Spirit in Action

JONAH - Joining Our Neighbors Advancing Hope

We visit with 3 congregationally-based organizers about JONAH (Joining Our Neighbors Advancing Hope), MICAH (Milwaukee Interfaith Congregations Allied for Hope) and WISDOM. Jonah is a new Chippewa Valley effort to link congregations working together progressively for the good of all.

Duration:: 59m
Broadcast on:: 24 Dec 2006
Audio Format:: mp3

I have no hands but yours to tend my sheep. No handkerchief but yours to dry the eyes of those who weep. I have no arms but yours with which to hold. The ones grown weary from the struggle and weak from growing old. I have no hands but yours with which to see. To let my children know that I am out and out is everything. I have no way to feed the hungry souls. No clothes to give and make it the ragged and the morn. So be my heart, my hand, my tongue, through you I will be done. The enders have I none to help them down. Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpsmeet. Each week I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service. Above all, I'll seek out light, love and helping hands, being shared between our many neighbors on this planet, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. I have no way to open people's eyes except that you will show them how to trust the inner mind. Welcome to Spirit in Action. Today we'll visit with three congregationally based organizers about Jonah, which is joining our neighbors advancing hope, Micah, which is the Milwaukee Interfaith Congregations Allied for Hope and Wisdom, a statewide organization. Jonah is a new Chippewa Valley effort to link congregations working together progressively for the good of all. Our guests are Joe Alwanger, a retired Lutheran Minister, David Liners, a former Catholic priest and Paul Opadol, a local Lutheran minister here in Eau Claire. They'll be talking about how to organize a grassroots effort for congregations to make a difference in our state and world. Thank you, Joe, David and Paul, for joining me for Spirit in Action. This is Joe Alwanger and I'm glad to be here and to be a part of this discussion. As David Liners, I'm the Director of the Wisdom Organization, Congregation-Based Organizing Around the State, and I'm also very pleased to be with you today. Paul Leskey Opadol. I'm the Associate Pastor at Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd here in Eau Claire, and I hope to bring more of a local perspective on the issue regarding congregational-based community organizing. Paul, you're the ringleader to get these peoples into town here today. Why did you bring them here? Me being the ringleader, I don't know, it's kind of a cyclical thing because in some ways I got encouraged into this through a statewide initiative treatment instead of prison through Joe and David. As we got involved in that over the last couple of years, we began to see a need for a more formal organization and more formal organizing here in the Chippewa Valley area. David, from my perspective, saw in me the possibility of someone coordinating that organizing, and fortunately through the Spirit, I think we've had some others that have risen to the surface like Diane Dawson, I'm Chippewa Falls, and Alta Bragg, who have really helped make what we've been able to accomplish thus far a reality. What we're doing now and what brings us together here at this particular time is just one more milestone in the progression towards a more formal organization and a more formal presence here in the Chippewa Valley that sort of, through conversations with everybody that's been involved, it was decided that we'll call ourselves Jonah. So we've got represented here Jonah, we've got Wisdom, we've got connections to groups called Amos and Micah, and, oh, we didn't get Obadiah, did we? No Obadiah, Joshua Esther, David, you're the director for Wisdom, what is Wisdom? And I don't mean philosophically, I mean organizationally. Wisdom is an organization of organizations where congregations, all told right now around the state belonging to us are about 125 congregations, were 15 different religious denominations ranging from Muslim to Jewish to Catholic to Unitarian, Quaker, you name it, well not quite you name it, but almost every major religious tradition that we're certainly open to everyone. And what we do is we organize, we organize people to live out their values, we organize people to build relationships with each other and to identify the ways that they want to put their values into practice in the world, I think, Wisdom and its various local groups, whether in Milwaukee or Green Bay or hopefully here soon, we're not content with just sitting in the church basement and talking about what's wrong with the world and how we wish it was different. But we really want to organize people to actually make a real life difference, and in the process, make a difference in our own lives by actually realizing that we actually can make a difference, that we can do something. So a big part of what we do is leadership development, a big part of what we do is relationship building and then a part of what we do is actually using our relationships, using our newfound strength to make some differences, whether it's in areas like healthcare or treatment instead of prison that Pastor Paul just mentioned or schools or whatever. And I'm guessing that there is some meaning behind WIS, DOM, what does that stand for? Actually, it doesn't. Wisdom is an acronym in search of what it stands for. We got as far as the WIS, we like that for Wisconsin. And then we never figured out the DOM, but once we hit Wisdom, we said, "Well, this is what we ought to be." So our motto, which we take from St. Paul, is that we need to be demonstrating God's Wisdom to the powers and principalities. So we kind of hit the motto, we hit the name, and said to heck with it, if it doesn't stand for anything, we'll just go with Wisdom. David, is there a particular slant to this organization? Can you say people living out their values? I think there are, I mean, there's the moral majority out there or various other groups who I think they think are living out their values. Is there a particular slant to Wisdom and its associated congregations? One of the things that needs to be in place for somebody to be a member of Wisdom or one of its affiliates is a real