1. How We Gather is growing!

We’re excited to announce the How We Gather project is growing! We’ve partnered with the Fetzer Institute for another four years, continuing to house the project at Harvard Divinity School. The Fetzer Institute will provide core funding as we launch a system impact effort to help build the infrastructure for belonging and becoming among the roughly 50 million millennials in America who are socially isolated and spiritually unsupported. 

2. Sue Phillips joins the team

In September, we'll joined full time by Rev. Sue Phillips, outgoing New England Regional Lead for the Unitarian Universalist Association. Sue brings decades of organizational and pastoral leadership and an intimate familiarity with the work of innovation from within existing systems. Sue will take the lead on supporting innovative community leaders around the country, as well as engaging religious institutions in coming alongside the emerging community landscape.

3. On Being joins as Core Partner

Further, Krista Tippett and the On Being team will deepen their collaboration with the How We Gather project by joining as core partners. They will continue to host gatherings at On Being Studios on Loring Park in Minneapolis, support the AltDiv learning lab for moral and spiritual leadership, and launch a cohort of ten On Being Fellows to strengthen the connective tissue among emerging community leaders.

4. Cool things to read and check out

• Check out our conversations with Rev. Joseph Deck and Estela Ortega, pictured above with other attendees at our Elder Gathering at On Being. 
• The Sanctuaries team in DC has produced an awesome resource with Sacred Practices for Resilience and Resistance. 
• Fabian and his team have produced Community Canvas - a framework to help you build meaningful communities. An extremely useful tool! 
• Want a stimulating Fourth of July read? Check out the The End of Average (a great social science book with real implications for community design) and Freedom's Prophet (a biography of Richard Allen, one of the founders of the AME Church) and Salsa, Soul, and Spirit (on multicultural leadership) by Juana Bordas, another of our gathered Elders above. 
• What does Facebook's new mission to build meaningful communities mean? Check out CMX's great analysis. 
• Measuring impact can be hard but the Transformational Index is here to help!