Gifts

The phrase social innovation is surfacing everywhere.  The European Union has just launched Social Innovation Europe.  The UK has multiple initiatives around social innovation. President Obama has an Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation. The Canadian Government has established awards for social innovation. ...

In 1938 the world was in a depression, war was breaking out in Europe and Al Capone, the gangster, ruled at home. Tough times. In the same year there emerged two comic book superheroes, Superman and Batman. They were...

I’m attending an amazing conference in San Antonio titled “Our Abundant Communities: Neighborly Nourishment in the Wilderness.” Here are my notes from Peter Block’s session titled “Art Calling Out Empire.” (The following notes are close to being quotes but there is...

My recent book, Missional: Joining God in the Neighborhood, argues that forming a mission-shaped life in our time involves the recovery of neighborhood. Congregations must be re-imagined around the location of their members in neighborhoods. This requires us to...

When Jennifer mentioned her goal of becoming a community connector in her review of The Abundant Community, we asked her to write a guest blog so others could share and learn from her experiences. Here is the latest installment in...

I’m attending an amazing conference in San Antonio titled “Our Abundant Communities: Neighborly Nourishment in the Wilderness.” Here are my notes from John McKnight’s session titled “The Gift of Fallibility.” (The following notes are close to being quotes but there is...

If you have a deeply troubling personal problem, where do you turn?  To a cleric? A psychologist? A counselor? A therapist? Each is a hired professional with different approaches to our dilemmas. But suppose they didn’t exist. Where would you...