Our Mission
Our mission is to create circles for all* people to wrestle through biblical texts, so that— together— we can expand each other’s experience of what is sacred, whole, and good.
*We value equity, diversity, and inclusion. We acknowledge and embrace the complex questions of what it means to be human. No matter how you identify in terms of race, class, gender, sexuality, faith background, politics, and more, you are invited to come and wrestle with us. The only thing we won’t wrestle with is each person’s God-given goodness.
Our Vision
Our vision is for our community to cultivate wholeness, hope, and freedom, for ourselves and for others.
Our Values—together, we are committed to:
Rooting deeply.
We circle around the biblical text. At the same time, we don’t make anyone in our circles believe any certain thing about that text. We see the Bible as a multi-faceted gem containing stories of the Divine and humanity. The Bible continues to reveal new beauty as we look at it from different angles.
Learning from each other.
Many people believe that there should be a leader and an answer key when they study the Bible in a small group. At 40 Orchards, we are all learners together. There are no answer keys and no hierarchies. We seek questions, knowing that questions are better than answers. The way we see it, since every human is made in God’s image, every human has something to teach us about who God is. There is communal wisdom in every circle.
Expecting goodness.
We believe goodness is at the center of who God is and how humans are made. Every human is inherently valuable and worthy of love. As we affirm what is already in us, we also celebrate the potential of the goodness we can bring through how we live. We hold on to hope, together.
Wrestling together.
We believe there is value in uncomfortable conversations and vulnerable questions. In our circles, we wrestle with the difficult parts of our own stories, as well as those in the history of Christianity. We struggle through the -isms (racism, anti-semitism, sexism, and more) that have been embedded in what we’ve been taught, and continue to look for new perspectives. While we believe God is good, we also talk about the times that might not feel true. Tension is a necessary part of moving forward in freedom and wholeness.
Searching for more.
Deconstruction and faith shifts can easily lead to cynicism and despair, feeling like we no longer belong to traditions that have been meaningful in our lives. We search the Bible and our lives through the lens of sacred possibility. We assume there is more to be discovered, questioned, and applied as we listen for how God is still speaking.