Do you feel like you live in a void of spiritual or cultural identity?

White Christian descendants often leave behind their family’s religious roots and reach for yoga, Buddhism, community organizing or rich cultural traditions like Día de los Muertos to fill this void, and to distance ourselves from the violence of our own lineage.

But this can leave us feeling rootless. These are life-affirming lineages, practices and rituals that honor ancestors, honor the body, and make meaning of the world around us. But they are not of our people, and they don’t account for a legacy of harm.

We need to find our way together with others who share our lineage. With Weaving New Ritual, we are here to co-create liberatory practice to support the collective in these questions.

a community of practice for white people with Christian lineage to reclaim ritual fluency

join us
“I’d been wrestling alone for years with questions about my relationship to Christianity. It turns out that asking those questions in a thoughtful group of creative thinkers, queers and courageous souls was exactly what I needed. ”

Kari Points, Reckoning with our Roots & SURJ Board Member

WHO

This offering is for White people who have Christian ancestry and/or currently identify as Christian who:

  • are curious about how their religious lineage has shaped them

  • desire more ritual and spiritual practice in their life - and have curiosity about sourcing that practice from their Christian lineage and through connection to land and their more-than-human kin

  • have a political analysis that affirms the harms and violence of colonialism & acknowledges the ways our spiritual ancestors contributed to these systems of harm 

  • want more integration between their spiritual life and their political commitment

  • want to experiment, play, co-create new ritual practice in a collective - and are willing to wonder and fail together

  • desire to practice being in and with their body more, to integrate embodiment practice with ritual/spiritual practice

WHAT

Christianity has long been complicit in the propagation and violence of colonialism and White-supremacy. To uphold these oppressive structures, the descendants of White settler colonial Christians have become more disembodied in ritual and spiritual practice, ruptured their relationship to the earth, and severed ancestral relationships.

This project gathers people who want to pursue a more rigorous relationship with their Christian lineage, to discern the blessings and burdens of it, and to cultivate repair from these historical and present day harms.

We will study and practice together at these intersections, in person and virtually. Moving through the seasons of the year together, we will explore embodiment, Christian and land-based ritual, the impact of Christianity on colonized lands, and how we tell stories (including scripture & theology).

We will learn more about how colonialism and capitalism have shaped our spiritual lineage. We will study through collective praxis as we weave new ritual: learning, experimenting, praying and failing together, for the sake of standing in deeper solidarity with the communities most impacted by colonialism.

WHY

How are we preparing ourselves to independently and collectively experience change?

We live in a time of polycrisis: climate change, growing fascism, late-stage capitalism, pandemics, increasing militarism and global war. The pace of these crises is increasing, in part, because Christian Nationalism and Christian Zionism are feeding them. It feels ever more vital to be with our lineages as the descendants of White Christian people.

 We are here: 

  • to study this lineage and compost the parts that need composting.

  • to practice and pray together as we bring forward the resiliency of our people and our ancestral spiritual traditions for the sake of our collective liberation.

  • to discern: what are the rituals we need now?

  • to interrupt the pattern of severance in our people. 

  • to resist our people’s spiritual lineage being used to justify violence and genocide.

  • to connect with those elsewhere on the political spectrum in the name of our shared lineage.

The blessings of our lines are right here, waiting for us to greet them.

Read more about why this offering: here, here, here and here.

When

A community of practice from April 2027 - January 2028

  • May - December 2027

    • Study Circle - 2 hours

      • Second Thursdays

      • 11:30a-1:30p ET / 10:30a - 12:30p CT / 8:30 - 10:30a PT

    • Ritual Circle - 2 hours

      • Last Thursdays

      • 7:00-9:00 p ET / 6:00 - 8:00p CT / 4:00 - 6:00p PT

Location

For the in person portion of our practice we will gather on the beautiful shores of Lake Michigan on Anishinaabe land, home to the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples. We will gather at a retreat center near Warren Dunes State Park with wooded trails, beach access, and a cozy fireplace inside for those winter months.

Promises: 

as your facilitators of this offering we commit to the following

  • Support you to develop embodied ritual practice that resources you as you move through the seasons of the year. 

  • Practice gathering in community rooted in belonging and dignity of all beings.