desire to be involved in interfaith things. Another is that we refuse to be single issue people. We don't want to narrow. I think one of our feelings as members of Wisdom is that perhaps certain people in the Christian Church have really narrowed the definition of what it is to put your values into action in the world. We really believe that our faith values need to be heard in discussions particularly about how the poor are dealt with, about how children are dealt with, about matters of equity. We believe that the faith community's voice needs to be heard as much in the criminal justice system as it does around questions of marriage and actually the president, just past president of our organization just had a great line and she said that as a Christian I refuse to believe that the only thing we can be concerned about is where to put the Ten Commandments and who gets to marry whom. There's a lot more other things that we believe that as followers of Jesus we need to be involved or not just followers of Jesus as people of faith that we need to be involved in in every aspect of our life that God cares about needs to be an aspect of life that we care about. I don't know that that was exactly just a slip. I mean you come from a Christian perspective. You mentioned Muslims, Unitarians and certainly there's some diverse spirituality represented there. What is the spiritual nucleus then of wisdom or Jonah as we're looking forward to in the Chippewa Valley? Joe, would you care to say a word? I failed to say earlier that I am a retired Lutheran pastor so I have my roots in a particular historical cultural religious experience. I would hasten to say that one of the really positive experiences that I have had in congregation based organizing and I've been a part of that for 18 years as Lutheran pastor in Milwaukee and helping to found Micah years ago in that city. It really is a plus and a strength of congregation based organizing that we cross the denominational lines, we cross faith lines, we cross racial lines and we do our very best to cross class lines and to have our organizations as representative as possible. If at this point Jonah and organizations in the cross and up in the northwest Wisconsin area where we have organizations forming as well, if those organizations at the present time are made up largely of United Church of Christ, Roman Catholic Lutheran Methodist Presbyterian and Episcopalian, we would say that we're hopeful that as we continue to reach out and to build these organizations that they will include more and more denominations and that they will definitely include racial and ethnic groups in a given community and that they will include the low income and the middle income and the upper income because we believe that we are all together in this journey of life and of faith and we ought to be together in our work to bring about change. David? If I go one of the things we've been working on and actually we had a very good session up here as a matter of fact in Eau Claire at Good Shepherd about eight months ago or so is a process we're calling our faith and values process in which we really are trying to bring together people from that diversity that Pastor Joe was talking about, diversity of religious traditions and backgrounds and that sort of thing and get people to start trying to name what are some of the things that bring us together, you know, not to name the dogmas that cause problems for us but to really to start to name some of the values that we all hold together and we actually right now have a statewide committee that's actually working on trying to compile the results we've gotten from around the state and from different places and it's very interesting, some of the kinds of things. I don't want to give away what the result is going to be before it's there but some of the things that people talked about were for example that all of us, no matter what our religious background, we all have a real belief in the power and the value of community as opposed to kind of the cultural value of individualism and the kind of the isolation that people tend to feel in our society that we really feel that, you know, whether we're Jewish or Muslim or Unitarian or whatever, we really believe in community. I think there's a whole sense too of believing in a sense of abundance and generosity as opposed to acting out of a worldview of scarcity and fear. That's something that no matter, it doesn't matter who was at the table. We all kind of shared those so part of what we're in the process of doing is trying to really identify for ourselves some of those things. I mean, until now, we've always kind of worked backward. Like we get involved in treatment instead of prison because we know we all kind of feel there's something very unfair about the fact that so many low income and minority people are locked up for crimes that middle class white people wouldn't be locked up for. We all kind of feel that that's unfair. Part of what we're trying to do is to say, you know, let's positively state what are the things we really believe in that are the things that we champion and it's amazing. The variety in our answers doesn't have nearly as much to do with religious tradition as it has to do with people's socioeconomic status. But the fact is we all really very much find ourselves on the same page. We don't worry too much about, you know, how each of us feels about the blessed mother or the pope or any of that kind of stuff. We really try and worry about what are the values that really determine the quality of our life. You know, we really try and focus what's the life, what's the world we want for our children, for our grandchildren, and those values are remarkably similar, no matter where you go. Is there a defining story which is the story of wisdom or of these organizing congregations in the way that for some political campaigns, you know, it's mourning in America, you've got that idea or we're the Roman Empire, we're taking civilization to the world or whatever. Is there a defining story which is really the impetus that's bringing wisdom and the associate congregations into this growth period right now? What is it that is making this possible now and giving it the energy now, Joe? I'm not so sure that it's one story that's pulling us all together so much as many individuals