Greetings from Omaha!
We want to share an important update with you.
Last fall Word Made Flesh celebrated its 20th anniversary. It has been one of our greatest privileges to serve with the community for 18 of those years. The work WMF does and the communities we have formed inspire us. We marvel at the sacrifices our WMF community members have made to faithfully follow Christ into some of the world’s most desperate neighborhoods.
Early in May we announced our transition out of the leadership of Word Made Flesh. Over the past few months we have been discerning a possible transition with our core team and have finally come to a place of deep peace regarding this new phase in our vocations. We are also incredibly fortunate to have tested and proven leaders within our community who are prepared to lead WMF into the next 20 years with fresh vision and vibrant energy, further testifying to the gift that change can offer our WMF community.
Though we will no longer serve as the International Co-Executive Directors of WMF, we will both remain part of the community in reimagined roles that are better aligned with our evolving vocational passions.
A significant aspect of this forward momentum is our launch of Gravity, a Center for Contemplative Activism. Though this seems like an entirely new venture, we have actually been dreaming about this since finishing the Camino de Santiago back in the summer of 2007 during our Sabbatical. As we understand that there are questions that many of you have about the Center and our continued participation with WMF, we wanted to take time to share what lies ahead with us.
What is the purpose of a center for contemplative activism?
The Center will offer education, formation and support to nurture a contemplative Christian imagination for accountable and effective social engagement. Without a deep spirituality, many of our good deeds can actually cause more harm than good—harm to self in bad self-care that can lead to burnout or worse, harm to others in using or exploiting the vulnerable to feel better about ourselves which leads to breakdown and potential destruction of communities.
After nearly 20 years of mission service among the most vulnerable of the world’s poor, we’ve learned that serving in places of extreme poverty, injustice and social change demands a authentic spirituality. At WMF we’ve been developing a collective spirituality that we often refer to as “contemplative activism.”
So what is “contemplative activism?”
Contemplative activism reconciles our inner and outer lives. Contemplative practices marked by disciplines of solitude, silence and stillness, help bring adequate attention to our true selves so that we can offer the best of ourselves to the world through our active life. Such contemplative practices are not only counter-cultural for social activist types, but for society at large. What we’ve learned is that many missionaries, social activists, students, ministers, and lay people of all walks of life are hungry for this depth of life.
Contemplative spiritual practices help us live the Christ life by purifying our motivations for service and liberating us from thought and behavioral patterns that threaten that good service in the world. The result is more effective work in the world where true justice, freedom and peace can reign—hallmarks of the reign of Christ.
Anyone who is concerned about their neighbor and is seriously combating poverty and injustice in our world needs to connect with their inner life to authentically energize their active life, thus “contemplative activism.”
How does the Center relate to Chris and Phileena’s vocation among people in poverty?
The essential core of our vocations has not changed. Our lives and message will continue to be given to a prophetic witness and engagement with our global neighbors in poverty. Now, we will just be able to devote ourselves 100% to this, rather than be divided by WMF operations, staff development, administration and infrastructure concerns. The Center will enable us to do more speaking and teaching, publishing, offer more spiritual and practical support for workers at the grass roots, and consultation for other communities and organizations like WMF. In this way, we will be able to do more for our global neighbors in poverty—seeing more abandoned children welcomed into loving homes; more young people being set free from the sex trade; more survivors of war being healed; all of whom become agents of hope and reconciliation.
How does the Center relate to WMF?
We will continue to serve WMF as WMF community members. WMF has pledged to incubate and support the Center by covering rent for the first year. This will give us some time to work out all the intricacies of clarifying vision and values; defining the programs and services; and establishing a tactical plan to enable the Center’s long-term sustainability.
The Center will also support WMF community members. They will be able to receive the various programs of the Center for their formation and sustainable work in urban poverty. Our friends in poverty as well as the non-poor alike will directly benefit from learning more about Christian contemplative spirituality and adoption of various spiritual disciplines in their life.
What else lies ahead?
Phileena: In addition to focus on the Center, I will be studying during the next three summers, working on my Masters in Christian Spirituality at Creighton University. I have also been accepted into the renowned Halo Institute—a three-month entrepreneur fellowship that will provide much needed support in helping launch a center.
Chris: I will serve the community as a Senior Strategist focusing on partnerships, community development and fund raising. I will lead focused Discovery Teams, consisting of thought-leaders and culture makers who have potential to be significant advocates for our work by nurturing networks that can assist our communities. And I will spend considerable time developing my writing and speaking vocation, giving the best of myself as an advocate for the causes we all have given our lives for. In fact, this fall my third book will be published and I’m already in the middle of planning a book tour around the launch.
We are full of hopeful anticipation that our new positions within WMF will allow us to continue serving together in deeply satisfying ways. And we are confidant that new leadership for WMF will provide the necessary spaciousness for continued growth of the movement.
Thank you for partnering with us in our shared journey of hope.
With love & gratitude,
Phileena and Chris Heuertz