Sign up at mtview.org/listening-campaign.
Out of love for our church members, our wider community, and our world, we will be conducting a Listening Campaign to hear your joys and concerns around societal issues. A core team of “listeners,” Trudy Gygi, Pua Aki, Jean Bowen, Gary Schmitz, and Bruce Fest hope to meet you and hear what you have to say.
Ideally through one-to-one conversations with all (or most) of you–we hope to hear how you are doing, about anxieties as well as optimism, so we can work to discern which societal and community issues are important to our church family. This process will help us determine how best to partner with an organization like Together Colorado, made up of “people of various faith traditions organizing to create a better world.”
Together Colorado is “a nonpartisan, multi-racial and multi-faith community organization working to place human dignity at the center of public life in Colorado,” where “faith drives us to organize for a better world for our children and our children’s children…. to create a society where everyone can thrive, without exception.” “Partnering” with Together Colorado can happen in several ways and on many different levels. Trudy Gygi, Pua Aki, and Pastor Stephanie are individual members of Together Colorado; members of a church or a whole church can be a Local Organizing Committee that focuses on a specific issue; church members or churches can join the Boulder County Together Colorado Organizing Group; or churches can become member congregations of Together Colorado and participate in socially transformative faith work that way. More information about Together Colorado can be found at togethercolorado.org.
“Organizing to create a better world” is another way to say bringing about God’s Kingdom on Earth, or creating the Beloved Community, and also aligns with the Social Principles of the Methodist Church.
The Mountain View Listening Campaign will begin in January. We plan to schedule and conduct Listening Campaign sessions before and after church on Sundays and on Wednesday afternoons/evenings. Information on how to sign up for a one-to-one session with a Listening Campaign core team member will be forthcoming – stay tuned for Friday email blasts and Sunday bulletin announcements! We earnestly hope you’ll all sign up for and participate in Mountain View’s season of listening as an act of love to bring about affirming transformation in the world.