  • Explore earth-based ritual practice through deepening your relationship with and reverence for the land upon which you reside, and the lands from which your ancestors come.

  • Invite your reckoning with the blessings and burdens of your Christian lineage towards increased clarity about how you want to relate to that lineage in your own ritual/cultural + political practice.

  • Deepen your embodiment practices, including increased awareness of sensation, emotion, grief and pleasure, and connecting that embodied presence to your ritual.

  • Practice encountering discomfort and holding contradiction & complexity.

pricing & policies

  • Payment tiers:

    • 1 Pay-What-You-Can spot: with base of $750

    • 4 reduced rate spots: $2900 - $3999

    • True Cost: $4000

    • Solidarity Rate: $4000 - $8,000

    Cost includes all materials and facilitation for the year, and housing and food for the two in-person retreats (transportation costs not included).

    Deposit of $400 is due at the time of your registration to secure your spot.

    Here is a link to support you in your self-assessment as you choose a payment tier.

  • You can pay via Venmo, Paypal or Check - please indicate your preference on your registration form.

    We offer two payment options:

    • monthly payment plan

    • one lump sum

    Your first payment (after deposit) is due by March 18, 2027.

    If you select a monthly payment plan we will set up regular reminders for you to make a monthly payment.

    • We will refund 50% of your deposit before March 18, 2027 (90% if there’s a waitlist)

    • After Mar 18, 2027 there is no refund on your deposit.

    • After the cohort begins, if you choose to discontinue your participation we ask that you fulfill your financial commitment through the duration of the offering (whether you paid in lump sum or are on a monthly payment plan).

  • We know that life happens! While we hope you can make all of our time together a priority that may not happen. Sometimes you may have to miss a session.

    We will record our Study Circles, but will not be recording our Ritual Circles.

    • We ask that everyone test prior to coming and mask if using public transit to come (train/plane)

    • Please do not come if you feel sick.  

    • We will also ask that everyone test upon arrival at the in-person retreats.

    • We will adjust based on current COVID rates and will respond to requests as we are able.

Register

EARLY BIRD discount of $100 if you register on or before Jan 1, 2027.

meet your facilitators

✳

meet your facilitators ✳

Nicole Bauman (they/them)

We are thrilled to launch our third cohort of Weaving New Ritual in 2027! Together we bring experience in facilitation, faith-based community organizing, coaching, embodied practice and ritual.

Lucy is a somatics coach, politicized spiritual leader, mom, land-tender, ritualist, writer and organizer. After ten years as a pastor and community organizer, she is now focused on weaving together cultural change and organizing for material change, with the body at the center. She is the descendent of European ancestors from Germany, France, and the British Isles and many Christian clergy.

Nicole is a midwest-based queer parent steeped in the sacred work of facilitation, transformative justice, somatics and Nonviolent Communication. They see building conflict resiliency as an essential part of living into the world to come, and are passionate about creating space where personal and collective liberation feel possible. As the descendant of white Western European peasant farmers who carried their trauma with them to the Americas, Nicole is committed to centering racial justice and ancestral healing in their work.

Lucy Waechter Webb(she/her)

What People Are Saying

“Being a part of Weaving New Ritual helped me to find community with which to take on the uncomfortable work of facing my own people, history, and lineage so that I can accept how I have been shaped as a white Christian in ways that are damaging to myself and others, and also to reclaim the parts of my ancestry & spiritual heritage that can contribute to collective thriving. I've been really moved by how much ritual and storytelling can be supportive to that process. It is like walking through mud, but having other people to walk with through the mud is deeply helpful.”

— Margaret Ernst, minister & community organizer

“Weaving New Ritual embraces abolitionist world-building with a radical foundation of care for our bodies, the land, and each other. I found myself leaning into new creative practices, cultivating inspired ritual spaces, and supporting others to craft rituals that focus on joy, grief, and transitions. Lucy and Nicole held the group with so much skill, wisdom, and care, and were in tune with the emergent needs of each moment in time. If you're seeking a portal to transformation and new ways of being, this is it!” 

— Rachael Zafer

“Working with Nicole and Lucy in Weaving New Ritual has been phenomenal! There's a deep commitment to relationality with each other, the land, ancestors and reckoning with the white Christian lineage we have inherited. They approach this work with reverence, skill, reflection and playfulness!”