whose stories, individual stories are pulling them together. It is amazing how different the stories may be but bringing us to the same point. I have a story having done some of my growing up in Selma, Alabama and then getting my first call to the black community of Southwest Birmingham, Alabama and being a pastor there in the African American community from 1958 to 1967. I have some experiences there that taught me and helped me to realize that unless people of faith come together across these lines that so often separate us, unless we come together and work for the common good of all, then yes, the Ku Klux Klan does win out. And yes, the minority of people does have the last say on maintaining segregation and that day and time, that was the big issue. The Civil Rights Movement was not just a movement of some people who thought the change needed to be brought to this country, although it could be defined that way. But if you look at it closely, it is people of faith, in this case, almost all African-American people who crossed some denominational lines and congregational lines and said together, we can bring about change. So there are a lot of individuals in Eau Claire, a lot of individuals in each community that have had their own personal experiences that bring them to realize that we by ourselves are not going to bring about a whole lot of change, we can do a little bit. But together, we could be awesome and that's what people are discovering and congregations are discovering. [music] You can look to the stars in search of the answers, look for God and life on distant planets, have your faith in the ever after all each of us holds inside the map to the heavens and honor, the other spirit, the collective conscience, he created the pain and suffering and beauty in this world, heavens and honor, and our faith in humankind, and our respect for what is earthly, and our own fault to rain believe, the peace of love, understanding, seeing the angels wearing the disguise, ordinary people eating hard and never lost, filled with love, compassion, forgiveness, and sacrifice, heavens and hearts, and our faith in humankind, and our respect for what is earthly, and our own fault to rain believe, and peace and honor, and understanding, look around, believe in what you see, kingdom is rooted here, promise land is at your feet, can it will come when we aspire to be, if heavens and honor, if we have faith in humankind, and respect for what is earthly, and our faith in humankind, and understanding, look around, and understand, and understand, understand, and understand, and understand, and understand, and understand, and understand, I've met angels, touched creations, beautiful anyone does, I've been places where I was to know, I think I know, I believe, I believe, I believe this could be the best. We are born inside the gates, to the part of great life, and to take it away, the world is our temple, the world is our church, heavens and honor, if we have faith in humankind, and respect for what is earthly, and our own fault to believe, and peace and love, and understanding, this could be heaven and heaven and earth. That incredible artist is Tracy Chapman, and that was her song "Heaven's Here on Earth." I'm Mark Helpsmeet, and you're listening to a spirit in action interview with folks associated with Jonah, that is joining our neighbors advancing hope, and Wisdom, which is a Wisconsin statewide organization, bringing together different congregations for congregation-based community organizing. They're trying to make a real difference in our communities, in our state, by bringing together religious people eager to make this world more like the vision that our religions lead us to believe it could be, and should be. Joe L. Wanger and David Liners are active with a statewide organization called Wisdom, and Paul Opadol is a Lutheran pastor here in Eau Claire with the Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd. Joe, from your experience, living in the Deep South for that period, because you're still doing this these many years later, you're still being an organizer, you're still pushing things forward, you must have got some positive feedback from the environment, you must have had hope burst out of your heart and felt like, yes, I'm making a difference. Can you share any of those stories? Well, absolutely, it's those stories from the 60s and the 70s that are part of my roots and part of what motivates me today, although I could cite some experiences today, but perhaps a couple of the most overarching stories and powerful stories are simply that when you look at what was accomplished in the 60s, when people came together across congregational and denominational and finally began to come together across racial lines, it is amazing what transpired. People did not think that we would end day you're a legal racial segregation in the public places for maybe another generation, but we did it in a matter of a couple, three, four years there, a voting rights act that made it possible for people to vote in, I think, of Lowndes County and Wilcox County in Alabama in 1965, not a single African-American voter. That's how rigid the segregation was in those days in a matter of a year or two things turned around changed and now we have a black sheriff in Lowndes County. We have blacks and whites working together to oversee the life together in Selma, Alabama where we had some real tensions and we had some real dramatic experiences asking to bring about change and so to see what can happen when people come together with commitment and across those old traditional lines, really, we have to conclude that there's hardly anything that cannot be accomplished. We look today at the health care issue and it just seems impossible, it is just so monstrous, it is so complex. I truly believe that as people of faith come together around that issue, dramatic, amazing changes can take place and will take place and part of that faith comes from that experience, of course, back in the '60s, you're right. David? I was actually thinking of something much less dramatic than the civil rights movement, but something that I think exemplifies the way that I hope that what we do just kind of turns people on their head a little bit and makes people reconsider what the faith community is really about, it makes people reconsider