“Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
JPIC COMMUNITY ORGANIZING CORE TEAM AND DURHAM CAN
JUSTICE, PEACE, AND INTEGRITY OF CREATION (JPIC)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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I. New to Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC) Community Organizing?
II. What is Durham CAN? III. How Do I Get Involved? IV. JPIC Community Organizing Core Team |
V. Durham CAN Metro Council and Internal Action Meetings
VI. Durham CAN Research Action Teams
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VII. Durham CAN Public Action Meetings
VIII. Additional Durham CAN Teams
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NEW TO JUSTICE, PEACE, AND INTEGRITY OF CREATION (JPIC) COMMUNITY ORGANIZING?
If you are new to Durham or Immaculate Conception, or just to our Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC) ministry, you may not be familiar with our parish’s relationships with numerous “community organizing” nonprofits. Although our parishioners and staff promote the Gospel’s call for solidarity and social justice through a number of local community action organizations, Immaculate Conception has a particularly long history of supporting Durham CAN. In the section below, "What is Durham CAN?," you can read my more detailed description of the organization. Simply put, Durham CAN is a nonprofit organization uniting "Congregations, Associations, and Neighborhoods" to help promote the common good within our shared community. Our church was a founding member of the organization. In addition to providing financial support over the years, our parishioners have continued to work for justice on countless issues alongside other Durham CAN member institutions.
If you would like to join your fellow parishioners on our JPIC Community Organizing Core Team to help provide a voice for our parish in organizations like Durham CAN, or if you have any questions about the information explained below, please contact:
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Ken Chiha, Director of Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC)
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Robert Singagliese, JPIC Community Organizing Core Team Parishioner Leader
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WHAT IS DURHAM CAN?
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Durham CAN (Congregation, Associations, Neighborhoods) is based in institutions: congregations, associations, schools (both private and public), nonprofits, community health centers, and neighborhood organizations that share a concern for families and a tradition of faith and democracy. Durham CAN strengthens these institutions by developing the skills and capacity of their leaders to be change agents in the public process.
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Durham CAN (Direct Link)
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Durham CAN creates a vehicle for ordinary people to have a powerful voice in community decisions that affect their lives, instead of leaving decision-making in the hands of a select few. It builds relationships of trust among people and institutions across Durham County, intentionally crossing boundaries that divide our communities. It supports member churches, synagogues, even dioceses, synods, and conferences as they seek to address problems that impact families and communities. Issue-driven and politically non-partisan, Durham CAN puts forth an “issues agenda” as a platform for constructive change.
HOW DO I GET INVOLVED?
Many parishioners are familiar with or have already participated in supporting larger Durham CAN events, particularly around elections or specific social justice issues in Durham. Every CAN campaign begins with listening. People come together to share stories about the issues that affect their lives, families, and communities, then choose issues all can support. Durham CAN acts strategically, holding government and corporate power players accountable to create change for the common good. Durham CAN only moves forward on projects you have the energy and commitment to address. They remain driven by the testimony of concrete experience, not pre-conceived ideology. Once potential issues are identified, community leaders like you do research to develop practical, achievable solutions on concrete issues we can do something about in our community. I have listed below several ways our JPIC parishioners can get involved.
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JPIC COMMUNITY ORGANIZING CORE TEAM
JPIC CORE TEAM COMMUNITY ORGANIZING MEETINGS |
TIME COMMITMENT |
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2nd Monday each month, 7-8:30 pm
Parish Office Conference Room |
Monthly meetings and regular parish/community "relational meetings"
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Our JPIC Community Organizing Core Team organizes and strengthens our church's ability to work for social justice in our parish and throughout our community. Our Core Team also works directly with Durham CAN as our JPIC parish representatives responsible for disseminating important updates, organizing turnout for public action, and building an institutional culture of trust through relational practices.
Consisting of a small group of parishioners trained in the art of grassroots community organizing, they help identify our church's priorities and organize/mobilize our parishioners collectively to address community issues through public action on a variety of social justice initiatives. They serve as Immaculate Conception's main JPIC representatives in Durham CAN, presenting our parish’s concerns and questions, while maintaining a constant flow of communication, action, and evaluation about all Durham CAN-related issues.
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Our JPIC Community Organizing Core Team's efforts to organize our parish’s involvement with Durham CAN is part of its larger mission and goal to identify/develop leaders and strengthen/build our JPIC in our Immaculate Conception community to participate in training, initiate local action, and take part in major parish and social justice community organizing actions/campaigns. It is a vital part of the health of our JPIC, parish, and all broad-based organizations/institutions.