— Chandler Storrs

“The experience of Weaving New Ritual has been incredible. Nicole and Lucy created an open, vulnerable and very sweet space for us, which can be challenging when bringing together white people! I found myself going very deeply into my body and accessing surprising things about my connection to my lineage. Lucy and Nicole embody and practice the very work they are sharing and facilitating. I have never seen facilitators invite us to explore something, and then authentically embody the very practice.”

— Dinah DeWald

“Wow, I feel so thankful for weaving new ritual, I feel strength and softness in my chest when I feel all that has shifted and opened in me. I feel more aligned. I feel more sensual now. Previously, I had not felt a connection with land as relational. This has been greatly transformative for me. I am softened with awe, overwhelmed by abundance, and encouraged by what is changing in me. Thank thank you dear friends!”

— Rebecca Yoder Smucker

FAQ’s

  • This vessel is for anyone who identifies as Christian now, has grown up Christian, or has family or ancestors who practiced Christianity. Our lineages shape who we become, both the resilient and the wounded parts of us. Having Christian lineage shapes us just like being White or Black in the United States shapes us, like being queer shapes us, like being male shapes us. It is something to be reckoned with. This community of practice is for those who are interested in the reckoning. 

  • So many people of Christian descent make the move to sever ties with their lineage. There are many ways this has been life saving, life affirming and liberating. AND – it feels like a move we make as a colonial people – to sever our ties, break our lines of lineage and leave them behind for the sake of protecting ourselves, our own. It’s risky to even say out loud given how much harm there is at the hands of Church – but the question that arises for us when we sit with this move we make is: What do we lose when we do this? What is the impact? 

    We live in a time where facism is growing because Christian Nationalism and Christian Zionism are feeding it, and so it feels vital to be with our lineage more: to study it, compost it, and allow the gifts of the resiliency of our people and our ancestral spiritual traditions to move through us for the sake of collective liberation. 

  • Ritual can mean many things to many people. For this offering we hold the following as guideposts for practice: 

    • ritual is an embodied process that calls our full presence and creativity as humans forward

    • through ritual we connect with each other, the earth, and Spirit for healing, transformation, and support

    • ritual is a vital technology that we have lost fluency with due to colonialism

    • ritual is both for tending what is moving in our life every day, and for particular moments of transition, seasonal shifts, celebrations and griefs

    • ritual happens in a context, a particular time and place

  • Each month we will collectively have a community ritual and we will share in ritual at our in-person gatherings as well. Individuals will also be invited to be in discernment and practice in their personal lives and home places, separate from this community. So each person’s ritual practice will take on its own unique form, even as we may share some practices across time and space. 


    We will co-create rituals together as we each bring our own influences and imaginations to this practice. We will be in some embodied practice along the way, and draw from old and new Christian and earth-based/Pagan practices. This is “new” in the sense that it is spiral work; we are not just returning to/recovering the old, we are weaving what is true now, listening for what is needed now, as we work to shed and recover from colonialism and capitalism. 

  • “If you have come here to help me you are wasting your time, but if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”*

    When we use the phrase collective liberation we trust that our freedom is interdependent -- we cannot be free unless our neighbor is free. This means that our liberation, even as White Christian descendants, from these cultures of domination is connected to the liberation of those most harmed.

    *This quote is credited to Lilla Watson, an Indigenous Australian woman who is an activist, artist, and academic. However, Watson says that because her words arose from a collective process, she wants them to be credited as “Aboriginal activists group, Queensland, 1970s."⁣

  • We will gather as a whole group for two 4-day retreats, two 2-hour monthly meetings. We also offer readings/resources + invitations for ritual practice and land connection monthly which can take anywhere from 1-4 hours. We will invite you to self-organize a monthly check in with your buddies (a trio) to meet once monthly for integration and support.

  • Weaving New Ritual is open to anyone who identifies as White as well as anyone who identifies as multi-racial and/or as a White-passing person of color who is interested in exploring ways you've been socialized as White, and to explore both the burdens and blessings of the lineages of your White Christian ancestors. We acknowledge that we are two White facilitators — and — we are committed to holding the space well for all of these identities to the best of our abilities.

Still got more questions? Ask us here.