Victoria Scott-Miller, Liberation Station, Raleigh, NC

Liberation Station is North Carolina’s first Black-owned children’s bookstore. The bookstore specializes in children’s literature by Black creators that focuses on positive Black narratives and characters.

Katie Kenyon, Village Green RVA, Richmond, Virginia

Village Green RVA strives to make healthy food and family support accessible to the underserved community. Focusing on children in care (foster, adoptive, kinship, biological) and their families, single parent, and senior adults, the program will offer healthy and sustainable food while providing supportive life and career programs.

Nelson Crabbe and Nikola Rodriguez, ‘Awa Bird Nursery, Hilo, Hawai’i

‘Awa Bird Nursery is a small organic nursery committed to growing ancestral Hawaiian crops, including kalo (taro), ulu (breadfruit), and ‘awa (kava). These sister plants often grown together, are called '“canoe plants" because they were so important to the ancestors that they made it onto the canoes. Local availability of these crops will increase food security for native Hawaiians, offering locals more affordable, healthy options for food and beverages.

Jen Owens, FORAI, St. Louis, Missouri

Forai, Inc., is a faith-based, Christian 501(c)3 organization partnering with local refugee and immigrant women to enable the realization of economic, educational, and social goals through training and peer support, and by expanding market opportunities for artisans. Located in South City, St. Louis, MO, FORAI (Friends of Refugees and Immigrants) provides home-based and in-workshop incomes for women who can’t work outside home because of a barrier such as childcare needs or caring for another family member. FORAI offers artisan made jewelry and crafts to the St. Louis community. 

Josh Hayashi, Mission Management Company, Honolulu, Hawai’i:

Mission Management Company provides churches with alternative property based income options by matching them with mission-aligned partners who range from non-profits to real estate developers. MMC works with both churches in decline and thriving churches who need assistance in fully utilizing the assets of their church facility.

Mina Aria and Antajuan Adams, New Roots Urban Farm, St. Louis, MO

Mina Aria and Antajuan Adams run New Roots Urban Farm on reclaimed urban land, providing healthy local food plus urban farming resources and education for their low-income North St. Louis community. Recently devastated by fire, the farm is being revitalized and expanded, with a greenhouse and outdoor kitchen, chickens, and bees.

Marisa Prince and Calvin Lee, [GOSPEL], Boston, Massachusetts

Marisa Prince and Calvin Lee founded [GOSPEL] as an initiative to curate creative spaces and campaigns to catalyze more for the American Christian Church. [GOSPEL] innovates disruptive faith formation strategies to eradicate our country’s biggest problems.

Emanuel ‘Boo’ Milton, Cure with Love Strategies, Baton Rouge, LA

Cure with Love Strategies creates spaces of hope through social impact initiatives and consults with companies, educators, non­ profits, and governments on best practices for serving their communities. Through programs like C.H.I.L.L, a conflict resolution program for teens, and Spark Box, Social Emotional Learning kits for children, Milton offers hope and connection for disadvantaged youth in Baton Rouge.

Kerry Brodie, Emma’s Torch, Washington DC

Kerry Brodie founded Emma’s Torch with the mission of empowering refugees, asylees, and survivors of human trafficking through culinary education. Now opening a location in Washington DC, Emma's Torch provides refugees with in-depth culinary training as well as employability, equity, and empowerment training. Read more about Kerry Brodie here.

Kamaile Pahukoa, Ke’anae Market, Maui, Hawai’i

Ke’anae Market was created by Kamaile Pahukoa, granddaughter of one of the church members of Ke'anae Congregational Church on the island. The market offers local vendors, farmers, and artists the chance to sell their products on the heavily traveled tourist road to Hana. Vendors at the market include farmers, local artists, bakers (the area is famous for banana bread), and candy makers.

Due to the legacy of colonization, generational poverty, and racism in Hawai’i, The church is in danger of losing their property; funds from the market will help with church expenses, maintenance and restoration. Read more about Kamaile’s work here.

Dustin Mailman, Deep Time Coffee, Asheville, North Carolina

Deep Time Coffee offers spiritual community, employment and personal development for persons impacted by incarceration. Located in Asheville, NC, Deep Time is developing a social enterprise that begins with roasting coffee. Mailman has purchased a coffee roaster and has begun selling coffee through popups and word of mouth, hiring returning citizens (recently incarcerated) who face overwhelming barriers to employment. Founder Dustin Mailman is a United Methodist pastor in Asheville who offers a “ministry of loitering” - connecting with those on the streets, the unhoused, and marginalized.