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Some of our current JPIC Core Team members attended Durham CAN training sessions that helped teach members from all Durham CAN institutions what a Core Team is and how it can function within an institution, like Immaculate Conception. At these training sessions, we discussed how Core Teams build collective power, organize within institutions, increase energy and participation from our members, and mobilize institutions into public action. We also learned how to conduct group listening sessions and one-on-one relational meetings. I have included PowerPoint presentation slides from one of our first training sessions below.
DURHAM CAN METRO COUNCIL AND
INTERNAL ACTION MEETINGS
DURHAM CAN METRO COUNCIL MEETINGS3rd Thursday each month, 6-8 pm
Location Announced Monthly 
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Our JPIC Community Organizing Core Team members serve as Immaculate Conception's parish representatives at Durham CAN's Metro Action and Internal Action meetings. In addition to sharing the perspectives of our parishioners (noted above), the Core Team makes important decisions on behalf our church community at these meetings. They also serve as liaisons, communicating and receiving important updates/new resource materials, ensuring our parish commitments to Durham CAN are fulfilled in our efforts to make our city a better place for all!
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DURHAM CAN RESEARCH ACTION TEAMS
TIME COMMITMENT
Meetings 1-2 times per month
Meetings 1-2 times per month
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Parishioners may join a Durham CAN Research Action Team, empowering them to work alongside leaders of other Durham CAN member institutions. Research Action Teams temporarily work on a partial solution to a larger collective problem through research, relational meetings, listening sessions, power analyses, and action campaign recommendations.
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Durham CAN Research Action Teams often are the most direct way to help others and have your voice heard when wanting to address a particular issue. Durham CAN’s agenda emerges from small-group gatherings. People like you share your stories about issues you would like to see changed. They are responsible for the refining work of turning larger, abstract problems into specific, tangible issues they have identified as negatively affecting our constituency. Ultimately, Research Action Teams help provide Durham CAN institutions, like Immaculate Conception, clarity and specificity around our common issues, enabling Durham CAN effectively to address and transform those issues by organizing and mobilizing our collective power.
Our JPIC invited all IC parishioners to participate in the process of setting Durham CAN’s agenda for this current organizing cycle/year. We also invited our parishioners to attend the Research Action Team Training meeting to prepare to be a part of these teams. If you missed this training session, please review the helpful resources below.
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In Durham CAN's current organizational cycle, the four Research Action Teams include:
1) Affordable Housing
2) Gun Violence 3) Poverty 4) Public Transportation |
If you would like to join other Immaculate Conception parishioners in one of Durham CAN’s Research Action Teams, please sign up on the Durham CAN link below.
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Please remember to keep your current status and contact information updated with Ken Chiha, Director of Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC).
DURHAM CAN PUBLIC ACTION MEETINGS
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All parishioners can come together to support Durham CAN by showing up and participating in larger Public Actions they sponsor. Many of these events are designed to bring our community together and allow the people to express shared needs or concerns.
Often, public or political leaders are invited to respond to Durham CAN's broad-based, achievable requests for action on behalf of the common good. These public figures may be asked to change a particular policy or practice that Durham CAN's institutions have identified as negatively affecting our community. |
TIME COMMITMENT
2-4 gatherings per year 
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ADDITIONAL DURHAM CAN TEAMS
DURHAM CAN STRATEGY TEAMThe Strategy Team is responsible for setting the direction of Durham CAN, based on issues raised and ratified by the membership. The Strategy Team authorizes new issue campaigns, reviews the progress of current campaigns, attends to financial and structural aspects of the organization, and oversees the hiring of a Lead Organizer. Immaculate Conception does not currently have a representative on the Durham CAN Strategy Team. It is my understanding that representatives must be invited/appointed directly by the current Durham CAN Strategy Team.
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DURHAM CAN CLERGY CAUCUSDurham CAN's Clergy Caucus is composed of clergy leaders of member institutions who work with Durham CAN organizers to act on proposed strategy and guide Durham CAN's campaigns. The Clergy Caucus provides a regular space for philosophical, theological, and practical reflection. Our Parochial Vicar, Father Hugh Macsherry, OFM, is a member of the Durham CAN Clergy Caucus.
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© All rights reserved.
If you have questions regarding our various JPIC ministries, please contact me directly.
Kennith M. Chiha, Director of Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC)
Immaculate Conception Catholic Church - 901-A West Chapel Hill Street, Durham, NC 27701
(919) 682-3449 Ext. 293 - [email protected]
If you have questions regarding our various JPIC ministries, please contact me directly.
Kennith M. Chiha, Director of Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC)
Immaculate Conception Catholic Church - 901-A West Chapel Hill Street, Durham, NC 27701
(919) 682-3449 Ext. 293 - [email protected]