Parish Church

Thanks Nashville

I am so grateful for the beautiful Spero Dei Church on Nashville’s west side. The church hosted the Post-Evangelical Collective’s second annual national gathering. This was my first time participating. For anyone who feels ecclesiologically homeless in the larger church

Dwight J. Friesen May 3, 2025May 3, 2025

Thank You Lawndale!

So grateful for the legendary Lawndale Christian Community Church on Chicago’s south side. The church hosted Parish Collective’s annual Inhabit Conference. This was the first time Inhabit wasn’t held in the Seattle area, and Lawndale hit it out of park.

Dwight J. Friesen April 27, 2025May 3, 2025

Inhabit Conference . Chicago . April 25-26

Parish Collective’s annual Inhabit Conference is about two months away. The conference will be held in Chicago this year. Reserve your spot now. See you there! Peace, dwight

Dwight J. Friesen February 21, 2025April 21, 2025

Brueggemann’s Response to “Election 2024”

Earlier today I came across a post-election reflection piece on the Church Anew website by Dr. Walter Brueggemann… the wise, influential, and kind Hebrew Bible scholar. Brueggemann’s article is titled, “Beyond the Fetal Position,” and I commend it to you. Brueggemann

Dwight J. Friesen November 7, 2024November 13, 2024

Soon to be… Rev Holly Greenidge

I am excited to take part in celebrating God’s call to serve as a minister of the liberating Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth in the life of Holly Greenidge. Holly’s ordination service will take place in Portland, Oregon, on Saturday,

Dwight J. Friesen October 22, 2024October 22, 2024

Preaching Tomorrow

Looking forward to being with the Edmonds Lutheran Church tomorrow. Come by if you’re in the area. Peace, dwight

Dwight J. Friesen October 12, 2024October 12, 2024

Mission in a New Reality

Beginning later today, I will be serving as the Theologian in Residence for this year’s Western Gathering of Leaders. Innovative Episcopal leaders will be convening to share best practices, and I get to frame some of the shifts within Western

Dwight J. Friesen September 30, 2024September 30, 2024

Launching a Short Series

This weekend I get to preach at St. Columba’s Episcopal Church in Kent to launch a short series of midweek conversations about our evolving times and cultural context. My working title is: “What’s Going Here?  Becoming St Columba’s in a

Dwight J. Friesen September 18, 2024September 18, 2024

Leadership as Convening

So I was poking around the interwebs and stumbled across a little conversation about “gathering” that I forgot about. Enjoy… Peace, dwight View this post on Instagram A post shared by The Seattle School (@theseattleschool)

Dwight J. Friesen July 13, 2024July 13, 2024

The Spiritual Infrastructure of the Future

I highly commend Sue Phillips’s recent essay, “The Spiritual Infrastructure of the Future: Stewards of Religious Assets Should Embrace Spiritual Innovators.” Sue is on the founding team of the Workshop for Emotional and Spiritual Technology, a tech startup working to

Dwight J. Friesen July 12, 2024July 12, 2024

Emerged Podcast . All Episodes

I am so, so, so grateful to Tripp, Tony, Josh, and all the funders of this podcast. What a gift! I can only imagine all the creative energy, conversations, and time invested… thank you! Emergent Village and the entire emerging

Dwight J. Friesen May 6, 2024May 7, 2024

Reserve Your Place for Inhabit 2024

It’s Inhabit time! As you may know the annual Inhabit Conference, is convened by Parish Collective, whose mission is to connect people to be the church in the neighborhood. Inhabit is a two-day event filled with stories, learning environments, music/art

Dwight J. Friesen April 24, 2024April 23, 2024

Conference . Vancouver BC

The Centre For Missional Leadership at St. Andrew’s Hall is hosting a conference exploring “Rhythms and Rituals: Christian Formation on the Edges of Western Culture. ” If you’re in or around Vancouver BC, May 2-4 I invite you to participate.

Dwight J. Friesen April 19, 2024April 19, 2024

Guest Preaching on Palm Sunday

This weekend I will be guest preaching at Evergreen Mennonite Church in Kirkland on Seattle’s Eastside. I’ve been handed a lot of narrative to cover, from Christ’s entry into Jerusalem to the his unjust execution. I’m very much looking forward

Dwight J. Friesen March 19, 2024March 19, 2024

Inner Development Goals

If you follow my blog at all, then you know that I am passionate about helping realize the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). I often say that the 17 SDGs are as audacious as they are beautiful and are a

Dwight J. Friesen March 18, 2024May 7, 2024

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

As you may know at the end of 2023 the world observed the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This bold and beautiful series of 30 articles, is a milestone document in the history of human rights.

