Alan and I, (Roy) have have just launched our new book, Forming Communities of Hope in the Great Unraveling (Wipf and Stock, 2025). we've been working on it for over four years. When we started the notion of “communities of hope” wasn’t part of the lingua franca in the churches or society. But the theme of hope has emerged as a pressing question we want to talk about. The reasons aren’t difficult to articulate. We feel this unraveling of all things. As Marx put it: “All that is solid melts into air”. A sense of darkening and foreboding has overcome the Western imagination. Cascading threats to humanity and the creation feel overwhelming. Creation is groaning. We’re no longer confident that we, or AI, have answers.

Some who can remember have every right to ask what happened to what the French called the Les Trente Glorieuses - the golden era of economic prosperity and expanding international peace promised after WW2. The promises that all boats will rise and the socio/economic escalator would keep moving up have failed. What happened to the “end of history” and its myth of an ascendant neo-liberal West? We face a world of unstoppable climate change and self-indulgent leaders with no answers. Some turn to a salvation myth in the promises of AI and techno-utopias. Most of us suspect hope will not be found here. Forming Communities of Hope explores these themes. It names the journey we must undertake if God’s people are to be communities of hope.

We encourage you to get hold of our book and join us in conversations each week in June around the book's central themes.

June 4 - Where Are We? What Happened?

June 11 - God’s People and the Unravelling of Their Worlds

June 18 - Practices for Forming Communities of Hope

June 25 - Leading Communities of Hope in Dark Times

This conversation is being offered at:

4-5pm (BST) / 5-6pm (CET) and 8-9am (PT) on Zoom