The Courage to Love: Building Community through the Work that Reconnects

Anne and Terry are the co-founders of Canticle Farm, located in the Fruitvale District of East Oakland. Inspired by the life of Francis of Assisi, Canticle Farm is a community providing a platform for the Great Turning, one heart, one home, and one block at a time. The Great Turning—the planetary shift from an industrial-growth society to a life-sustaining society—is served by Canticle Farm through local work that fosters forgiveness in the human community and compassion for all beings. Canticle Farm primarily focuses on the poor and marginalized as those who most bear the burden of social and planetary degradation, as well as being those who are first able to perceive the need for the Great Turning. Rooted in spiritual practice, Canticle Farm manifests this commitment by engaging in the Work That Reconnects, integral nonviolence, gift economy, restorative justice practices, urban permaculture, and other disciplines necessary for regenerating community in the 21st Century. Anne and Terry are the parents of five children.

Anne served as Joanna Macy’s executive assistant. She has traveled extensively with Joanna, participated in dozens of Macy’s workshops and is herself a facilitator of the Work That Reconnects. Anne is a founding member of Nevada Desert Experience and currently serves on its Board. She has been involved in work for justice, peace, nuclear disarmament, nonviolence, and ecological sustainability for more than 35 years.

Terry earned his Master of Divinity degree at the Franciscan School of Theology and a law degree from UC Hastings.  He is a facilitator of the Work That Reconnects and has worked for twenty years in men’s communities holding men’s rites of passage developed by Richard Rohr.  In all his community building efforts he has focused on the role of conflict in personal and organizational development, and, in particular, the ability of trauma and shadow work to transform relationships and deepen the social field.

Serena is pursuing a life that remains attentive to the tenderness of a snail’s soft body and reverent to the miracle of its spiraled shell. She is a Chinese-American peacebuilder, storyteller, and community weaver devoted to the belief that intergenerational connection is vital for the future of our peace and justice movements. She recently completed six years as a Special Advisor in Design & Innovation to U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, bringing a spiritual and systemic understanding to the public health crisis of loneliness and isolation. She is a Zen chaplain-in-training and serves on the boards of CoGenerate and Commonweal.