Her connecting is asking people just to pay attention. We don’t know what’s going to happen after this. So stay tuned. Let’s build it together. Some of these things may not work. But what's happening now ain't working either.”
Harges challenges those in churches who have social agency, who serve on boards, and find themselves in places of decision making to use their social currency and social capital to advocate for change.
“Part of the magic of philanthropy is about gathering together and listening to one another. That’s why I’m so excited to do it. What do we discover? “