Santa Maria News

Patti Mardon, left, and Janice Bellucci pull vegetation out of a parking island at Unity Church in preparation of planting vegetables as part of a recent Cultural Creatives project in Orcutt

Brian Walker wants to bring people together to create a more compassionate community that helps to build a world that works for everyone.

He may be the pastor at Unity Church in Orcutt, but he’s reaching out to all members of the community regardless of whether they are religious or spiritual to bring them together in his new Cultural Creatives group.

“It calls for us all to acknowledge we’re interdependent,” Brian said. “We’re all on this planet hurtling through space. We’re all in this together.”

Socialist Paul H. Ray and psychologist Sherry Ruth Anderson introduced the term “Cultural Creatives” to describe individuals who are strong on personal development and engaged in world issues such as the environment, social justice, equity and poverty.

They share values such as authenticity (actions must be consistent with words and beliefs); engaged action and whole process learning; seeing the world as interwoven and connected; idealism and activism; globalism and ecology; and the importance of women.

There are about 50 million Cultural Creatives in the United States and about 200 million worldwide, according to the movie “Cultural Creatives: The (R)evolution,” but they don’t identify themselves as such. They generally believe they are alone in thinking the way they do.

Brian started in April to bring some of them together. Several met for a delicious potluck on June 4 at Unity Church. They talked about efforts they have already started and others they may undertake.

One of those is a community garden. Brian, Janice Bellucci, Greg Petro, Patti Mardon and others cleared a landscape island in the church’s parking lot then planted it with zucchini, cucumbers, bell peppers, herbs and tomato plants. They discussed what to do when the vegetables are ready for harvest and who would lead the effort on maintaining the plants or whether to plant some of the other seven islands.

They are also looking at doing a Time Bank where individuals do volunteer work and get credits in the bank they can later withdraw to get work done for them. They are looking for someone to head up the effort.

Dyanna Cridelieh and Alexis Van Natta invited attendees to join their food co-op. They purchase healthy foods from an online catalog at a significantly-reduced price by ordering together. Contact for more information.

The group adopted the Charter for Compassion as a guideline to follow. The Charter is a cooperative effort to restore compassionate thinking and action to the center of religious, moral and political life. (See charterforcompassion.org for more information).

Attendees came for many reasons: to be around like-minded individuals; to make a community garden; to build community; to learn about the local efforts and spread it to other communities; to show people how to grow things; and to share ideas on other projects.

Brian said it is all about what a person values, including personal growth, awareness and consciousness; “recognizing the interdependence of human beings, and wanting to have richer, deeper relationships in your lives.”

For more information, email .

Jeanne Sparks is a writer, photographer and graphic artist. For information, call 739-1836; email ; visit www.JeanneSparks.com; or write to her at P.O. Box 6437, Santa Maria, CA 93456-6437.

source: http://santamariatimes.com/lifestyles/columnist/jeanne_sparks/building-a-culturally-creative-world-one-community-at-a-time/article_2488d766-b68f-11e1-9507-001a4bcf887a.html