Reflections from the Ekklesia Project Gathering

Hope does not disappoint

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Jul 18, 2025

Last week, our Englewood Review of Books team, along with a few members of the Englewood Christian Church congregation, traveled to Chicago for the annual Ekklesia Project Gathering. The Ekklesia Project is a multinational community of friends who seek to follow Jesus and take church seriously together. Here at Englewood, we’ve been connected with EP for many years and are so grateful for their work!

In fact, part of our impetus for the Cultivating Communities Series was recognizing the value of EP’s work to our own congregational life here and wanting to make these ideas and resources available to a wider audience.

As part of our reflections on this time together, our team wanted to share a few things that are still rattling around in our minds and hearts post-gathering.

A community of Christians who have found life-giving friendship through a shared hope in the vision of God’s good shalom. From across the ecclesial spectrum we gather virtually and in person, supporting each other and our communities in the beautiful, vexing, imperfect work of bearing witness to the non-violent way of the Cross. Together as members of Christ’s borderless body, and committed to our own conversion and to unlearning habits of domination, we find courage to profess our unwillingness to be at home in structures and systems rooted in the economics of scarcity and the politics of fear.

—from the Ekklesia Project’s website

From Katie: On Surprising Embodiment

During our few days together, I had the opportunity to serve as the gathering artist. As a part of our collaborative practice, I invited people to pick up a block of fabric and to stitch throughout our time together, to physically and visually represent something resonating with them from what they heard in our plenary sessions. Several themes came up (the plenaries were so rich), but one unexpected thing that arose from this whole process was to see people very physically embody the themes of the gathering. It happened very organically.

Unprompted, people gathered in our stitching space (which was like a lounge area) during breaks or even before our morning sessions began. We would admire each other's work, and then talk about the image or words being stitched. It became a space for stories. Whether or not we knew each other well, we were able to talk about the things we were lamenting, or how we've felt hope, or anything in between. It gave people an opportunity to verbalize what we see as God is doing in our midst.

Katie Selby is a textile artist and the Associate Editor of The Englewood Review of Books.

Katie works on piecing together everyone’s contributions to our collaborative quilt.

From Chris: A Feast of Life and Energy

As I often say when I reflect on attending conferences (including our recent post on the Missio Alliance conference this spring), the best parts are conversations with friends, and the Ekklesia Project (EP) was no exception. I've been attending the EP annual gathering since 2004 or 2005—so long ago, I can't quite remember which year was my first! And I have many friends that I have met through EP over these last two decades. With that kind of history, the annual gathering always feels like a bit of a homecoming. I didn't get to attend last summer in Southern California, so I was all the more eager to be there in 2025.

I could say quite a bit about the three plenary speakers (Ruth Padilla DeBorst, Terry LeBlanc, and Stan Chu Ilo), but for now I'll offer only the briefest of highlights from each talk. In Ruth's talk, I was delighted to be introduced to the work of Brazilian theologian and poet Rubem Alves. I was hoping to share a snippet of his poetry here that Ruth included, but unfortunately it slipped past before I could take a photo of her slide. I also was intrigued to hear a little about Casa Adobe, the Christian intentional community in Costa Rica of which she is part. Terry's talk was a rich feast that contrasted Indigenous theology/praxis with the Western pattern of theology/praxis into which so many of us have been formed. Terry also highlighted the hope he finds in these Indigenous ways of thinking, acting, and being. (I'm glad Lindsey is reflecting a little more deeply here on this particular talk.) Stan brought many striking stories of Christian faithfulness from the African continent, and highlighted the hope he found in African ways of faithfulness that hold suffering and smiling together. I am looking forward to reading his new book in these themes, releasing this fall.

After each of the plenaries, we gathered in assigned small groups and discussed some of what stood out to us. I especially enjoyed this part of the gathering and the opportunity it afforded to reflect with others on the stories and ideas that had been shared. Silence was structured into these small group conversations, which was refreshing for this introvert, and which helped me get my thoughts together at my own pace. I also enjoyed keeping my hands busy during Friday's talks with the stitching project in which Katie invited us to participate. I'm pretty sure I hadn't stitched since my middle-school home economics class (40+ years ago, back when such classes standard part of the curriculum), but the skill came back to me quickly, and I thoroughly enjoyed designing and stitching my block for the gathering quilt.

This was one of the smallest EP gatherings I have attended, but it seemed as full of life and energy as any previous one. I left excited for next year's gathering which we will host again at Englewood Christian Church in Indianapolis (where the gathering was also held in 2022 and 2023).

