Culture Shock? Culture Shift.

This is Part II of this week’s Great Idea(s): Part I supports processing the anger and violence 0f these traumatic days. Part II supports shifting local culture through multi-generational community activism – for the well-being of our political realities and the well-being of our souls.

REIMAGINE LEADERSHIP

‘An expert in the law asked Jesus a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” Jesus said, ” ‘You shall love the Living God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hand all the Law and the Prophets.” – Matthew 22:35b-40

The world is desperate for leaders whose primary object is caring for neighbors and creating a better world for all.

  • Adult: Discover leaders and movements that embody grace and wisdom in Toni Morrison’s, The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations (Vintage).
  • Youth: Auntie Kristina’s Guide to Asian American Activism (Beaming): a perfect invitation to celebrate AAPI Heritage Month while grounding readers in ‘diverse lived experiences of featured Auntie Heroes and inspiring Young Rebels’, while discussing Asian American community, allyship, movements, and practices of love and self-care.
  • Youth & Adults: How to Respond (Peer Ministry), is a ‘powerful resource [for adults and older youth] that will help move from conflict to connection – and keep relational doors open’, as folx learn to:
    • lower defensiveness without giving up beliefs;
    • show genuine understanding in tense moments;
    • know when (and if) it’s wise to share one’s perspective.
  • Children: Artivist (Kokila) is ‘a call to action for young readers to point out injustices in their lives and try to heal the broken bones of the world through their art’.

REIMAGINE ACTIVISM: COMPASSION IN COMMUNITY

‘For justice will return to the righteous, and all the upright in heart will follow it.

Who rises up for me against the wicked?

Who stands up for me against evildoers?

If the Holy One had not been my help, my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence.’ – Psalm 94:15-17

Some call activism, ‘praying with our feet’. Some call activism, ‘loving our neighbor out loud’. We stand for and with our neighbors as we develop courageous, compassionate leaders by boldly engaging in civic discourse and action.

  • Adults: Protest: Respect It Defend It Use It (Patagonia) ‘offers a powerful look at the role peaceful activism has played in advancing the public good–and shines a light on the urgent need to protect this democratic right. This is not a how-to guide, [but] a celebration of what collective action can achieve…’
  • Adults: Compassion in Practice: The Way of Jesus, Revised Edition (Upper Rooms) offers “specific practices for compassionate social activism, more interfaith conversations, and a ‘compassion compass’ to help orient [along] the path of healing.”
  • Youth: Make Good Trouble (DK Children), which ‘explores famous moments of global activism throughout history with more than 70 narrative stories’.
  • Youth: Compassion Camp: Youth Edition (Illustrated Ministry), is built around ‘what every living thing needs’ and can be ‘used across many different contexts’ – including intergenerational – ‘to bring the theme [of compassion] to your community’.
  • Short read: Diana Butler Bass’s Sunday Musings, The Spaciousness of God (05.02.26), turns exclusionary interpretations of Jesus as, ‘the way, the truth, and the life’ into an appreciation of, ‘Openness. A shared search, a common hope. A home with and in God. A home with many dwellings, a multiplicity of habitation. A spacious God.’