Okay, So I Founded a Church. Now What?

Okay, So I Founded a Church. Now What?

Well… here I am another year older, and apparently I accidentally founded the church I spent my whole life looking for. 😂

Tomorrow is my birthday, and apparently this is as good a time as any to say something I still find slightly ridiculous out loud:

I founded a church.

😂

For more than 4 decades, people have joked about the “Church of Christ-ie.”  I also heard my fair share of “anti-Christ-ie” jokes growing up, so  childhood branding was slightly confusing.  I certainly never expected either joke to become remotely relevant.  I wasn’t trying to start a church.  I spent most of my life trying to find one.

I wanted to know what it would feel like to walk into a spiritual community without wondering when somebody was going to decide I was too strange, too questioning, too independent, too different, too herbal, too loud, too brain damaged, too traumatized, too……………..something…everything.

I wondered what church would feel like if nobody was trying to convert anybody.  If questions were welcome.  If nature was sacred and treated with respect.  If service mattered more than appearances….If people could simply just BE……………………

And eventually I had to ask the rather inconvenient question:  Why am I waiting for somebody else to build it?

So here we are.

Now what?

 

That’s actually the funny part.  Not much changes.  I know there is plenty of cynicism surrounding churches, and most of it is entirely understandable.  People have watched religious organizations become businesses, personalities become brands, leaders collect followers, and money become strangely intertwined with spirituality.  If you know anything about me, you probably already know how poorly suited I am for that particular business model. 😂

Let it be stated…………..I am STILL not looking for followers.

I’m not interested in people agreeing with me.  I’m not interested in converting you.  And money has never been the thing that determines whether I pursue something I believe in.  Sure, money can make things happen faster. It can buy lumber, plants, food, tools, bathrooms, supplies and infrastructure.

But with money or without it?  I’m still going to build…just like I have everything else I said I would.  It might just take longer. 😂  No problem.

There is a very long public trail behind me. For roughly 2 decades, most of my life, work, writing, service, businesses, struggles, experiments and very public mistakes have existed online and elsewhere.  I haven’t suddenly become someone different because there is now a religious corporation attached to the words Ozarks Church of Nature.

I’m still me.  The Herbal-Tique is still a for profit business operating as my DBA.  We still sell things…got to pay the bills somehow to build a place where all is welcome, like I have these past any years.

We still collect the taxes we’re required to collect on those sales.  The gardens are still the gardens.  This is still private property.  And ALL are still welcome………..with boundaries.  🙂

And the mission is still what it was before anybody filed paperwork:

– Feed people.

– Help people.

– Grow things.

– Make things.

– Learn things.

– Share what we can.

– Protect a little piece of land.

– Create sanctuary.

– And leave people freer than we found them.

All the same things I’ve spent countless hours over the years discussing with everyone who said they were interested in being part of what I’m building here.

And, in another sentence I never particularly expected to write, yes, I also hold minister credentials. 😂  But those credentials didn’t create my faith either. They didn’t suddenly give me special access to God, make me spiritually superior, or turn me into someone looking for followers. They simply put a formal name around a role I have already been living in my own way for a very long time: serving, listening, learning, teaching what I know, helping where I can, and making room for people.

I don’t need the state, or a certificate, title or credential to validate what I believe.  My faith existed long before any paperwork did.  What matters to me is having the same freedom to practice, organize, gather and build community around my beliefs that anyone else has around theirs.

The paperwork recognizes an organization. It does not make my truth more true than yours.

And because apparently I process major life events by turning them into music…here’s the song that probably explains this whole thing better than I can.  🙂

So what WILL the church look like?

 

Pretty much like it does now.  Except hopefully with more places to sit. 😂

We have dreams for a pavilion, an outdoor kitchen, bathrooms and a community gathering area.  I’m working on a new garden oasis around the pond.

There will be music.  There will be food.  There will be gardens.  There will be laughter.  There will be conversations.  There will probably also be animals interrupting all of the above.

And if we do this right, someday there may be a Buddhist sitting beside a Jew, a Pagan beside a Muslim, a Christian beside an atheist………and absolutely nobody needing the person next to them to become anything else before sharing a meal.

That is the whole point of LOVING EVERYONE, like pretty much every religion I have ever studied over the decades claims to do…  🙂

• What happens when we make room?
• What happens when we stop needing sameness before we offer belonging?
• What happens when we practice freedom of religion by actually allowing people religious freedom?

Maybe Ozarks Church of Nature is, in part, a freedom-of-religion religion. 😂  A place where your spiritual life belongs to you.  That includes mine.

I have had experiences in my life, including during times when I came very close to death, that profoundly shaped what I believe about God, life and each other.

But those were my experiences.  I have never believed that having a powerful experience gives me authority over yours.  I don’t know more about your relationship with the Divine than you do.  I’m not “righter.”  LOL  I’m still that same little girl asking entirely too many questions.  And I hope I remain her for the rest of my life.

There is also a strange irony in making any of this “official.”

