Faithventure Forum

My chief care should not be to find pleasure or success, health or life or money or rest or even things like virtue and wisdom--still less their opposites, pain, failure, sickness, death. But in all that happens, my one desire and my one joy should be to know: "Here is the thing that God has willed for me. In this His love is found, and in accepting this I can give back his love to him and give myself with it to Him. For in giving myself I shall find Him and He is life everlasting.   Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

Nisolo shoes is an exciting new faith venture that grew out of a mission teams experience in Northern Peru. Patrick Woodyard, one of the members of the team, met a local shoemaker who was crafting beautiful hand-made men's shoes. Out of this encounter, Nisolo Shoes was birthed with a job creation mission for Peruvian shoe makers. In the following video, Patrick shares with the Clinton School of Public Service about this new project:

Belay's Purple Door Coffee project to employ homeless young adults received a very small mention in an article on the redevelopment of the Five Points Neighborhood  in the New York Times: After buying that building and successfully developing it into four small retail spaces and five apartments, last year Mr. Beal renovated a building on Welton Street and leased out four retail spaces to businesses that include the Purple Door Coffee Shop and Winter Session, a manufacturer of high-end, handcrafted canvas and leather goods. In Denver, Beat Starts to Pick Up in a Once-Thriving Hub for Jazz , New York Times, August 20, 2013. Read the whole story here .

In December of 2013, the Syracuse Rescue Mission purchased the Up to 8 Cents Bottle and Can Return, a local chain of seven redemption centers that it has renamed Mission Returns and expanded to 12 locations. The operation provides employment opportunities for individuals in the mission as well as generates funds for the organization's hunger and homeless programs. The business is replicable in other states with bottle redemption laws. Read about Mission Returns here and watch the following behind the scenes video:

There is a fantastic short essay in the latest Stanford Social Innovation Review that provides lots of food for thought for aspiring social entrepreneurs. Several times a month I meet young 20 somethings who are interested in developing a particular social enterprise and want advice. I think the biggest fight they have is the internal one to grind it out when social enterprise loses its sexiness as is the case in the hard work of every start-up. I love this quote by Mathias Craig There is no app for this. You have to get out there and do it—and you have to have the staying power to be at it long enough to have a real impact. Leading people on with the idea that there is a widget or a model or a process that will short-cut this leads to quick burnouts, ineffective allocations of funds, and ultimately less impact...What seems to be lost is that creating meaningful long-term impact in the social space is still really about the people [who] are willing to stick with the hard work ...