New Short- and Long-Term Educational & Engagement Opportunities!

March 13, 2017

We are in the midst of our inaugural year of Day Immersions – day long experiences for groups of any size, age, and background. Back in January, we hosted the confirmation class from Trinity Presbyterian Church in Cherry Hill, NJ for a day in which we explored together The New Jerusalem. We dug into the questions of: What needs have we discovered and witnessed here in Philly? How is the city living up with William’s Penn’s Prayer for the City, written in 1684? If we were to redesign the city thinking about equal access, justice, and love – what would the city look like?

Another unique request for a Day Immersion came from a group of students collaborating from Swarthmore, Bryn Mawr, and Haverford colleges. These astute college students were exploring interfaith dialogue in Philadelphia. They came to us seeking to witness and be a part of how BSM serves our neighbors – those experiencing deep poverty and those experiencing wealth – and how our Christian view of the Eucharistic and hospitality is in dialogue with our values.

The idea behind Day Immersions is utter creativity and flexibility – designing a day of intentional, meaningful, and provocative service and education for any kind of group. We’re so glad to have gotten off to a great start, and we hope that you’ll bring a group into join us for a Day Immersion! We’re now accepting registrations for April-May and September-December 2017!

But, Day Immersions are not the only new and exciting educational offering. We’re also thrilled to introduce the Mission Practicum – if you are a leader or congregant of a Presbyterian church in the area, and if you are have a youth, a lay leader, or even a pastor who is seeking out deeper, more challenging work, missional, and educational opportunities – send them our way!

The Mission Practicum is looking for 10 folks from our neighboring Presbyterian churches – youth, young adults, and adults alike – to join us once a month during the 2017-2018 academic year. Together, we’ll engage in relational, meaningful service to enter into truly transformative relationships. Then, we gather to hear from BSM’s community of witnesses and collective brain on how we can engage our neighbors more deeply and intentionally; how we can think creatively and entrepreneurially about mission and outreach; and, how to extend meaningful invitations to our community to join us in our endeavors. Here’ what we’re thinking in the way of a syllabus:

September: Why Mission, Why Serve? How our faith & theology call us to serve our neighbors

October: Ministry in Context, Responding to the world around you & developing faithful presence

November: Being in the City, Using our full senses, observation skills, & conversation to truly be in our community

December: Convening & Community, How to convene, charge, & meaningfully involve your community in mission

January: Social Awareness, Understanding the complexities & intersectionality of social justice issues, including housing & food insecurity, racial justice, & mental health

February: Project Development, Learning how to write proposals & grants, exploring models for securing funding for present goals & future sustainability

March: Leadership & Sustainability, Exploring models of leadership & building up community support & energy towards your goals

April: Open Space, Cohort participants can choose what they’d like to add to our syllabus here

May: Why Mission, Why Serve? Reprise, Looking back on all we’ve done to understand more fully our call to serve & enact justice in our communities
We’ll be posting application to the 2017-2018 Mission Practicum cohort in mid-March. Contact Devin at devin@broadstreetministry.org to learn more about how to get involved with both Day Immersions and the Mission Practicum!