On September 11, Circle of Hope birthed a new congregation in a new part of the city. This is our fourth congregation in the city limits and our fifth in the region. We are now into our third week as a congregation and we are gathering people who are curious, skeptical, looking for community and many other folks. We have the desire to be an open and serious presence in the neighborhood. We are people on mission to serve and gather those who are looking to make a real connection with God and each other.
We were birthed out of our congregation in South Philly. We want to maintain the feel (and the reality) of being an organic group of people who can know and love each other. The gatherings that happen in homes, called “cells,” and on Sunday evenings, are intentionally made to be a place where people can be known, ask questions, and have a real life of faith as well as see others live out their life of faith. I am regularly on the streets asking people how Circle of Hope can be a presence in the neighborhood and I am eager to tell them about the fact that there is a chance to be a community of people who care about each other and those in the neighborhoods of which we’re reaching. We have seven cells all in the Northwest neighborhoods and our Sunday Meetings are at 5720 Ridge Avenue in Roxborough. Come check out what faith looks like in real life.
-Jerome Stafford, writing