Dwight J. Friesen March 2, 2024March 4, 2024

Pope Calls for Liturgical Reform

Matthew Santucci of the Catholic New Agency reported yesterday that Pope Francis addressed members of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments to discuss the importance of liturgical reform as a core feature of the board

Dwight J. Friesen February 9, 2024February 9, 2024

Faith For Cities

I’m joining Chris Elisara and the folks at Faith for Cities seeking to harness multi-faith insights and actions in the face of an unparalleled era of urbanization. As we know more than eight out of people people on the planet

Dwight J. Friesen February 7, 2024February 7, 2024

Multi-Faith Presence @ COP28

While I wasn’t able to attend COP28 in person, it’s been so great to the reports from my multi-faith colleagues about the remarkable advancement in the active participation of world’s faiths, religions, and spiritualities in the conversation. 84-85% of the

Dwight J. Friesen January 30, 2024January 30, 2024

Learning Community This Weekend

This weekend Today and tomorrow is a Parish Collective Learning Community. Can’t wait. To find out more about these learning communities, visit Parish Collective. Peace, dwight

Dwight J. Friesen January 26, 2024January 25, 2024

Spirituality & Polycrisis

Some of the people of faith I’ve been collaborating with to activate our respective traditions to engage the SDGs for a more sustainable urban future for all everything alongside UN-Habitat and the World Economic Forum have just published a new

Dwight J. Friesen January 19, 2024January 19, 2024

Guest Preaching this Sunday

I am delighted to be invited back to St Luke’s in North Bellevue to preside and preach this weekend. It’s going to be so wonderful to be with this community again. This is the faith community with whom I served

Dwight J. Friesen January 10, 2024January 9, 2024

Emerged… an oral history begins

So excited to share the launch of a new podcast co-hosted by Tripp Fuller & Tony Jones, and produced by Josh Gilbert. It’s titled, “Emerged: an oral history of the emerging church movement.” The podcast launched on January 1st, 2024

Dwight J. Friesen January 5, 2024January 8, 2024

Dying for Change: Two Loops Model

Systems thinkers, organizational innovators, and localists Deborah Frieze and Margaret Wheatley, with the Berkana Institute, have developed a very helpful model for better understanding the complex process of systems change. Their model – among other things – thoughtfully attends to

Dwight J. Friesen September 13, 2023September 13, 2023

Wowie, Wow, Wow!

Well, Sunday was my final Sunday serving at St Luke’s. And today was my final staff meeting. As challenging as transitions can be in the life of any community, this one was so beautiful and warm. It was filled with

Dwight J. Friesen August 29, 2023September 5, 2023

My Time @ St Luke’s Coming to a Close

If you’re a regular to my site you might recall that I have had the privilege of serving as the “substitute pastor” for an ELCA (Lutheran) community here in Bellevue since January 2022. Even though I am not ordained Lutheran

Dwight J. Friesen August 25, 2023August 25, 2023

C-TEN Interview

podcast interview “Church after Mars Hill” In this episode, I am hosted and interviewed by Dr Joel Kiekintveld.

Dwight J. Friesen July 18, 2023August 18, 2023

Surgeon General on Loneliness

Last month The U.S. Surgeon General released an important report outlining the nation’s loneliness epidemic. Among other things the report demonstrates that loneliness has a equivalent impact on one’s health as smoking 15 cigarettes’ a day. The report provides some

Dwight J. Friesen June 25, 2023January 9, 2024

The SDGs in their Rightful Place

UN-Habitat goes Local… putting SDGs in their rightful Place “Part of loving loving neighbor as oneself involves loving and serving one’s place, its peoples, & systems sustaining shared life.” – dwight j. friesen “My Neighbourhood” ‘MY Neighbourhood’ provides an extensive

Dwight J. Friesen June 8, 2023June 8, 2023

Thank you, Wilmington

I just returned from a great weekend Delaware. While it was a bit of a whirlwind, it was a rich time of imagining deeply with some very thoughtful leaders from St Barnabas’ Episcopal Church. The leadership retreat was held at

Dwight J. Friesen May 8, 2023May 8, 2023