Sojourners Movement

Sojourners are a progressive Christian organization in Washington, D.C., that has sought to follow the Bible's “call to integrate spiritual renewal and social justice.” Influenced by the peace churches and the black freedom struggle, Sojourners articulated a “vision for faith in public life” that differed from the religious right. In many respects, Sojourners grew out of the vision and experience of its founder, Jim Wallis. Reared near Detroit, Wallis belonged to a middle-class family, but grew cynical of his family's middle-class existence, finding more attractive the black freedom and New Left movements then coursing through Detroit.

This teen-aged rebellion became activism in 1966 when Wallis joined the anti-war movement at Michigan State University. While he initially abandoned Christianity, Wallis by graduation had come to believe the Sermon on the Mount provided the only foundation for radical revolution. This (re)discovery led him to enter Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. There Wallis's activism, while troubling to administrators, attracted like-minded students who, in 1971, launched a newsletter, the Post-American, which expressed their evangelical vision of peace and social justice.

Drawing concurrently on church tradition and trends in the New Left, the newly formed group decided to form a commune, or “lived community” to live out their values. Here the partnership split ways, with several members leaving to form a fellowship in Michigan, while Wallis and several others moved to Washington, D.C., to create a commune there. In 1975, having moved into the Columbia Heights district of the nation's capitol, the group christened themselves and their magazine “Sojourners,” and dedicated themselves not to the government or other such earthly system, but to God. In “lived community,” the Sojourners lived together, shared a common purse, and mobilized for peace and justice. Along with their magazine and lived community, the group also began serving the various needs of the poor families in their community.

Eventually, life and ministry changed the group, and by the 1980s they had transitioned from communal homes into an “intentional community” with a [Page 1318]common rule of life. Their work in the neighborhood grew more formal when they designated their work a not-for-profit center and instituted year-round programs for area children. During this stage, Wallis increasingly earned national attention for his work on the magazine and his own publications. Likewise, Sojourners magazine filled the void left by the demise of progressive Christian magazines such as Christianity and Crisis.

In the 1990s, as the ministry and mission of Sojourners spread nationally, the Sojourners transitioned again into “committed community” with a shared mission of working together to live a life that “integrates spiritual renewal and social justice.” Though many members had never belonged to the community, Sojourners maintained the shared household component for their intern team, many of whom work for Sojourners or its anti-poverty program, Call to Renewal. Wallis convened Call to Renewal in 1995 as a faith-based network joining together to combat poverty through spiritual politics. Like Call to Renewal, Sojourners increasingly became a national, ecumenical organization designed to counter the political vision of the religious right. It also became the institutional foundation for Wallis's growing political influence and a strong voice for liberal Christian activism in America.

...