themselves and what they're about. We had a situation in Milwaukee, an organization there where we had some members of a mostly white Roman Catholic congregation who were doing kind of an outreach and talking with some of their neighbors and just kind of to hear what people had to say and we discovered that there was this motel right in the middle of Glendale, which is kind of a pretty nice place to live. It's a pretty nice little suburb that there were all kinds of problems and police calls and we learned that people were afraid to have their kids go by there and stuff. So I won't give you the whole story, but we tried to speak to the city manager of Glendale and they refused to talk to this little group of white folks, you know, from the church who went out to try and talk to them and said, "No, no, no, this is none of your business. We know what we're doing." So we tried to get some more people and then the city manager locked us out of City Hall, wouldn't let us come in and talk to them. So we said, "Okay, this is it. We got to kind of call everybody to come up and help us here." So we caught our whole organization, our whole MICO organization came out. We probably had 200 people go to the parking lot in the city hall and the president of our organization, who was African American, was speaking and there was a TV reporter there and they said, "Reverend Harris, you know, why would you from the central city be out here protesting something in the suburbs?" And he said, "You know, if we don't nip this prostitution and drug dealing in the bud here in Glendale, it's going to spill over into the central city." It was just a great moment of just kind of, there was just this whole sense for me that just symbolized a whole lot of things, that it's not always the same people who are on top that were, there's a common humanity, there's a common sort of a problem and there was this whole sense of empowerment, there was this sense of we're together as a community and every so often the shoe is going to be on the other foot and that's just great because the thing is we're kind of in this, as brothers and sisters, and we're out to try and kind of make everybody's life better, we're trying to make everybody's life a little bit more fair and I think just the empowerment that comes from that, the sense that people have that, you know, we can make a difference, we got the place closed down, it's now a very reputable new establishment that's been put in there, you know, it didn't turn the whole world upside down but it sure let a whole lot of people to understand how they could together actually make the world a better place and those people have gone on to do much bigger things. Why a religious organizing group, why don't you just join the Green Party, the Democratic Party, the whatever it is, why set up an organization that organizes from this religious point of view? David? Primarily, the reason is we're really about values, we're about getting our faith values into practice, we don't particularly care who gets elected, whether it's Democrats, whether it's Republicans, whether it's the Green Party or whatever, what we're about is actually raising up citizens to hold their officials accountable, you know, we don't want to be so tied in with anybody, we don't want to give away our right to be prophetic, we don't want to say, oh, well, this is our guy now, now that it's our friend, you know, we believe that as people of faith we need to be together and we need to just be very honest and no matter who's there, there's nobody we won't work with and there's nobody who we're going to guarantee that we'll agree with them every time because that's not what we're about, we're not out to promote or to hurt anybody's political career, what we're out really to do is to get the faith community organized, to stand up in a powerful way for its own values and to challenge in a constructive way. And therefore we don't want to say, oh, this is our guy or that's the other guy, we are who we are. In a certain sense, we want to be true to who we are as people of faith and let everyone else react to us. Joe? Yeah, I'd like to piggyback on David's answer and add to it that as people of faith we are very much concerned about the tendency that we see around us and it can be found in every religious group and every denomination that somehow personal individual spirituality is where it's at, personal happiness, personal well-being, and we certainly are concerned about spirituality and personal well-being and personal happiness. But if religion does not impact areas of the larger community, the public need in the community that does not address and help to bring about change toward justice and toward peace, then it becomes something that is turned in on itself. It is not true to the religious tradition of every religious group, which says that the whole human family is what we ought to be concerned about and that we ought to feel and to see our connections with. And so this is, although we permit certainly anyone to be a part of the movement with us, it is unabashedly a group of faith people who say that our faith has to do with the larger community. It has to do with justice. It has to do with bringing about change and transformation in society toward those ends. And if that part of our spiritual life is left out, then our spirituality is not complete. Our spirituality is lacking something and we want this to be a part of people's spirituality. I don't want to pitch you against any stereotyped versions of other religious thinking, but I do perceive that there is a difference between the activism that you're talking about and some of what I might call right-wing leaning activism, which has been very influential in the U.S. lately. When you make it clear to our listeners how you're different, why is this different than just a brother I have who's very concerned, he's very spiritually, religiously motivated, but his concerns are very much diametrically opposed to many of the peace and justice and care for the poor concerns that I have. I'd say first of all, one of the real differences could be the breadth of what it is that we want to impact. I really believe that our members and our organization, we are about justice on every level and it's about the things that we perceive that God cares about, frankly. So