Chris Smith is the Founding Editor of The Englewood Review of Books.

“Hope hears the song of the future. Faith dances to it.” —Rubem Alves

From Jeni: Song, Word, and Thread

I tried to remember the last time I’d officially attended an EP gathering. The best I could figure was that outside the porch parties when Englewood hosted the gathering, I’d not attended since 2016! Despite the heavy topics and times spent reflecting on ways we as Christians may have become a bit too comfortable in the world, EP was refreshing. It was healing to be surrounded by Christians who are wrestling with tough things but err on the side of acceptance and kindness. I felt the freedom of telling my stories and asking my questions among people who were also being open with sharing their stories and questions.

Another refreshing part of the gathering was the group art project envisioned by Englewood’s own fiber artist, Katie Selby. I’ve sewn since I was old enough to hold a needle, but I’ve always followed patterns that focused on perfection and precision, which took the enjoyment out of it for me over time. Being guided to stitch meditatively, without a specific plan or a goal of perfection, to stitch while allowing my brain to think about other things, was not only refreshing, but invigorating.

Reconnecting, meeting new folks, talking about both the mundane and the difficult, creating together through song, word, and thread: I hope it’s not another 9 years until I take part again!

Jeni Newswanger-Smith is a middle school ELA teacher and a member of the Englewood Christian Church congregation.

From Joe: The Stakes are High

I was only able to attend one day of the gathering, but during that time was able to listen in on a panel discussion between Michael Budde and Reverend Lindsey Long Joyce. The questions posed to them were, “What are three things you are not putting your hope in?” and “What are three things you are hoping for?” During the conversation, Lindsey shared that in her opinion, polarization is not necessarily something to be avoided when the stakes are high and certain ideologies must be opposed. As you might imagine, this idea generated some pushback! I'm still thinking about the back-and forth and disagreement that was generated. It felt like an important dialogue.

Also, given what has and is transpiring nationally (particularly as it relates to our immigrant neighbors), this year’s conversations at the gathering seemed to have greater stakes. A lot of folks brought into the conversation what their churches and communities are doing and contemplating to respond to our current moment well. Sometimes, gatherings or conferences such as these can feel like theoretical theological word play. This year’s Ekklesia Project Gathering was different.

Joe Bowling is the Executive Director of the Englewood Community Development Corporation.

From Lindsey: Beginning with Creator and Creation

In her work as a textile artist, Katie practices meditative and mindful stitching—embracing imperfection and improvisation as she prays, reflects, mends, and makes. As part of our time, each attendee was invited to select a piece of fabric and use some meditative stitching as a way to embody and illustrate what we were exploring together. At the end, Katie began bringing all our pieces together into a quilt. I loved what was present in the end result: patterns, images, and words, some clearly made by experienced sewists and others less-so. I loved getting to see what was resonating with other attendees and wondering about what others may have been considering as they stitched. The idea that all humans are creative beings is one of my deepest-held beliefs, and yet it’s so rare to get to experience this truth with community as we did during this gathering. It was also delightful to practice being a beginner in a space where imperfection was explicitly welcomed and encouraged, even while we worked together in shared purpose.

One of the ideas that I tried to convey in my own stitching came from Terry LeBlanc’s plenary talk. As Chris said, he talked to us about moving away from the binaries that dominate Western thinking and, by extension, Western Christian theology. To move away from binary-based thinking, he suggested adopting a creatiocentric theology, foundational to how many indigenous people think about spirituality. This framework begins with God as Creator, and moves in an iterative cycle through creation, context, community, culture, ceremony, Christ, back to Creator, and around again. This way of framing our faith begins with God’s intent in creation—which is relationships and harmony. In that framework, sin and redemption become less about morality and legality and more about the breaking and restoration of covenantal relationships. The implications of this idea are vast and will take a long time for me to wrap my head around fully (if I ever can). I’m grateful for the opportunity to explore these ideas more.

Lindsey Cornett is the Managing Editor of Englewood Press.

Ways you can connect with the Ekklesia Project:

Read the Cultivating Communities Series! Two of the three books in the series originated as resources in the Ekklesia Project’s Congregational Formation Initiative. We’re thrilled to have been able to pull this content together and make it available to you in both paperback and digital form! Learn more about the series and these titles here.
Check out their Substack,
Called Out: Conversations with the Ekklesia Project
. Among their offerings are a weekly lectionary reflection.
Join them for weekly Thursday evening prayer on Zoom. Learn more and register here (scroll down).
Join us here in Indianapolis at Englewood Christian Church for the 2026 Gathering, next July. We’ll be sure to share more details in the future!