The Justice Conference LIVE at Multnomah University
AFTER THREE YEARS, momentum continues to build and the vision for The Justice Conference continues to reach thousands of people through a networked national conference that educates, inspires and connects a generation of men and women around a shared concern for the vulnerable and oppressed. Come see why The Justice Conference has become one of the largest international biblical and social justice conferences and an annual pilgrimage for justice workers, students and learners from all over the world. The main conference will be simulcast LIVE from Los Angeles, California.
Our pre-conference will be a unique presentation of speakers engaged in justice work throughout the Portland-Metropolitan area.
Education as Freedom in East Africa with Amon Munyaneza
Asante Ministries founder, Amon Munyaneza, will explore how education not only brings opportunities to impoverished children, but actually frees them toward the life intended. He will challenge us to analyze our role in the world and how we can engage with organizations and communities to make an impact in the lives of children waiting to be freed, loved, and empowered to hope of a better life. You may even be convinced to pack your bags and travel to Africa to experience and support freedom in Rwanda.
The Cost Of Caring For Victims Of Injustice with Christopher Coffman
While talking about justice issues such as sex trafficking and foster care is exciting, caring for victims of injustice is extremely costly. In this session, Pastor Christopher Coffman will unpack the personal, emotional, physical, financial, and spiritual costs we encounter as we walk alongside the vulnerable, exploited, and abused. Drawing from his experience as an advocate and mentor for prostituted children with Door To Grace in Portland as well as stories he’s encountered working with genocide survivors in Rwanda, Christopher will offer a biblical framework for caring for victims of injustice along with practical steps caregivers can take to avoid burnout.
Mentoring Kids of Color with Eric Knox
It has been well documented that students of color have been marginalized by social and academic constructs that have perpetuated cultural inequities within the public school system. In an article derived from the teaching principles of culturally relevant pedagogy, pioneer Gloria Ladson-Billings and Heather Coffey speak to the issue of African American students being placed in an environment where their culture is not valued or nurtured and in turn “perceive school as a place where they cannot be themselves.” The oppressive nature of these systems is not only emotionally damaging, but also steers students away from passions, interests, and ultimately opportunities (academic and otherwise) to help them shape and change their immediate realm of influence and the world. In this workshop, we will look at relevant cultural pedagogical approaches through “mentorship” that empower young girls and boys of color. It is our contention that a faith-based culturally-specific approach that considers who they are and where they come from, is not only essential to their growth and success, but would also be socially, societally, and spiritually transformative as they navigate their future.
Sex Trafficking “On Your Watch” with Gary Tribbett
Girls and boys, as young as 12 to 14 years old, are being systematically and subversively recruited into the sex industry in alarming numbers. This dark side of keeping Portland weird is an atrocity you cannot ignore. This workshop gives an overview of human trafficking in Portland, and outlines efforts by civic, social and faith organizations to stop this horrendous evil. Here is what you can do to help avoid propagating the injustice and begin being an agent of healing for our city.
Advocating 4 Justice with Vulnerable Children with Greg Burch
Nearly 1 billion children were born in the decade from 2003-2013 with over 90% of them to mothers and fathers earning less than $1(USD) a day. This pre-conference session will look to research coming out of Latin America that highlights the need to incorporate policies that recognize human rights, child participation and protection as part of a missional approach to advocate for vulnerable children globally.
Embrace Oregon: How the Collective Church is Collaborating with the State’s Child Welfare System with Jillana Goble and Dan Minne
The most vulnerable children and families in our community are involved with DHS (Department of Human Services) Child Welfare. Embrace Oregon is a growing volunteer movement of faith communities in the tri-county area who desire to serve the children and families that DHS serves. Embrace Oregon seeks to provide on-ramps for community involvement for individuals, families, small groups, faith communities and local businesses. We seek to demonstrate radical hospitality to DHS and to create awareness of the crisis shortage of foster homes in our community and the need for a response. Many people think if they can’t or don’t want to be a foster or adoptive parent, there is not a role for them to play. Embrace Oregon is changing the very nature of this conversation. This is a volunteer movement focused on collaborating for better outcomes for vulnerable children and families in our communities through relationship with the DHS Child Welfare. In this session you will hear how this movement began and what has transpired in the last 18 months from both the perspective of the faith community and Department of Human Services.