I think any of us from whatever religious tradition we're from, we can't ignore the poor and the question of equity and the question of fair treatment for workers. These are scriptural, those are deeply ingrained faith values that we can't just sit those out. We can't just say, "No, we're only going to deal with sexuality today. We're going to forget about the public school kids and we're going to forget about health care and we're going to forget about prisoners." I think that a big part of it is we really do try to be true to the totality. I think the other is from, again, I don't want to be reacting to a stereotype, but I think some of it has to do with methodology. I mean, I think we really want to enter into dialogue with folks. I don't know that we want to just whack people over the head with, "Here's what you've got to do because we said so," and if you don't, you're going to lose the next election. That's really not where we want to go. I think what we want to do is really enter into dialogue to get our faith perspective into the public discourse and have it be part of the decision-making process. I don't think in wisdom, I mean, we have some strong opinions on some issues, but I don't think we ever pretend to think we're the only ones who have an opinion and that we necessarily ought to be running the world. What we want to do is be sure to enter into an honest and respectful dialogue. I think we also try very hard to listen and we also try to work with whoever wants to work with us and we try to keep our agenda as above board as possible. I always hope we were not smart enough to have hidden agendas. We can't keep the visible one straight half the time. We try to be as transparent and straightforward as we can be. Paul, I think that as human beings, we are social people. What we offer is something that reaches out into that community sensibility. So often, I think in our language that we have heard today in our culture, the Catholic Church talks about a culture of life, and that's even been picked up by the present administration. But when you hear that and you look at it, oftentimes it gets confined to issues with regard to abortion and the beginning of life or perhaps at the end of life. And we forget about the more communal aspect of life and that culture of life that needs to be addressed throughout the expanse of our lives. Our poor people living and experiencing a culture of life are the hungry, experiencing a culture of life, our immigrants experiencing the opportunities for a culture of life. I see Jonah and wisdom, the Gamelio Foundation and others as groups that are seeking to have dialogue and say, you know, the culture of life is more than just the popular culture values issues. You know, religious values are more than the personal morality type issues that have gotten so much emphasis in our culture today. This is Spirit in Action, and I'm your host, Mark Helpsmeet. We're visiting today with some folks associated with Wisdom, Jonah, and Micah. Wisconsin organizations involved in congregation-based community organizing. They're empowering congregations to make this world the kind of place that it should be. We're visiting here today with Joe Elwanger, David Liners, and Paul Opadol. And I have been curious, Paul, your pastor up here, Luther King pastor, it seems like a very different environment from within the sphere of influence of Milwaukee. Why are these concerns that are shared by our big metropolitan, big brother, big sister down there in the southeastern corner of Wisconsin? Why are they important to you on the West Side of Eau Claire? What commonality do you have in terms of environment that makes you want to work together as part of this larger organizing throughout the state? Well, for me, it's the basic philosophical issues about that. But there are hungry people in Eau Claire. There are homeless people in Eau Claire. I had a wonderful opportunity, even Joe Coluthan Church in America, local Chippewa Valley Pastors Conference had a great opportunity back in October to meet with a couple of dairy farmers in the Chippewa County and to hear them talk about what are basic justice issues that they struggle with in rural Wisconsin life around health care. And just being able to get by day to day, those are issues that put a face on things that are universal, whether you're living in downtown Milwaukee or Eau Claire. Honestly, it has been difficult in some regards. I think there's a complacency that is perhaps a little bit easier to fall into than the Chippewa Valley area when we don't have, for lack of a better word, the abject poverty that we might encounter more readily in Milwaukee and in those urban areas. But that doesn't mean that it's not there. I have a sense of motivation to find ways to have the dialogue and the opportunities for people to see that, yeah, there is those things going on. I think when that deep-seated desire that we all have, no matter where we're at, to be a part of community, when you start getting to know people and getting in touch with them, you discover that there is that desire for community that 100 years ago was just a natural part of existence. You had to be in community in order to survive, whereas you have to be more intentional about creating community nowadays. And I think there are people that want to experience that and when they have an opportunity that I think Jonah can offer them to be involved in issues that make a difference and get them connected with other people who have a passion. That genuine community is able to form and they become more in tune to seeing the reality out there. There's an old song from a distance. The world is, God is watching us from a distance and yet in reality, the more in tune we get to who we are supposed to be as children of God, God is not watching us from a distance and the world is not clean and nice and in order, we become more aware of the messiness of the world and more passionately called to get ourselves into it. A mentor of mine who was a former pastor at Hope Lutheran, Mark Olson, often would say if he could put his ideal sign in front of Hope Lutheran Church, it would be Hope Lutheran Church where we might make life more complicated. To me that just really rings true. It's about getting people in touch with all the gray areas and the complications and the exciting