EarthAbbey’s new approach to membership is now in place.

Visitors to this website will notice a new area of the site known as the Cloister. This is a members only and entirely private space, where members have the opportunity to say something about the lives they are living, the projects they are pursuing, and get in touch with others who are on a similar journey. We are hoping now to reorient our understanding of what it means to be a member of EarthAbbey so that being present in the Cloister is being a member of EarthAbbey and we invite everyone who has been associated with EarthAbbey up to now to register at the Cloister.

We are also taking a different approach to subscriptions. We are very grateful to those who already give regularly and invite all our members to consider this. The money is used to cover our core costs, but we hope in future to dedicate the majority of this income to member’s projects. This year we have given £2000 to The Walled Garden Project in Barton Hill to help it through a financial hole. We shall be consulting with members about how to choose where this money should go in future years. The intention is to begin to see ourselves as a cooperative of people working to establish projects around the world on an EarthAbbey theme, and supporting one another in the process. We shall report to members each year on the use of funds. Find out more about giving here.

One of the big questions about EarthAbbey has always been, but aren’t you just a virtual community? The answer to this is that we intend to be much more. As a way of addressing this we have been piloting Way of Life groups in Bristol this year. These are very simple but transformative and can be run by anyone with a few interested friends. We are now in a position to recommend them to all our members. Find out more here.

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