Community Expressions

Community Beliefs and Values are best seen and not just heard.  From the deserts of Arizona to the glaciers of Scandanavia to the rain forests of Southeast Asia, these commmunity-enhancing, foot-to-ground expressions will look similar because of the same creativity and connectedness guiding any person from any time in any town to live out their beliefs and values.  Here is a sample of how these look in a small Southwestern rural town, based upon how various members have individually chosen to live out their faith.  These are the ways in which many of us spell “good news.”

• The Schoolhouse Cooperative – a secular preschool and elementary/middle school cooperative that seeks to educate children in a more communal, sustainable, and holistic way, so they can better make a difference in the world.  Rather than pursuing the accumulation of content, the school pursues the formation of character, creativity, and curiosity in its students on a three acre farm.
• First Fridays/Second Saturdays in Vida E Caffe and Poets on the Rez – three monthly venues in our locale designed to promote artistic expression and the cultivation of community relationships around the arts.  With roots in mining and The Wild West, the arts have not been a celebrated and integral part of our regional ethos.  We believe that the celebration of beauty, the expansion of the imagination, and the discovery of one’s “voice” are an important part of a community’s well-being.
• Promotion of the Arts – In addition to these venues, individuals work in and alongside our city’s art center to help promote local artists’ visual and performing arts work.  Some also engage in the arts ourselves, participating as actors, stage assistants, vocal instructors, musical directors, and assistant directors to numerous theatrical works performed in our city.
• The Arizona Outback/Caffeinated Ventures Ecotourism – a forthcoming and green business venture designed to help individuals and groups to better connect with the beauty of God’s creation.  This business will help promote tourism to and business consumption in our local city while also engaging body, soul, and spirit of customers we take on photo-stalking shoots, personal or group retreats, contemplative outdoor excursions/walkabouts, low to mid-impact wilderness/water adventures, or Man vs. Wild-type survival challenges.
• City Government – While still firmly believing in the wisdom of the Church’s separation from the State, the need for inspirational, visionary, and upstanding civic leadership remains — regardless of what city in which you live.   One individual’s involvement in city leadership has helped beautify the downtown district, bring tourism and new kinds of business ventures to the city, and also provide the infrastructure for green projects and additional family-friendly recreation to a region that has historically relied on mines for its revenue stream.
• Alternative Juvenille Corrections and New Business Incubator – a multi-purpose center designed to assist Native American juveniles with transition back into society by providing housing, counseling/mentoring, life-skills (farming), and education (GED and credit recovery).  In addition to helping  juveniles, it also creates new educational and environment-friendly business opportunities (community gardens on 60+ acres of land and brick sales from recycled glass) for tribal residents in need of work.
• Education for a Nation – Individuals are working to assist the high number of tribal high school students in one Native American Reservation who drop out and later discover they are unemployable as adults with families to care for.   Over 60 students have passed their GED and moved on to college, vocational school, or new employment opportunities. In addition to this, individuals also educate children in the the joys of gardening, parents in the necessity of childhood literacy, single mothers in the how-tos of child care, and community college students in songwriting and in the art and science of digital photography.
• Fitness, Medical and Personal Wellness – Beyond improving the mind, individuals are also providing physical, medical, and nutritional education for our region that suffers from an inordinate amount of childhood obesity and early onset diabetes.  Individuals educate parents and young adults in these areas, medically screen and treat their families, and also provide recreational/fitness opportunities for them to lose weight, learn self-defense, and take greater personal responsibility for their and their family’s health, diet, and personal wellness.   They also provide professional medical care for invalid patients, birthing mothers, and those in need of respiratory and vision assistance.