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November 2, 2023
Dear friends,
This week brought the first freeze of the season to Maine, after a few days of incredibly warm weather at the end of last week. These wild swings of the world around us mirror, in many ways, the emotional swings we've experienced in the wake of a mass shooting event in Maine last week. We know we are not unique in this country for having experienced such trauma, and that fact in itself is testament to how deeply divorced we are from the rhythms of reciprocity and belonging into which nature continually invites us.
A few days ago, some of our staff were involved in a conversation in which we reiterated one of our core stances — to help foster resilient communities in which we may turn toward one another in times of crisis rather than turning against. We are grateful that our community — you! — are with us on this journey. And as we offer a few more programs in November before taking our annual programmatic pause in December, we hope you'll join us to continue co-creating spaces of healing, abundance, and connection.
Next week, at our quarterly Leadership Commons Open House, we'll welcome Rabbi Katy Allen to share a resource based on her book A Tree of Life: A Story in Word, Image, and Texts. The following week we have our next chaplaincy gathering, Spiritual Wayfinding in a Changing Climate, presented in partnership with Chaplaincy Innovation Lab. And the end of November brings the release of our next episode of Climate Changed, our podcast, as well as a Climate Changed Podcast Party.
We hope you'll join us for one or more of these offerings, and we offer our gratitude to each of you for your presence and all you do in the world.
With best wishes,
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Join Us for these Upcoming Events:
Leadership Commons Open House
- Wednesday, November 8 • 12.15 - 1.00pm (Eastern) • Online
- Featuring Rabbi Katy Allen presenting her new Leadership Commons resource
Spiritual Wayfinding in a Changing Climate
- Wednesday, November 15 • 1.00 - 2.00pm (Eastern) • Online
- Featuring Talitha Amadea Aho and J.D. Mechelke
- Presented in partnership with Chaplaincy Innovation Lab
Climate Changed Podcast Party
- Wednesday, November 29 • 12.00 - 1.00pm • Online
- Join hosts Nicole Diroff and Ben Yosua-Davis along with producer Peterson Toscano for lively conversation rooted in clips from our current podcast season
Lament with Earth
- Wednesday, December 6 • 7:30 - 8.30pm (Eastern) • Online
- The second of five seasonal offerings of ritual, poetry, music, and lamentation
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One Home One Future Campaign
The BTS Center is a proud partner organization in the One Home One Future campaign, a seven-year multi-faith campaign encouraging visible and collective creation care and climate action. We believe this is a moment when spiritual leaders and faith communities everywhere — clergy, congregants, youth, and people of conscience from all spiritual paths — must unite in pursuing meaningful and just climate solutions at the local, regional, and national level.
One Home One Future is designed to offer fulfilling, positive, and accessible pathways for education, engagement, and action on creation care and just and equitable climate solutions, whether you are just getting started or you're already deeply engaged.
We encourage you to join with One Home One Future, as an individual or as a congregation. Participating congregations will receive free congregational toolkits, including a banner to hang in front of your house of worship. You will also gain free access to training and guides, a library of worship and educational resources, action sheets, webinars, retreat resources, programming opportunities, and an online community of practice to connect and collaborate within and across faith traditions.
One Home One Future calls people of all faiths to stand together and do what they can, when they can, to engage their congregations and communities in caring for our common home, now and for generations to come. Learn more.
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Season 2 of Climate Changed is here!
We are thrilled to be bringing you another season of our podcast, Climate Changed, co-hosted by Nicole Diroff and Ben Yosua-Davis and produced by Peterson Toscano. Each episode features thoughtful and thought-provoking interviews and reflections, this season centering on the theme of collective honesty and complicated hope.
Featuring conversations with Rob Shetterly, Susi Moser, Eileen Flanagan, Keisha McKenzie, Rob Buckley, Margaret Wheatley, Debra Rienstra, and Shanon Shah, Season 2 is sure to spark your imagination and curiosity. Click above for a taster of this season's conversations!
Episodes 1 and 2 are now live, and Episode 3 will be released on November 28. You can find Climate Changed at www.ClimateChangedPodcast.org or on your favorite podcast listening platform.
Listen to all of Season One and the first two episodes of Season Two here!
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What we're reading, listening to, and pondering...
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We're pondering these words: "If climate change was easy to fix with purely technological solutions, churches would have little role in saving the world. But long-term solutions need so much more than just technology — they need changes in thinking, culture, society, religion, politics, and governance. These are areas our tradition equips us to help with. As the climate crisis forces us to reassess our values and decide what foundations we want to build a new world upon, we can be the voices for love of our neighbor, love of the poor, the image of God in every person, and the sacredness of creation." — Blair Nelson and Jessica Morthorpe, Climate Pastoral Care, an online training course
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Our mission is to catalyze spiritual imagination with enduring wisdom for transformative faith leadership. We offer theologically grounded programs of continuing education and spiritual formation, including workshops and retreats, learning cohorts, public conversations, and projects of applied research.
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