Brownsville UMC is currently halfway through the GNE nine-month curriculum and is taking a break for Advent/Christmas. We will resume with Lab 3 in the beginning of 2023. Subscribe to our newsletter below to keep up to date on all things GNE!
The Good Neighbor Experiment (GNE) is a transformative learning process that prepares congregations with the practical tools they need to forge more meaningful relationships and to create sustainable impact in their community.
The Good Neighbor Experiment is small group program in faithful neighboring for churches that desire to thrive as instruments of God’s love. However, between COVID-19, declining church membership, and shifting cultural and societal contexts, this desire can feel challenging to live out. Through participating in GNE, created by the folks at The Neighboring Movementbased out of Wichita, KS, Brownsville UMC hopes experience a culture shift and gain practical tools to get to know our actual, literal neighbors in the following ways:
experience a shift in emphasis from programs to relationship
experience a shift in focus from scarcity to abundance
experience a shift from inauthenticity to joy and discernment
learn a dynamic set of tools founded in asset-based community development
Learn more about the Good Neighbor Experiment by clicking on the video below!
The Approach We believe that an asset-based approach to neighboring can create lasting change in the world, reduce a host of social issues and increase the quality of life for individuals, communities, and beyond.
The Mission We achieve our “Big Idea” by living out relationship, abundance, and joy in our founding neighborhood and sharing what we've learned in simple, doable, and universal ways with individuals, churches, and civic organizations. Our DEI Commitment The Neighboring Movement nurtures authentic, gifts-focused connections to foster neighbor-centered leadership. We work for justice for all neighbors across the intersections of age, race, ethnicity, family configuration, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, immigration status, difference of ability, neurodiversity, religious tradition, body shape and size, economic circumstances, housing status, and more. The expression of our work will be a liberating and justice-seeking effort of joy, relationship, and abundance for all people. The Neighboring Movement was originally founded within the Christian tradition and now works with those of religious, non-religious, and nominally religious backgrounds.
We would like to acknowledge that the land on which we gather is within the ancestral territory of the suq̀ʷabš “People of Clear Salt Water” (Suquamish People). Expert fishermen, canoe builders, and basket weavers, the suq̀ʷabš live in harmony with the lands and waterways along Washington’s Central Salish Sea as they have for thousands of years. Here, the suq̀ʷabš live and protect the land and waters of their ancestors for future generations as promised by the Point Elliot Treaty of 1855.