and invigorating reality of being a part of the complicated and joy-filled world. David. The person I have a lot of admiration for, Professor John Powell, has a great line that he's used in working with our organization over the years and it is, he says, you know, the question in modern America is not, am I my brother's keeper? The question is, do I really think that that's my brother? And I think that, well, all of us in all of our faith traditions, we believe we're all children of God, we believe that we're all one, I think with wisdom in general, we try and actually make that real. That people, whether it's in downtown Milwaukee or people in Darfur, are not theoretical. That they're real and that we can form the real relationships, that there is a real palpable sense that we're in this together, that draws us out of our isolation, draws us out of even our own small homogeneous groupings, but gets us to really have this experience that, yeah, these are my brothers and sisters and as a matter of fact, I know them and I know their story. I know them by name. I didn't just see them on the news. Paul, you mentioned about how being involved with church can make things more complicated. I've been part of Quaker meetings for 30 years or something now and we're used to having peace and social concerns action and we're used to having it almost everyone involved in that kind of thing. I think for some other churches that the percentage of involvement is not nearly as high and people are already feeling overloaded, they're feeling like they've got their very full lives. Why would they want to add on another layer of organization? Why would they want to get involved in this kind of thing? Paul? I think that's a wonderful example of the complicated reality of life. There is, as we get into it and we encounter some of those things, those complicated realities that healthcare isn't just a simple issue and we're able to address them and see the fruit of our labor, there is a more fulfilling experience in having seen that earlier in our meetings before we sat down here. You had referred to that study that showed the churches that are growing are churches where people are more committed. When people can be committed to something and really see that what they're doing makes a difference, they get a deeper sense of fulfillment and I think if everything was just easy, the deep sense of commitment that people would have would not be as genuine and it's a process that's, you know, it's not easy to get people committed to something that's going to be more complicated but I think once people are, it's a lot more fulfilling. Joe? You raised the question about why people who have their plates so full already would want to think about adding something more and that includes people of faith as well. Maybe it's precisely because we as the current generation are extremely busy, busy about making money, maybe two jobs, three jobs, busy about our recreational pursuits, busy about developing our investments and our second home and making sure that we can have this or that we live in an age that is super busy but it's precisely that busyness that is revolving around material things as the fulfillment of life and as the meaning of life that is so wrong and is so wrong headed and is so unfulfilling and leaves an emptiness in people's lives. And so I would say that we need to put working for others, noticing those who aren't making fifty hundred thousand dollars a year, who are making ten thousand dollars a year, finding it extremely difficult to even put a roof over their head for me to go about my life and be very busy about amassing stuff and things and forgetting the huge numbers and the growing numbers in our country to say nothing of the rest of the world is a selfishness, a self-centeredness and a materialism that is debilitating, that is dehumanizing and that makes our lives empty and we need this kind of walking with others, building community and working toward justice and peace in order to fulfill our lives and really feed our souls because that stuff and busyness does not feed our souls. I think I'd better ask you a little bit about what you actually do. Jonah stands for joining our neighbors advancing hope, wisdom stands for wisdom. Micah is Milwaukee Interfaith, congregations, allied for hope, what is it that you actually do? There's a lot of good acronyms here but what comes out of joining and getting involved in something like Jonah as we're proposing to do here in the Chippewa Valley. David? The main thing we do is organize. We're not an advocacy group, we're not a social service group, we actually provide people with tools and we provide people with some guidelines and some guidance and we provide people with some structure through which they can actually act out their own faith. We support, we encourage, we seek out leadership, we encourage people, we agitate people, we train people, we help people to be organized, we challenge people to be courageous and to be prophetic and we try and kind of keep people on the same page so that they can be more effective and more concerted in their efforts. So let's say we do get Jonah up and going in full swing here in Chippewa Valley, what's going to be different, what's going to happen, what structures will be in place? Paul? Well, good shepherd for example would be more deeply aware and in cooperation with St. James and Plymouth congregational because we are in this neighborhood, more deeply aware of issues that people are dealing with on the west side of Eau Claire and be able to have those, build those relationships with the neighborhood and perhaps address the need to solve something that needs to be solved. We're pretty new at this so I'm afraid I have to admit that at this point good shepherd's not really in touch with the stuff that probably needs to be solved on the west side of Eau Claire but I'm sure there are the issues out there that we can uncover. We have been involved in the treatment instead of prison issue which has been statewide at Eau Claire county level we're looking at the building of a new county jail and from Jonah's perspective if we're going to go ahead and do that and for me personally and I think for Jonah the issue hasn't been so much for or against a county jail the issue is treatment so can this county jail that gets