I didn’t create Ozarks Church of Nature because I needed the state to tell me my beliefs were legitimate.  My faith existed long before any paperwork did.  One of our foundational beliefs is freedom of conscience and direct relationship with the Divine.  I do not believe a government gives me permission to believe, pray, gather, question, worship, or seek God. Religious freedom existed before any certificate did.

So yes, there is something a little funny about filing paperwork to document a freedom I don’t believe government created in the first place. 😂

But I also live in this world.  If organizing formally helps protect the sanctuary, keep finances transparent, build community spaces, feed people, and preserve our ability to exist beside every other faith, then I’m willing to navigate the paperwork.  The paperwork does not create the religion. It documents the organization.

What matters to me is that I have the same freedom to practice, organize, gather and build community around my beliefs that anyone else has around theirs.

I don’t need the state to validate my faith. I care that the law leaves room for mine just as it leaves room for yours.

And no, I don’t care if anybody ever “follows” me.

(In fact I truly hope you DON’T follow “ME!”)

Seriously.  I care that this place exists.  I care that my spiritual path gets room to exist beside yours.  I care that someone who has spent a lifetime feeling unwanted by religious spaces might someday walk onto this land and discover that nobody here is asking them to disappear.

If 500 people eventually gather here, wonderful.  If 5 people gather here, wonderful.  If nobody comes one afternoon and I spend it planting flowers beside the pond?  Also wonderful.

The value of this doesn’t depend on an audience.

That’s probably one of the biggest reasons I finally understood I could build it.  And yes, we are working on some fun things behind the scenes.  We’re making music now.  And somehow that has already gotten completely out of control. 😂  ooops….lol

There are writings and documents being developed.  There are gardens being expanded.  There are gathering spaces I want to build.  There are ideas for food, education, fellowship, creativity, healing, nature and community that will take time to grow.  And I would genuinely love some outside eyes on what already exists.

Read the documents you can find by clicking here. 

Read what we actually say we believe.  Read the principles.  Look for contradictions.  Ask questions.

Tell me what doesn’t make sense.  Tell me what concerns you.  Tell me what you love.  Tell me what you think is missing.

A faith that welcomes questions shouldn’t be afraid of questions about itself.

And if something about this makes you think:  “I could help with that…”

Please contact me…

• Maybe you build.
• Maybe you garden.
• Maybe you cook.
• Maybe you make music.
• Maybe you’re good at paperwork.
• Maybe you know something I don’t.
• Maybe you just have an idea.

There is plenty of room for all of that, and more here.  Because after all these years, I finally got to experience something I wondered about for a very long time:  What would church feel like if I didn’t have to be afraid of being rejected by it and it’s followers?

Turns out?  It feels pretty damn good. 😂

Nothing magical happened when the paperwork became official.  I didn’t suddenly become somebody else’s spiritual authority.  I didn’t become a guru.  I didn’t acquire all the answers.  I didn’t change religions.  I didn’t change the mission.  I just finally stopped waiting for somebody else to create the space I had spent my whole life hoping existed.

So…  Okay. I founded a church. 

It seemed like the most logical step.  LOL  Now what?  Same thing I’ve always done.

•  Plant something.
• Feed somebody.
• Keep building.
• Ask questions.
• Make room.
• Choose love.
• And see what grows…

 

And this isn’t meant to become a one-person church…

As we build the initial Council of Stewards and get the organizational pieces in place, we also plan to invite people from the broader community to express interest in future Steward positions as I’ve always believed in diversity and am able to respect and learn from those who believe differently and feel multiple eyes will keep everything growing in the right all inclusive direction.  🙂

You do not have to share every one of my beliefs. In fact, one of the things I hope the Council eventually reflects is genuine religious, spiritual, philosophical, and life diversity. What matters far more is whether we can disagree respectfully while still agreeing on love, service, freedom of conscience, community, and responsible stewardship.

More information about that process will be coming as we get established, but if you are interested in being part of our steward council, please fill this out here and send it to the email on the contact page after you have looked over all our public founding documents found on this site.  🙂

I am looking forward to many more years of bringing people together from all lifestyles, faiths and any other differences we can all learn and grow with by being allowed to share with one another.  Who knows….maybe you find we’re really not so different after all!?!?!

 

And if this is the first you have heard about it, let me get this out of the way here so you don’t have to go sifting through all the documents to find it.  🙂

We are not trying to rewrite the Bible or any other sacred text!

We are not creating our own version of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Paganism, or anybody else’s tradition.  We do not believe all sacred texts say exactly the same thing, and we do not need them to.  I personally believe many of the principles I try to live by are deeply biblical as I understand them: love your neighbor, feed people, welcome the stranger, practice compassion and mercy, care for creation, serve rather than dominate, and pay attention to how our beliefs are actually lived.

Other people may understand those same texts differently. That is okay.  We can read sacred writings seriously without pretending that one human interpretation is the only possible interpretation. We can learn from the Bible without rewriting it. We can learn from other traditions without appropriating or erasing them.

The goal here is not to replace anyone’s scripture. It is to practice what we believe.