Core Values & Beloved Community

Beloved Community is a vision to create a compassionate and inclusive society where Love is at the center. Beloved Community has an intentional focus on growing an attitude of  non-judgement, nonviolence, forgiveness, and mindfulness. Beloved Community was first used by Josiah Royce and more recently recognized through the work of Martin Luther King, Jr. As practitioners of Compassion we seek to be agents of transformation in our communities where we are open and loving to one another, recognizing we need each other to be the whole body of Christ.

We are surrounded by fear, disrespect, alienation, and othering. Our world is in deep need of reconciliation.  As Beloved Community we are followers of Jesus and his inclusive, compassionate walking with those who were lost, least and left out. Jesus modeled for us and invites us to this ministry of love by feeding the hungry, weeping with the grieving, welcoming the outcast, (the other), forgiving the guilty. This response calls us to be counter-cultural and we find ourselves  walking on the edges of society extending care, kindness and compassion.

Now! We are called to live out our faith, love and compassion daily. For some this call begins through the waters of Baptism.  Regardless, it begins with each of us and our actions toward self, one another and God’ creation. For those living in Beloved Community we are invited to step back and hold a mirror up to ourselves to recognize in the many ways we struggle and are broken and yet called to live out this love. We have Love within us already waiting for us to recognize its presence within us. 

Becoming aware of the many ways our world is suffering, (its people and creation) both concealed and outwardly observed. The first step requires an attitude that recognizes our connectivity,  and oneness with all of life.”If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.” 1 Corinthians 12: 26

“Compassion is an ‘inside-out’ movement.  A radical change unfolds in us when compassion becomes a way of life, a transformation as far-reaching as an acorn growing into a tree.. Compassion is the primary agent of transformation.” –Joyce Rupp 

“I could never extend a boundless compassion to anyone unless I know deeply what it means to hold myself in a compassionate heart.”  –Christina Feldman, Compassion (BC page 42)