built be an effective tool for treatment so we just don't have to incarcerate everybody. Possibilities for health care things that are going on are certainly opportunities that Jonah could perhaps step up on. Again it's something where the people are hopefully in each congregation that would be involved with Jonah it would discover what are the issues that they're passionate about and how can Jonah in the same manner as wisdom help these people act on these passions in a life affirming way for the sake of the greater community David. Once Jonah is completely formed and up and running Jonah will be run by a board of directors chosen by the congregations and the institutions that are members of Jonah so typically our local organizations which are autonomous they run themselves will have this board of directors usually one or two members from each congregation sits on the board of directors and they're the ones who really chart the direction for Jonah and including needing to raise money you know get enough money and hopefully the between local efforts and some ways that we might be able to help from the state level to raise enough money to actually have an organizer a staff person for the organization who could be working full time in this part of the state to help folks. Another part of the structure is in our local organizations we always have a religious leaders caucus the pastors or other religious leaders get together once a month for lunch for theological reflection and really to reflect on the direction of the organization to be sure that Jonah really is following the course that it's supposed to follow that it really is acting in accord with our deepest faith values that are shared so it's their job to do some discernment and reflection about that and then usually we'll have an issues committee which is a group of people who actually works on the very specific things that's where the health care the jail those kinds of stuff they'll sit together and talk about what are the issues that we want to get involved with and how are we going to get involved in each of the member congregations because the members of Jonah will be congregations and institutions it's normally religious congregations you have the occasional other institution that decides that they want to join. We ask each of those member organizations to form a core team four, five, six, ten people of Ralaki but a group of people that will get together on a regular basis to be the Jonah people in their congregation they in turn will send people out to the issues task for sort of the board of directors or the religious leaders caucus but they'd also be the people who would be doing what Paul was talking about saying what do we need to work on right here in our own neighborhood that we might be able to get some help from others so the way that it's structured is the congregations are the bedrock they're the members and their core teams are the people that we count on and then on a Jonah wide level we'd have the board of directors to run the darn thing we'd have the issues committee to work on the issues and we would have the religious leaders caucus to keep us on track. Today on spirit and action we're privileged to have folks associated with Jonah, wisdom, Micah and other statewide religious organizations involved in congregation based community organizing they help train congregations to take the power to help this world live out the values that we all share religiously. My guests are Joel L. Wanger, David Miners and from Eau Claire, Paul Opedal and I'm your host Mark helps me. When we were speaking earlier you mentioned that one of the things that you do is encourage people to do these one-on-ones. I was struck that this is a wonderful grassroots empowerment of the community. Can you say a little bit more about how that works? Joel? Yes one-on-ones is exactly what that term implies that one person engages another person in an in-depth conversation doesn't last ordinarily more than a half hour but it's especially a listening conversation where the one person asks the other person to share their journey the amazing thing is that on the one hand we don't really ask people some of those basic questions about where did you grow up what kind of experiences did you have in high school or college that really challenged you or shaped you and where did you experience maybe some injustice in your life or where did you see some injustice that you can never forget and what is it the key question that we ask in these one-on-ones is if you thought you could change something in your community or in the world what is it that you would give some time and energy to changing and there you're finding out what really is the passion or as we call it the self-interest the concern of the individual and you're getting them to sometimes get in touch with themselves in a way that they themselves have not done in a long time every once in a while and one-on-one somebody says you know I've never shared this with anybody but you know and then you know you're really getting a someone to share their journey and their inner self well in a half hour it's amazing what can happen in a one-on-one and if you can imagine 15 people in a congregation each of them doing 10 one-on-ones with other members of the congregation and perhaps a few people in the community you can see what a set of relationships is developed in a sense of community solidarity and in the process finding people that really do have deep concerns about a need for change and transformation in their congregation in their community and in the world and that's what these one-on-ones are about it really is the development of a new sense of what's important development of relationships and then some of the key learnings are then shared with the organization and if it's discovered that there are you know 60 70 people that are really concerned about the health needs of the kids in the schools because they can't learn because of that then suddenly we know that there's something that needs to be addressed. David say some of my peers actually kind of find us to be sort of hopelessly old school in a day and age of web based organizing and all the other stuff we really believe that the basis I mean yes the internet is a great tool and there's all kinds of other things that are wonderful