The Hatchery: Common Cause Community – a conversation with Spencer Burke [LDT023]

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Spencer Burke is a name quite familiar to progressive Christians. For 12 years he headed up the extremely popular website, “The Ooze,” which documented the evolving spirituality of the day.

Beginning this coming September, Spencer is launching The Hatchery LA, a very exciting project that will train and mentor people in the arts of creating new spiritual communities. This isn’t exactly church planting. Many things will stay the same: the focus on Jesus and the commitment to his vision as well as strong communities that will keep people focused ant fulfilled. But the teaching part of what we call Church today will be transformed by a “cause” that fulfills the needs of the greater community. On the website it says,

“We’re a hybrid of both a seminary and an MBA program. We’re holding the tension between the best of non-profit NGOs and the best of what church communities create. We’re blurring the line between ministries and churches. We are at the forefront of the transition from “teaching-centric” to “service-centric” church planting. If this resonates with you, learn more below or contact us soon!”

The Hatchery is a three-year program (plus seven years of mentorship), designed to train Innovators (students) to create service-based Common Cause Communities. Nine Innovators each year will be trained and mentored in the skills and practices needed for this new kind of church. In the second year they will launch their projects in the area of The Hatchery’s campus, Redondo Beach, California, and then they will grow and eventually duplicate the communities across the country.

Spencer has a very exciting vision and it is making a serious contribution to the ongoing conversation about the future of Christianity.

(LDT223)

Some useful links:

Hatchery LA: http://hatcheryla.com/

This site has info about Hatchery LA, the blog, and the podcast.

Particularly interesting blog posts:

Light of the World in an LED Culture