Rooted in Christ, Close to the Earth
A report from the 2007 Annual Gathering
by Mardi Tindal, president
On May 10th to 13th, about 20 of us from centres and movements across North America gathered at Kirkridge Retreat and Study Center in Bangor Pennsylvania. “Rooted in Christ and close to the earth,” a phrase from Kirkridge’s own mission statement, describes our gathering and our longing as individuals and centres in this diverse network known as Oikosnet North America (ONA).
With the theme of Common Grounds for Peace, we explored
various aspects of peace-making.
For many of us it was an opportunity to find a bit of personal
peace away from the daily demands of our own retreat centres (it’s
difficult to retreat in one’s own place of work!). We also
came to peace with the discovery that our challenges and dreams
are shared with others in this network; peace is found in knowing
that we are not alone in our vision and struggle. And good learning
about how to make peace with God’s green earth and with those
with whom we find 
ourselves in conflict, provided skills with which
we’ve returned to our home centres and related work. Fletcher
Harper of Green
Faith
gave us good insight into how we can move more deeply into care
of the earth at our centres. (Related trips to Genesis Farms and
Columcille were also enjoyable excursions by which to be rooted
in Christ, close to the earth.)
We long to support and complement one another’s work, so
explored, for example, how Janet Chisholm’s excellent leadership
(Kirkridge) on Creating a Culture of Peace complements how
Tatamagouche and Spirit in the Desert are nurturing the Dialogue
for Peaceful Change initiative of Oikosnet. We compared notes
on some of our most successful and faithful program initiatives
of the past year across all of our centres, and took action to
move the work of this North American network forward, in concert
we hope with our colleagues in other regions of our global Oikosnet
network.
A number of ONA Executive members are working on the following projects:
- Planning for a joint meeting and program with our South American Oikosnet colleagues (Conosur) in 2009
- Planning our first collaborative pilgrimage, to Iona in September of 2008
- Developing joint-marketing initiatives, and exploring how we might share program leadership across our centres
- Further developing and regularly updating our website with the help of Mary Gabel, our communications coordinator
- Compiling worship resources across our centres
- Reviewing our constitution and by-laws so that they reflect the kind of organizational reality which we desire
Our next gathering will take place May 12th to May 15th (2008)
at Naramata Centre (Naramata, British Columbia, Canada) and between
now and then the following executive members will meet regularly
by phone: Mardi Tindal (President), Jean Richardson (Vice President),
Sally Simmel (Past President), Lawrence Pentelow (Secretary Treasurer),
Paul Campbell (US rep) and Andrew Church (Cdn rep).
2008
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