tools but the tool for organizing people is doing one-on-ones people sitting down and actually developing a relationship one person to one person that we actually know what each other wants we know what each other hopes for and we can start to learn to help each other and the more we can build those relationships that's how we're going to organize I think we all wish there was a shortcut you know we could write a really good article and everybody'd read it and they'd all do the right thing but in fact organizing is really about building those relationships one at a time and then one at a time building a network of people who can commit themselves to each other and commit themselves to something better. Can you tell me of some of the successes the outgrowths of activities that have happened through your various organizing throughout the state? David? In Milwaukee one of the things Mike has been doing for probably 15 years at this point is every time that there's a homicide or a violent death in the city of Milwaukee we have a group of our members sometimes you know on a cold rainy day it might only be six or seven of them sometimes it's 25 or 30 who go to that place to pray for the victim to pray for the victim's family to pray for the perpetrator to pray for that person's family and to pray for peace in the neighborhood. Some of the things that have grown out of that effort have been a real attempt to say you know we're here to pray for these folks we're here to promote healing but we're also here to talk you know and to talk and to listen and it's amazing what comes out of that you know through that we develop this real sense you know we need to also do something about the crime the more we looked at it and we got people together and we talked and we studied and they said you know we're never going to deal with the crime we're never going to deal with the violence we're never going to deal with the bloodshed until we can deal with the drugs because in a lot of the neighborhoods where we work in Milwaukee that's the cause of it it's not even necessarily the folks who live there it's the folks who are doing dirty business there that are kind of where the crime comes from and the violence and that sort of thing and that very directly led us into saying you know first we're going to try and close down drug houses and we're going to try and get the police on the corner and then we realized every time we closed down a drug house two more would open two blocks down the way which is what got us into saying you know now what we really need to do is we got to get treatment we don't seem to be able to cut off the supply maybe let's try and deal with the demand problem and then we went out and was began to advocate every place we could for more resources for drug and alcohol treatment because there's a lot of folks stuck in that world that don't want to be stuck there but they need a hand and they don't have insurance and that is actually what led us into this statewide campaign for treatment instead of prison to say you know we're putting all our resources into punishment we got to put some of our resources in the front end toward helping people to deal with it it all came out of people being prayerful people being compassionate people actually looking at who are these victims who are these perpetrators who are these families and what is God's call to us for these folks what is it that we're supposed to do and that's actually led us down an incredible journey that we've actually shown some success and there's a you know kind of millions of dollars at this point being spent on treatment that's been diverted out of punishment and we're hoping to increase that tenfold in the next year or two. I know you'd better run on up to Chippewa Falls for your next meeting I think it would be a pity if our listeners weren't able to get ahold of you afterwards how are they going to find out more about wisdom and about Jonah about Micah whatever how are they going to find out more about this and how are they going to get in contact with you because I know that Paul is just eager to have more congregations locally involved in this. I would be happy to go out and speak to anybody's congregation or just have anybody speak with me and I can be reached here at the Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd my phone number is 834-295-834-2959 area code 715 and my email address is Paul at Good Shepherd-EC.org and Shepherd is spelled S-H-E-P-H-E-R-D hyphenec.org, Paul at Good Shepherd-EC.org and again I'd be happy to speak with anybody about Jonah. If you want to contact wisdom our email address is wisdomwi so W-I-S-D-O-M-W-I at S-B-C-Global.net. Wisdomwi@S-B-C-Global.net. Our phone number is at area code 414-831-2070. Thanks for coming up to West Central Wisconsin. It's a long track for you guys from down in Milwaukee area. It's good work you're doing. It's inspirational I think with your help and help of a lot of other folks we're going to be changing not only our local community not only Wisconsin but we're going to change the United States and the world so thanks very much for your work. Thank you. It's a joy to be here and to see that people are on the move for change. And Paul thank you for helping inspire this organization within the Chippewa Valley. Thank you. (Music) (Music) Those are the women of the Calabash and the song lift up your voice and sing also known as the Negro National Anthem. You've been listening to an interview with Joe Elwanger, David Liners and Paul Opidol. Folks associated with Wisconsin organizations called Wisdom, Jonah and Micah. Their special goal is to get churches and other religious groups involved in congregation based community organizing. You can listen to this program again via my website northernspiritradio.org and on the website you'll find information about my guests, the music on these programs, other helpful information. The theme music for spirit in action is "I have no hands but yours" by Carol Johnson. Thank you for listening. I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit. You can email me at helpsmeet@usa.net. May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light. This is Spirit in Action. All you can do is to love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. To love and serve your neighbor. Enjoying selflessness. [Music]