St. Louis Gathering of Fellows
Partnering with new Americans and refugees to teach skills like cooking and jewelry making. Driving a bus full of fresh groceries into rural areas where seniors don’t have access to stores. Creating resources for churches and faith communities to interrupt sexual violence. These are just some of the social enterprises Invested Faith Fellows have created, working to change unjust systems in their own local communities across the country. All of our Fellows are doing world-changing work, but often they are doing it alone, constantly trying to convince others that their vision is actually going to make a difference.
At Invested Faith we are committed to supporting our Fellows not only through unrestricted grants, but through facilitating connection and responding to their needs. For over two years, Invested Faith Fellows have been meeting on zoom through our RESOURCED program, making virtual connections and sharing good ideas. A few managed to meet up in their areas for lunch or coffee. The connections have been meaningful and have created impact; we knew there could be even more.
We were curious. What would happen if we actually put these scrappy, idea-filled innovators in a room together IRL? What kind of magic would we find?
We decided to find out.
St. Peter’s United Church of Christ in Ferguson, MO
At the same time, the Invested Faith team had been working with Good Faith Media to tell the story of St. Peter’s United Church of Christ in Ferguson, MO. For over a year, we visited and we listened. Along with Cliff Vaughn and Mitch Randall from GFM, we heard the story about the church’s decision to remain in a beloved community. We walked through St. Peter’s cemetery and heard again the story of Michael Brown, who was buried there. We knew the video would be ready for a premiere in January.
What if we put it all together - connecting a church dedicated to solving justice problems in their community with social entrepreneurs working to create change through sustainable businesses across the country? That’s what Invested Faith is all about.
We sent out the invitations and the response was incredible. St. Louis in January? Sure!
Fifteen Fellows made it through snow and ice and travel delays and frigid temperatures to join their colleagues in St. Louis. As the room began to fill up with their arrivals the first night, we watched as the magic we suspected would happen did indeed begin to bubble up. Animated conversations carried the evening into the next day, when we toured St. Louis together, learned about its unique history and development, and engaged in thoughtful conversation relating what we learned to our own settings.
Friday found us working design exercises to dream about our work and how it connected to the work of our colleagues and the work of the Church. Connections long-severed reignited and all that we know to be true about what our faith calls us to do and be in the world came into beautiful focus.
Invested Faith Fellow Boo Milton summed it up well. “I’m so grateful for this because it’s a place where I can connect with other people who are in the work of just spreading light. I’m so grateful for this community, because it’s people who, even though I just met them, I can trust them. I can tell that they have been through some of the same experiences - even though they come from different walks of work and different walks of life. I’m grateful for the community because it’s allowing me to grow, and to thrive and to expand my world view.”
We closed our time together with a celebration, at which friends from St. Peter’s joined us. Scrappy, creative social entrepreneurs laughing with older church leaders told us everything we suspected was true: the Church is not dying…it’s changing.
And God’s work of healing the world takes all of us, working together.
Thanks to Mitch Randall and our friends at Good Faith Media for capturing the highlights of this trip in the short clip below!
More photos from the Gathering!
