The Goodenough Community
 The Goodenough Community is a long-term experiment in community formation and
 development sponsored by the American Association for the Furtherance of Community.

  Fellowship for Intentional Community

     “This Web site serves the growing communities movement. We provide important information and access to crucial resources for seekers of community, existing and forming communities, and other friends of community.”
     The Goodenough Community is a member and is listed on page 256 of the 2000 edition directory. We affirm the value of this organization for the importance of communities networking with one another.

Village without Walls

American Association for the Furtherance of Community, chartered 1981

     The American Association for the Furtherance of Community is the official and legal name of the Goodenough Community. More accurately, the Goodenough Community is a creative project of the American Association for the Furtherance of Community  which has an intention to utilize the bright and dedicated people of the Goodenough Community to both test and demonstrate ideas and processes which are vital to community living in this era. This association will be represented at its web site aboutcommunity.org. At this site, still under construction, they will soon be offering a basic introduction to :

• the history of living in community

• modern expressions of community

• kinds of community

• which kinds of people can most benefit from community?

• some things to think about when considering joining a community

• some interesting and important things going on in communities this year

• what its like to live in community? (by members of various communities)

• the basic wisdom that emerges from long-term community living

• the perennial wisdom as a by product of community life

• a practical bibliography for studying the communitarian movement

• brief excerpts from important literature about community life (these will be distributed among the areas above)

     While this project is well under way we are very open to assistance from other communities or individual communitarians and we will use all the help we can get. Your suggestions will be appreciated. Contact us at goodenough@aboutcommunity.org

NICA Mission

• To coordinate the exchange of information and resources between NW intentional Communities and others.

• Facilitate communication and networking between local, regional, and national intentional communities organizations.

• Ascertain and promote intentional communities aims and values that contribute most to community sustainability.

• Foster and assist the study of and education on all major elements of intentional communities.

• Assist organizing and financing efforts of and for intentional communities.

     One of our members is a volunteer in the NICA organization with the purpose of supporting more community in all communities. We also intend to support this association financially.

Cultural Creatives

      “In this era, our biggest challenges are to preserve and sustain life on the planet and find a way past the overwhelming spiritual and psychological emptiness of modern life. Cultural Creatives are responding to these challenges with solutions directed toward healing and integration.”
     We have followed Paul H. Ray, Ph.D.  since he was first published in Yes! magazine many years ago. We recommend a book he co-authors with Sherry Ruth Anderson, Ph.D.,  The Cultural Creatives: How 50 Million People Are Changing the World. We have found it confirming of our work.

 
The Communitarian Network

To respond to these challenges, we created a communitarian quarterly, The Responsive Community: Rights and Responsibilities. 

     “The Communitarian Network is a coalition of individuals and organizations who have come together to shore up the moral, social, and political environment. We are a nonsectarian, nonpartisan, international association.”
      The founder of the Communitarian movement, Amitai Etzioni, lays out the blueprint for how in the 1990s Americans can move forward--together. His book, The Spirit of Community, calls for a re-awakening of our allegiance to the shared values and institutions that sustain us--from our marriages and families, our schools and neighborhoods, and extending to our nation itself. In proposing a new balance between our rights as individuals and our social responsibilities, this controversial and groundbreaking book articulate the emerging social attitudes of the 1990 and helps you understand the communitarian premise.  

 
Foundation for Global Community

     “The Foundation for Global Community, a nonprofit educational organization, is dedicated to building a world that functions for the benefit of all life.
     For over 50 years, the Foundation has been helping individuals find meaning and value in their lives and advancing the concept of global community through courses, workshops, projects, publications, and special events.”

   
Communal Studies Association

     “To encourage and facilitate the preservation, restoration, and public interpretation of America’s historic communal sites. Founded in 1975 as the National Historic Communal Societies Association, the CSA has expanded its focus in recent years to include the study of contemporary and international communal societies.”
     Dr. Hoff has presented at Association meetings and some of our members have attended as well. Their journal, Communal Societies: A Journal of the Communal Studies Association is read here by many.

 
Institute for Noetic Sciences

     “For 25 years, the Institute of Noetic Sciences has been at the forefront of research and education in consciousness and human potential. From the beginning we have pursued this inquiry through rigorous science.
     We honor open-minded approaches and strive to bring discernment to our work. We are not a spiritual sect, political-action group, or single cause institute.”
     Several members of our community are members and attend their offerings locally. This organization offers workshops throughout the world.  

Adidam

     A number of people from this community seek to follow the way of Adidam and our community as a whole has studied Ruchira Avatar Adi Da Samraj's teachings for many years.
     The best way to learn more about the Avatar's teachings is through His book, The Promised God Man is Here can be purchased from His web site.
     It is important for me to say, writes the Reverend Dr. John L. Hoff, that while I've had many teachers the most important influence has been the person I knew first as Da Free John and who is now known as Ruchira Avatar Adi Da Samraj. His relational methodology for working with people suggests that it is centrally helpful to learn how not to constrict in the presence of another. He suggests we query ourselves continuously, "avoiding relationship?" I began to learn how afraid I was of intimacy even though I was leading a process of developing an intimate community. As He published book after book, I found they each helped me with other difficult aspects of community life: people's fear of cults; the human difficulty with sexuality; the problem of dealing with levels of consciousness; the conflict that can occur between good friends at different stages of the journey, and the like. His writings have also impacted many members of this community, helping them to appreciate my own process of Realization. A wonderful experience of Him at Darshan when He visited the Northwest last spring was a huge gift to me and to three other members who were with Him as well. The power of His Blessing has been experienced by many of us.

Positive Futures Network
Yes! Magazine

Positive Futures Network is a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting people's active engagement in creating a more just, sustainable, and compassionate world. PFN is the publisher of YES! A Journal of Positive Futures.

Alternative Press Award: YES! magazine has been nominated for an Alternative Press Award in the new category, New Paradigm/Emerging Culture. Utne Reader issues the awards to “the best of the alternative press” each year.

SNOW