Home Calendar Blessed are the Poor: Session 2 - Cultural Poverty Webinar

Blessed are the Poor: Session 2 - Cultural Poverty Webinar

The first session of “Blessed Are the Poor: Engaging the Community for Social Transformation” took place in October with a focus on economic poverty. Leaders Rev. Dr. Michael Bowie and Rev. Mary Downey helped bring attention to the challenges that economic poverty brings with it, offered a vision of God’s work and the Beloved Community, and provided insight on the work that takes place through Downey’s ministry at the Community Hope Center in Florida as a tangible experience of what engaging community and working for the Beloved Community looks like. It was a challenging and insightful conversation that offered wisdom and learnings that gave local church participants the opportunity to adapt the information to their context and begin engaging their own communities in ways designed to build the Beloved Community.

The next conversation on Tuesday, November 17 features Rev. David Wilson and Rev. Donna Pewo, who serve in the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference. The focus of the session will be on cultural poverty and the implications of the invisibility that resulted from the genocide that took place as the dominant culture moved westward. The dominant culture attempted to erase the language, practices, and life of the indigenous people. Wilson and Pewo have wisdom and vast experience in working with diverse cultures and people. They know how to engage the local community through congregational ministry and build long-term relationships of solidarity and support with tribal nations across the United States as well as with indigenous peoples around the world.

Wilson and Pewo engage and connect with the community. Their work has included increasing voting in indigenous communities, emphasizing census counting, supporting the Standing Rock “Water Is Life movement” and flood and disaster relief on the Pine Ridge reservation, and collecting gifts for the Four Corners ministry on the Navajo Nation for COVID-19 relief. They have partnered with tribal nations and peoples in Oklahoma, advocated for those who have not been recognized by the dominant culture, and have led and encouraged the congregations in the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference to do the same.

This webinar series on poverty will conclude following five sessions and will be available to download. It includes accompanying written resource guides as well. Contact Bryan Tener [email protected] with any questions.


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Blessed are the Poor, is a webinar series designed to help church leaders engage with the people in their communities and reflect on the different ways in which people experience poverty.

This webinar will help contribute to the mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

Discipleship Ministries and Path 1 will be exploring the many experiences of poverty in two-hour sessions that will take place once a month for five months, from October 2020 through February 2021.

Topics Include:

  • Economic poverty
  • Cultural poverty
  • Physical poverty
  • Spiritual poverty
  • Political poverty

Each Session Includes:

  • Panelists offering perspectives on a national and global level
  • Panelist sharing experiences, learnings, and best practices to help leaders in local church settings
  • Resource guide complete with theological discussion questions, Bible study, and community engagement tools
  • Cohort community options for further discussion and support in implementing actionable steps
  • Digital bundle of online resources to assist leaders during the series

This series is an opportunity to support your continued discernment of how God is calling you and your congregation to engage with your community and your work for justice, so that all people will have the opportunity to experience God’s power for life and live into what God desires for us— the beloved community.