Nikole Lim, Freely in Hope, Berkeley, California

Freely in Hope is dedicated to equipping survivors and advocates to lead in ending sexual violence. Currently working in Zambia and Kenya, Freely in Hope is publishing a first children's book, promoting body automony and safety, which will be offered in the US along with a faith-based safe touch and body autonomy curriculum for churches and other organizations. Founder Nikole Lim is a survivor-advocate and educator on restorative storytelling and survivor-leadership models. Read more about Nikole Lim here.

Anna Clark, Lady 280, Colorado Springs, Colorado

Lady 280 is a safe, inclusive hair salon located in Colorado Springs, CO which also offers services for victims of sexual trafficking and violence. Founder and owner Anna Clark works with victims of violence whose hair has been shaved, dyed, or burned by those abusing and exploiting them as a "stamp of ownership" and as a way to make them look less reliable to law enforcement. She often works with clients just prior to court appearances for charges against their abusers to help provide confidence and to enhance their standing in the eyes of the court.

Carmelle Beaugelin, BeauFolio Studios, Princeton, New Jersey

BeauFolio Studio is an emerging art house at the intersection of Sacred Art, humancentered design, and restorative equity. Founder Carmelle Beaugelin, a Haitian- American multidisciplinary artist, offers CreatioDivina workshops, creativity consulting, and other opportunities to create art in worship spaces, as well as Lenten and other worship resources and commissioned art.

Johnetta Roberts, Blak Koffee, Louisville, Kentucky

Located in a newly renovated building in the West End of Louisville, a red-lined, low-income area, Blak Koffee was born when Roberts, trying to schedule a business meeting, couldn’t find a coffee shop with internet access in the neighborhood. Currently, Blak Koffee is run as a coffee cart “under the stairwell,” but will open in their own space in early 2023. Read more about Johnetta and Blak Koffee here.

Alexander Clemetson, Franklin County, Ohio, Together We Compost

Together We Compost is a Black-owned compost collection and creation service that works to ensure that members of the BIPOC community are offered equal access to composting collection.TWC offers compost services for residences and businesses along with education and consulting around composting, the climate crisis, and food accessibility. Read more about Alexander here.

Robert Rueda, Global Blends Coffee Shop and Deli, Edinburg, Texas

Global Blends Coffee Shop and Deli is a “pay what you can” coffee shop and deli located on the campus of the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, on the Texas-Mexico border. After a study found that 40% of students at the university experienced hunger on an ongoing basis, Rueda opened the coffee shop, which offers affordable or no-cost food, along with leadership training and job skills for the students employed there.

Chelsea Spyres, Wilmington, Delaware, Wilmington Kitchen Collective

The Wilmington Kitchen Collective utilizes church kitchens, which sit empty and unused most of the week, to offer culinary entrepreneurs an affordable option for high-quality commercial kitchen facilities. The kitchens are used by caterers, food truck owners, bakers and other start-ups, helping entrepreneurs overcome a major obstacle in starting their business. Through the Kitchen Collective, Spyres offers advocacy, community, and pastoral care for the entrepreneurs. Read more about Chelsea and the Wilmington Kitchen Collective here.

Collective, Sanctified Art, Black Mountain, North Carolina

Sanctified Art is an artist collective that provides progressive visual art, poetry, and other creative resources for liturgical worship. Sanctified Art helps worshiping communities integrate art and creativity into their spiritual practice using resources with inclusive and affirming theology and an expanded imagination around the divine image. Creative team members include Rev. Lauren Wright Pittman, Rev. Anna Strickland, Rev. Lisle Gwynn Garrity, Hannah Garrity, and Rev. Sarah A. Speed. Read more about A Sanctified Art here.

Tiffany Terrell, Albany, Georgia, A Better Way Grocers

Tiffany Terrell created the Mobile Grocery Store concept for A Better Way Grocers in 2017 after recognizing the deep need of local residents in surrounding food deserts. The mission of A Better Way Grocers is to drive nutritious food into communities struggling with food access issues across southwest Georgia. Using a retro-fitted school bus as a one-aisle grocery store, Terrell and her team offer reasonably priced, healthy and nutritious food to local communities, along with health education to address chronic food-related illnesses such as diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Read more about Tiffany Terrell and A Better Way Grocers here.