Alt*Div
A conversation between
the ancient and the emergent
In 2016, Open Master’s launched Alt*Div as a community for spiritually-rooted learning and action grounded in wisdom traditions, outside of institutional divinity schools, and beyond religious classifications.
In Alt*Div’s first two years, we organized two cohorts of self-directed learners from a wide range of spiritual backgrounds and identities. We are now lifelong companions in each other’s journeys of being, becoming, and taking action in a time of crisis and change.
Who we are
Our second group launched in Maryland, USA in August 2017.
Baha'i youth organizer, musician, linguist, scientist.
Pilgrim. Catholic by heritage, mystic at heart. Exploring themes of vision, courage, and roots.
Ph.D candidate in ethnomusicology. Lightworker and sound artist, teaching and creating medicine.
Jewish Queen, feminist + spiritual warrior, lover of God, dance + theory, committed to truth + justice. Exploring power through divinity.
Photographer, organizer, and Ph.D student. Rooted in the expansive spiritual freedom of the past, present, and future of queer divine embodiment.
Soulful facilitator. Liberatory community builder. Relational culture worker. Spiritual activist. Eats arepas and talks feelings.
A Muslim feminist, mother and activist. Exploring sacred motherhood through the themes of being, bond and bearing witness.
Human rights lawyer exploring identities through migration, motherhood, mourning.
Ways of remembering. Listening as radical hospitality. Furious art in difficult times. Life after loss.
Actress, activist, poet. Queer spirituality through divine art-making with love as a highest teacher.
Exploring the impact of appropriation and exotification, and the reclamation of Hindu culture and practices for herself.
Founder of Everyday Feminism and Compassionate Activism, sharing her Buddhist journey toward social liberation.
Making visible the effects of the invisible. Creating compassionate communities of purpose for both Public and Planet.
Ecosystem healer serving biological community through nutrition and detoxification, body work and sacred movement.
Our inaugural group launched in New Mexico in August 2016.
Chief Instigator, U.S. Department of Arts and Culture
Co-founder and steward of the Open Master’s Community. More.
Movement teacher, exploring what it means to be human through dance, yoga, and play. Student of children.
Soulful improviser & script-flipper, dabbling filmmaker, writer, host.
Tender-hearted organizer, activist, dreamer, and schemer, fighting for collective liberation and revolutionary grace.
Cultural healer through music and counseling. David's Open Master's Learning Plan.
Exploring existential dread by way of climate activism, cycling, and dad jokes.
Social psychologist turned community builder using art and play to connect strangers in novel ways.
Learner, Writer, Healer, Organizer.
Social entrepreneur, learner, facilitator in meaning making and way finding, gardener. More.
Carrying forward the hopes and struggles of her ancestors.
Artist, Writer, Storyteller. Instigator of Creative Communities. More.
Artist, Poet, Social Entrepreneur connecting dots across inner and outer geographies.
Composer, Sex Educator,
Queer Rights Lover-Fighter. (More)
Writer, Singer, Lifelong Learner. More.
Designer, Director, and Producer, interested in the tactile and the ephemeral.
Community Creator, Questioner, Kindness champion, Learner, Deep Listener & Belly Laugher.
Co-founder, creative director, and steward of the Open Master's. Plays with design, words, songs, cities.
Scribe, Storyteller, Bridge, Mirror. Co-Creating Love, Beauty and Play.
Our North Star
What We’re Guided By
"Community ministry" can look like many things...
The thread that seems to run through everything you do is a quest for human connection and belonging. You have worked hard to create ways for this to happen, and you are yearning to find ways to support your own learning and growth on this journey. Perhaps you have thought about actually going to divinity school, formal ministry, or counseling, but you are not sure these are the right paths for you.
Spiritual pluralism is a core value...
Many don't identify with just one spiritual home. Whether raised in multiple faiths, distanced from their own tradition, or drawn to the cracks between affiliations; alt*divvers view such non-traditional identities as a strength, not an add-on.
Pursuit of justice = spiritual leadership...
We live in a world built on intersecting systems of oppression. In order to build cultures of courage, care, and wholeness, we must see the direct relationship between spiritual formation and the pursuit of justice.
Practical learning is in the books and on the ground...
There are artists, entrepreneurs, and movement builders who are already doing work in the world. They are seeking to integrate that work fully into their learning journey, instead of adding isolated "coursework" on top.
This group represents, welcomes, and is intentionally woven together through what each of us carries and contributes from many different backgrounds and experiences. We do this with the hope of building something more beautiful and strong together than we would ever be able to create in silos of separation.
In order to do this, we do not just include many perspectives across race, ethnicity, culture, gender, sexuality, and, religion, but we intentionally weave together and build our community by:
Centering the voices, needs, and experiences of those who do not benefit from the privileges of Whiteness or cultural supremacy in other forms (such as Christian Supremacy). We are deeply committed to both dismantling and healing the wounds of these cultures of supremacy, in all of their manifestations, because we understand that all of our liberation is inextricably bound up with each others’. We acknowledge that we come from a world built on intersecting and overlapping systems of privileges and oppression, so we hold ourselves and each other to the highest standards of resisting replicating cultures and patterns of violence that exist in our wider culture (and therefore in ourselves) within our community.
Putting pluralism of religious and cultural traditions (including “none”) at our very heart. Many of us come from or have explored multiple faith traditions or sources of meaning making. At the same time we challenge ourselves to be sincere in our explorations, and conscious of appropriation and colonial tendencies while grasping for meaning from traditions outside our family and culture of origin.
Are not a gender-binary-conforming group. We are LGBTQ+, and LGBTQ+ welcoming.
Whatever our background, each person is invited to shape the way this group works, according to the gifts and wisdom they carry. We strive to always be learning and growing in our practice and understanding of how to create loving and healing spaces because we understand that our liberation is collective.
