Overview

«Most books about purpose-driven lives either glorify or vilify a savior figure. This deep, engaging memoir is the inspirational exception. Wellspring House was a haven from dominant social structures, collectively built on mutuality and a commitment to a sustainable community, both economically and spiritually. It is a model that can and should be replicated.» (Ruth McCambridge, editor emerita of the Nonprofit Quarterly) «If you care at all about homelessness, read this book. Most of the conversation about affordable housing is about the housing. This book demonstrates how to welcome the stranger, inhabit a house, and make it a home, and that may be the point. Written with the grace it speaks about, this book is both inspiring and grounded in the moral challenges of our time.» (Peter Block, author of Community: The Structure of Belonging) This book tells the story of Wellspring House, an extraordinary community founded by ordinary people with a simple but radical mission: to live together and share their home with people who needed one. Rejecting typical nonprofit models, they created a welcoming home for families, mostly headed by women, through reciprocal relationships, human dignity, and fresh flowers always on the table. Wellspring listened to what their guests needed, then stretched to meet those needs: by developing affordable housing and a land trust, educating women to be change leaders, supporting parents, and more. This book combines the dramatic narrative of creating homes and losing them—including their own—with an analysis of misguided anti-poverty policy. It is a cautionary tale about the misuse of power in nonprofits. In a time of desperate need for hospitality and community, it offers justice-seeking organizations and activists an inspiring model of how to make a real difference in the place you call home.

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9781803744261

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Nancy Schwoyer has a BA in journalism from St. Mary-of-the-Woods College in Indiana and an MA in English literature from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She has done post-graduate work in theology and education at Boston College. Rosemary Haughton began writing while raising a large family, publishing more than thirty books on relationships, family, community, and theology. She also illustrated some of her own and others’ books. Kimberly French writes essays, journalism, and other nonfiction. She coaches, edits, and helps authors with book-length works.

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