The Festival Center
Core Themes
The Servant Leadership School
preparing a people on the way
The Inward Journey
Call in Community: Call is what we hear God asking us to be and to do to help create a just and loving world. When we are called, our being and our doing complete each other. As following God’s call involves risk and vulnerability, it necessarily requires grounding within a committed community. Only in community do we come to know ourselves authentically and find a place of belonging where we are nurtured, challenged, and held accountable. Offerings in this area support individuals in pursuit of their call and equip communities of faith to become inclusive and empowering, so that together we may embody the life that our world needs.
Prayer and Contemplation: In prayer we become opened to a wholly other way of being, one that flows from God’s very own self. As we give ourselves over to prayer, God begins a new birth in us, transforming us into the likeness of Christ. Yet even as prayer is the cornerstone of the life of faith, many of us must confess with Jesus’ first disciples that we do not know how to pray and must be taught. The cacophony of life and our own inner resistances often keep us from hearing the still, small voice. Offerings in this area nurture participants in the practices of prayer, silence, and contemplation so that we might hear and respond to God’s newness.
Scripture and the Christian Tradition: Scripture is the story of God and the struggle to be God’s people. It is a story not only to be exegeted but embodied, as it is one that continues to this day. In the pages of the Bible we begin to discern the radical nature of our faith. For it is here that we learn of a God who liberated Hebrew slaves from Egyptian oppression, inspired the Prophets’ call to care for the marginalized and excluded, and became manifest in the coming of Jesus and the upside-down reign he proclaimed. Offerings in this area explore the biblical story and those who have sought to live within it in order that it may more deeply become our own.
The Outward Journey
Economic and Earth Justice: Some of the first lessons the Israelites learned in their wilderness wanderings were those of Jubilee justice and Sabbath rest for people, animals, and the land. Such biblical wisdom is needed now more than ever, as the deeply interrelated economic and ecological crises threaten our shared future. Alternatives to our present systems and ways of living must be developed that both honor the poor and protect the planet. Offerings in this area educate participants on these contemporary crises and explore how to build and organize for faithful economies rooted in community and the abundance of creation.
Liberation from Oppression: Jesus announced in his Nazareth sermon that his mission was to proclaim release to the captives and to let the oppressed go free. Today countless people remain bound in prisons, both metaphorical and actual, which prevent them from experiencing fullness of life. Mass incarceration, debt entrapment, inadequate healthcare, unaffordable housing, and a lack of meaningful work are all signs of systems stacked against the poor and people of color. Offerings in this area explore meaningful ways we can respond in solidarity to those victimized by these systems, for ultimately our liberation is bound up together.
Peace and Reconciliation: Reconciliation is at the heart of the Gospel. And as the life of Jesus clearly attests, it does not come easy. For peace requires the establishment of justice and reconciliation the discernment of truth, neither of which receive much of a hearing within the wider culture. Thus the path to right relationship must begin with a willingness to confront painful realities such as racism and militarism and to explore our own power and privilege. It also necessitates a recovery of the often-untold stories of social movements and training in active nonviolence. Offerings in this area prepare people to be peacemakers both locally and globally.