Changing the World One Cupcake at a Time with Joy Hoover
Sex trafficking is an injustice that is currently one of the hottest topics around the world. The more we know, the more we realize that we too need to join the march in being part of the solution. But how? Where do we start? What do we have in our hands that can help us fight for and with the precious lives affected by sex trafficking? Join Joy Hoover, President and Founder of The Cupcake Girls, as she shares The Cupcake Girls’ journey in what they call their ‘beautiful disaster’. Learn how hundreds have joined the march and together are changing the world one cupcake at a time. (Watch Joy’s Tedx talk for more on her work.)
Love and Justice: Don’t Lose Love with Mike Mercer
Making the case for love and mercy as the primary and enduring motivators of the justice movement, Mike Mercer will discuss the incumbent role of maintaining a sincere faith and a soft heart in a world of work that can be sincerely difficult and discouraging, even to the point of cynicism.
Solo Justice: The Temptation to Compete, Not Collaborate with Milan Homola
Jesus prayed: “May they be one…so the world would know the Father sent the Son.” Too often our justice work is characterized by one upmanship and haughtiness: “My branding, approach, numbers”, etc are better than yours. This poison runs in our veins whether we verbalize it or not in our ministries and churches. In this workshop we will consider anew the call to pursue Justice collaboratively as The Church. What is the importance of co-laboring and how do we do it?
Serving the Earth, Serving the Poor with Peter Illyn
Is eco-justice just about people? Does the natural world have inherent rights before God or is that concept a slippery slope to paganism and earth worship? Peter Illyn of Restoring Eden will lead an interactive discussion as to why eco-justice and creation care may be the most important, but least engaged, expression of Christian stewardship in the post-industrial church. We will discuss the basics of eco-justice and stewardship theology along with the environmental history of the modern church to reveal where this tragic disconnect happened. We will also highlight how eco-justice issues, especially coal trains, could impact churches in the Pacific Northwest. Finally, we will end with an inspirational look at how nature reflects the gospel embedded in the church that can make a lasting difference for the kingdom of God on earth.
The Disabled: A Forgotten Minority with Ranelle Gildersleeve
It is the only minority that any person no matter their gender, race, socio-economics, or religion can become a part of at any moment in their life. The disabled are also the largest and most widespread minority that is unreached by the church. A rough estimate is 15% of the world’s population is disabled and about 12% of that population has no interaction with the church. How has our culture and our historical understanding influenced the church’s care of the spiritual welfare of the disabled? And how do we change our thinking so we can celebrate a whole Body of Christ in the church?
Speak out! Grassroots Advocacy to End Extreme Poverty with Sunia Gibbs
In our modern world our neighbors include those we will never see or whose names we will never know. Those who sew our clothes, grow our food, and live in nations impacted by our policies are our neighbors. Our lives are deeply connected. How can we stand with them against injustice and oppression? We stand alongside brothers and sisters from across the world as part the Micah Challenge movement in 50 countries speaking out against injustice, praying passionately “on earth as it is heaven”, and living humbly in service to the gospel. Come and learn about our work and how you can mobilize your church, campus, friends and family to see justice done.
“… And Justice For All”: A Community Response with T. Allen Bethel
“What do we want? Justice!” How does a community respond after they continuously reach dead end after dead end in the quest for justice for all? That’s the question that propelled the Albina Ministerial Alliance (AMA) to ask the US Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate the Portland Police Bureau (PPB) for patterns and practices of excessive use of force. This session will address the genesis of this quest and subsequent steps taken, coalition building, the US DOJ report of findings and the ongoing work in this quest for justice.
When Diversity Isn’t Cool Anymore with Tory Campbell
Though the American church has made strides to become more integrated since the 1970s, there still remains a huge gulf between the idea and realities of addressing the historic and present impacts of race and racism on our identity, cross-cultural relationships, and ecclesiology. So, what happens when we push beyond the goal of having a “diverse” Sunday experience toward the deeper aspects of being relationally reconciled cross-culturally? Come hear the journey of a community in Portland, Irvington Covenant Church, moving into these uncharted waters of gospel-centered equity. We invite you to join in the conversation of how the gospel makes reconciliation around the historic and present impacts of race and racism a priority and possibility.
Visit our Christian Chamber Northwest / Serving Our Neighbors Booth during the Conference Breaks. We would love to share with you how we are impacting Justice issues in our region.
