Creating and Nurturing our Spiritual Community

Important Town Hall meeting

Date: Sunday May 29th

Time: 1pm - 3pm

Location: Pandosy Peace Centre

                 2490 Pandosy, Kelowna

We are getting together this Sunday May 29th as a spiritual family to dream about, to imagine, to envision our best future for this community. Let's face it, we are already great! But we also know we can get even better!

What would that look like? Imagine the most inspiring, supportive, loving, accepting, engaging community. What would it feel like to be a part of something so magnificent? How would you want to be a part of it?

As we know, Divine ideas flow through each and every one of us in the One Mind, so your attendance is important. Please join us. Please share your vision for the future of this dynamic community.

This will be an interactive discussion led by one of our very own members, David Church. It is exciting to think about what we can do when we come together for a common goal. We are a powerful group of positive and inspired people.

Let's make a "World that Works for All" by creating a Centre that works for all.



Notes from the 2015 AGM

I’d like to extend my deepest gratitude for those who came out to our Annual General meeting last Sunday.

It’s always so interesting for me to see who’s interested in the fine balance of marrying our vision with the practicalities of the business side of “doing church.”

It’s a great representation of our own inner life/outer life, the objective/subjective, and spirit/form, and in the final analysis, to realize that it’s all really one thing… albeit with very different appearances.  It’s all God/Good.

For those of you who weren't able to make it here is a little recap of the things we talked about.

There are some fantastic things going on here at our centre. Our classes are vibrant, our music uplifting, our children’s program, the VIBE, is growing our young minds and hearts (to the point where we’re putting out the call for more volunteers…)

This past year also included the addition of 6 newly licensed practitioners, the licensing of 6 new staff ministers and the ordination of 3 of our current staff ministers. To me, this supports the growing consciousness of the Science of Mind both in our centre and in the world.

Our theme for the current year is “Being Seen in 2015” and we saw two major thrusts last year that paved the way to make this possible. One is having our “marketing maven” Amanda Pope support us in utilizing Social Media in impactful ways- reaching out way beyond the bricks and mortar of either the Community Theatre or the Pandosy Peace Centre; and the other is Rev. Lesley McNamara’s powerful outreach into our greater community of the city of Kelowna. I am so grateful to both of them and all the volunteers who support these initiatives.

Rev Lesley and her outreach committee are particularly active right now with events profiling the Season of Peace and Non-Violence.

I believe our growth as a centre lies in community - both on the inner level, within our centre, and on the outer levels, in our city and even out into the greater world.

There’s no doubt “church” itself is vastly different than it was 10-20 years ago. Much of our philosophy and what we teach is now available in a wide variety of formats - often without cost or commitment required. And while I know community can happen this way, through virtual means, I hold there’s nothing that can replace being together face to face or heart to heart.

This idea of being together in person leads back to the business matters that affect our centre. Being able to support and supply our spiritual community with Sunday celebrations, classes, programs, events, and places to meet all require support - spiritual, financial, volunteer, and organizational.

One particularly potent way to provide this is through your participation in our Conscious Giving Program which allows our board to make sound financial decisions and to be the very best stewards of our resources.

Our goal is continue to offer moving, relevant and engaging experiences in all these areas and it’s your support that allows us, and will continue to allow us, to do all of this in ever greater ways. 

Thank you for your part in blessing our centre… Dr. Deborah

Connection, Community, Collaboration

Connection, Community, Collaboration

 

Today was definitely a day of connection and community. We came together for our town hall 'Community Conversation' to discuss the values survey that was done over the summer. There were about 50 of us who gathered at the peace centre.

The first thing that stood out for me was how many people care deeply about the Centre for Spiritual Living Kelowna. I was delighted with the turnout and the level of engagement in the room. The discussion was lively and it was apparent that people are committed to this community.

Derek presented an overview of the survey results. You can see the presentation here. It might be a little confusing without his explanation but basically the survey tells us that as a community we value accountability, love, compassion, and education. We want to see our community develop by fostering continuous improvement, further accountability, open communication, and community collaboration.

We discussed as a large group what this means to us. There were some great ideas shared. One was that people want our community to be a safe place where they feel comfortable to be vulnerable as they grow spiritually. There was also discussion that we need our values to be apparent in our community, not just in what we say, but also in who we are and how we connect with each other. Someone suggested that not only does the community have a responsibility and commitment to its membership but also each member has a commitment to the community. It became clear that some of our newer members are not familiar with our Organizational Design Model and our principles. This is an area of opportunity for our future town hall meetings.

We broke into small groups to delve deeper into a discussion about what accountability means as one of our most important values. We had some juicy discussion in my small group. We talked about the fact that as we are all quite independent thinkers our accountability stems from a commitment to our own spiritual growth rather than from a place of guilt or sense of duty. I shared that sometimes I get so wrapped up in continuous improvement that sometimes I can lose sight of being present and connecting with the other members in community on a Sunday morning.

Each small group submitted some notes from their discussions. The board will bring forward this feedback as an important part of the strategic plan.

If you were not able to be there, please share your thoughts and ideas with the community. What does accountability mean to you? How can the Centre for Spiritual Living Kelowna be more accountable to the principles we espouse? How can you be more accountable to your own spiritual growth and to the community as a whole? Please share your ideas. You can comment on this link on facebook, send a comment through the website, or email Dr. Deborah at revgord @ shaw.ca.