COMMUNITIES AND HOUSING
AllelousCohousing and Westminster Housesare intentional communities atFuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena,California.
The BruderhofCommunities have a membership of2500 people in North America, Asiaand Europe.
The ArlingtonFriends House is a housing cooperative near Boston.
BartimaeusCohousing is a new community in which each family has their ownresidence, set on seven acres near Seattle.
Church of theSojourners is a 20-year old community of several dozen people livingin four large houses in San Francisco.
The CommunityLand Co-op works to secure affordable housing for marginalizedresidents of Cincinnati.
Dorothy DayCohousing is a community in St. Louis, which is based in theCatholic Worker movement.
Jesus People USAis a community of 500 people in Chicago, which is mostly supported bycollectively-owned business enterprises.
L’Archeis a federation of 131communities in 34 countries, each of which includesmembers with intellectual disabilities.
The Simple Way,Camden House, and Rutba House are membersof the New Monasticism Project, whichare communities of faith that have taken root in “the abandoned places ofEmpire,” ministering to economically devastated communities.
Reba PlaceFellowship has been living incommunity in Chicago for half a century. They have also planted a ruralcommunity called PlowCreek, which provides the urban residents with fresh produce.
Temescal Commonsis an urban cohousing project in Oakland, California.
FINANCES
Banche di CreditoCooperativo forms the financial core of the cooperative system foundin and beyond the Trentoprovince of Italy. (note, this remarkable region is not well-documented inEnglish, and we are presently searching for a better link to describe a systemwhose participants include nearly one-third of the local population. If anyonewho speaks Italian would like a research project, please let us know)
ChristianCommunity Credit Union, EvangelicalChristian Credit Union,Christian Financial Credit Union,America’s Christian Credit Unionand Baptist Credit Union are some of the faith-drivenfinancial cooperatives in the U.S.
Christian CreditUnion serves Canadians.
FOOD
Green FieldFarms is an Amish and Mennonite cooperative that uses traditionalmeans of milk production. It recently joined the CROPPcooperative.
The OklahomaFood Cooperative is an innovative system that directly connectsfarmers and craftspeople with Oklahomans who want to buy their products.
The CommunityFood Co-op of Utah is a food distribution cooperative that servesmore than two dozen churches of a variety of denominations.
EMPLOYMENT AND BUSINESS
The Bruderhof’s business enterprises include Community Playthings,Rifton Equipment,Spring Valley Signsand The Plough publishinghouse.
The Catholic Worker Farmand Gift of Tears are bothCatholic Worker communities that are engaged in small-scale craft production.
HomeworkersOrganized for More Employment (HOME) is a self-help cooperativenetwork, affiliated with the SuperMarketco-op.
InterfaithBusiness Builders works to provide jobs and build community inCincinnati.
The MennoniteCooperative Bookstore is run by students at the Associated MennoniteBiblical Seminary in Indiana.
Mondragon isa Basque cooperative complex with 60,000 worker-owners in 150 firms, which wasfounded under theguidance of Father Jose Maria Arizmendiarrieta. Mondragonincludes industrial, agricultural and retail operations; it has its owneducational and social security systems and includes one of Spain’s largestbanks. It is the world’s most highly-developed cooperative economic system.
The Scott BaderCommonwealth is an international producer of polymers founded byErnst Bader in 1951. Its subsidiaries now employmore than 700 people in Europe,North America and the Middle East.
HEALTHCARE
ChristianHealthcare Ministries is a mutual aid system through which memberscan voluntarily help each other pay for medical expenses.
Medi-Sharehelps members pay for medical expenses through a fund which is built up bymonthly contributions.
SamaritanMinistries also provides sharing of medical expenses.
OTHERS
The Coady InternationalInstitute at St. Francis Xavier Unversity carries on the work thatgrew out of Nova Scotia’s Antigonish movement.
TheConfederazione Cooperative Italiane isa Catholic cooperativefederation, which has 390,000 employees serving 2.9 million members. Its manydivisions includes a network of credit unions which constitutes 11% of Italy’sfinancial system, as well as consumer cooperatives, utilities and housing. Thisis one of Italy’s four major cooperative federations, and is centered in the EmiliaRomagna region.
Equal Exchange hassuccessfully engaged over 100 thousand congregations from 10 denominations inFair Trade and co-operation, in the process linking them not onlywith their own co-op but with small farmer co-ops growing coffee, tea,chocolate and other co-ops around the world.
Goodville Mutualis an insurance company serving nine eastern states, which was founded byMennonites but has expanded to serve the general public.
Vineyard HomeSchool Co-op provides support to homeschoolers, through curriculumdevelopment and supplemental instruction. It is one of many such organizations.
If you know of any other organizations, please senda message to[email protected]