Community Glossary

Overview

While acknowledging the guiding value—and potential distortion—of words, scripture, and canon, SGC prioritizes Least Dogma, direct experience, and practice as the foundation of shared belief. Our intention is to communicate more effectively within our diverse and evolving group—using words simply and without domination within a communication environment guided by Least Dogma - within which every members’ dogmatic perspectives are welcome so long as they are shared with humility - to support growing deeper, less obscured connection with each other and reality.

Within SGC, we recognize that words can either connect or distract from Truth, Reality, and Divinity. We also hold that words may serve as “pointers” (signifiers, signs, symbols) toward deeper realities, without fully containing their meaning. Different words can refer to similar or identical referents. Identical words may be used to refer to different referents. This glossary is an extension of our practical understanding and ethical communication, aiming to reflect a shared, authoritative (not authoritarian) perspective distilled into sincere religious practice.

 

Assisted Meditation (within SGC - synonym for Sacred Plant Ceremony)

Primary SGC Definition: Meditation supported by an external modality—such as breathwork, sound, movement, or sacred plant sacraments. At SGC, it is a ceremony guided with presence and safety.

Synonyms: Guided journey, ceremony, supported stillness
Antonyms: Unintentional ingestion, distraction, solitary trance

Critique: Not all meditative assistance is sacred. SGC treats assisted meditation as consecrated space, not performance or therapy.

Retrieval: Experienced in ceremony, sacred circles, or intentionally designed spiritual containers.

Common Definitions: Individual or group meditation or ceremonies augmented by tools, substances, or facilitators to enhance depth or focus.

Care

Primary SGC Definition: The feeling or act of showing concern, kindness, and responsibility toward someone or something. Care includes mindful attention to the well-being of others and the sacred nature of each interaction.
  

Synonyms: Kindness, attentiveness, gentle interest, affection, compassion, give a hoot, cherish, hold dear, treasure, love
Antonyms: Neglect, domination, harm, indifference, cruel, hurtful, inattentive, backbiting
   

Critique: In SGC, care must not become control. “I care for you, so I decide what’s right for you, punish  or ‘call you in’ or out if I don’t agree with your way” is not care—it’s coercion. Within SGC, we avoid care as domination.
Retrieval: We are each committed to bringing kindness and gentle, respectful, trusting care to the other, even if we are offended by or don’t understand each other. We are committed to caring for each others’ physical well-being. Emotional/spiritual harm is harm too, and we can definitely do that to each other, even unintentionally, unconsciously or through lack of shared understanding. When unsure how to act, we ask: Is this caring? Is this necessary? Is this loving in a way that supports both autonomy and connection?

Common relevant definitions (from chatgpt):

1. Emotional care: Being compassionate, supportive, understanding, comforting a friend.
2. Physical care: Taking action to meet needs, feeding a pet or helping someone who asks.
3. Attention or effort: Doing something thoughtfully—like handling a fragile item with care.

In many experiences, particularly within a community that moves from “Least Dogma” for our guidance, silence is more likely to be sacred than talk. Everything we say here is heard, felt and remembered, unless we choose to forget it. So we suggest, when in doubt, asking yourself before speaking: Is it true? Is it necessary? Is it caring and kind to everyone present? Even if I have been offended, can I respond from a place of care? Does it improve upon the silence?

Ceremony (also reference synonyms - Group Meditation, etc.)

Primary SGC Definition: A sacred, intentional container for transformation, often using ritual, sacrament, or communal practice to facilitate healing, connection, or insight.

Synonyms: Ritual, observance, rite, sacred gathering, group meditation

Antonyms: Routine, performance, hollow tradition
    

Critique: Ceremony can be obfuscated, empty, theatrical or rigid when divorced from sincere and engaged presence. At SGC, the value of ceremony lies in authentic engagement, not in empty, esoteric, obscured ritual.
Retrieval: Felt in sacramental gatherings, opening prayers, shared songs, and silent intention. May be personal or group-based, more or less formal and ritualistic.
    

Common Definitions: A formal religious or public occasion, typically one celebrating a particular event or rite of passage.

Church

Primary SGC Definition: A sacred space—virtual or physical—where people of shared values gather to practice, reflect, and grow in divine relationship. For SGC, “church” is the living body of intentional community, not a static building or hierarchical institution.
    

Synonyms: Sangha, Sacred Circle, Temple, Community of Practice
Antonyms: Institution of enforcement, passive congregation, compulsory tradition
    

Critique: “Church” has been weaponized by historical corruption. SGC reclaims the term with humility and clarity: we are not gatekeepers, but gardeners of divine encounter.
Retrieval: Church emerges when two or more gather with sacred intention, especially when grounded in honesty, care, and practice.
    

Common Definitions: A building used for public Christian worship; a body of religious believers.

 

Community

Primary SGC Definition: A group of people committed to shared growth, presence, and sacred practice. At SGC, community is relational, imperfect, and rooted in care and humility, not domination and conformity.
    

Synonyms: Fellowship, sacred gathering, spiritual family
Antonyms: Isolation, disconnection, forced unity
    

Critique: Community can be idealized or weaponized - particularly if Members mistake their personal dogmas for universally agreed ethics, and attempt to colonize the community with their unexamined dogma.
Retrieval: Found in ritual, shared meals, co-creation, accountability, and collective celebration. SGC honors the tension between individual integrity, sensitivity, freedom and shared space, holding diverse cultural perspectives.
    

Common Definitions: A group of people living in the same place or sharing common characteristics or interests.

Cult

Primary SGC Definition: A community or structure that demands conformity, suppresses dissent, and centralizes authority—often under the guise of spiritual truth. At SGC, we actively resist cultic dynamics through transparency, pluralism, and shared leadership.
    

Synonyms: Closed system, authoritarian group, rigid hierarchy
    

Antonyms: Open community, collaborative spiritual practice, sacred autonomy
    

Critique: “Cult” is sometimes misused to label unfamiliar traditions. SGC critiques specifically unsafe behaviors - not beliefs or cultural expressions - and is sensitive to avoid unexamined cultural domination, control, coercion, secrecy, or power abuse.
    

Retrieval: Prevented through transparent and ‘least inventive’ standard corporate governance structures, with opportunities for safety reporting and response, community feedback, and support for harmonious conflict resolution, guided by the practice of Least Dogma, Care, Respect and Trust.
    

Common Definitions: A system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object, often associated with control or manipulation.

 

Direct Experience

Primary SGC Definition: Immediate, unmediated awareness or insight—often sacred—encountered through practice, sacrament, or presence. At SGC, direct experience is the foundation of truth.
    

Synonyms: Revelation, insight, gnosis, lived truth, ground of religion
    

Antonyms: Abstraction, hearsay, dogma, belief, distraction, absence
    

Critique: Within SGC, we currently  effectively integrated to be meaningful. Direct experience without reflection can become chaos or spiritual bypass.
    

Retrieval: Through plant sacrament, silence, stillness, or sudden knowing in the body or soul.
    

Common Definitions: An event or perception encountered firsthand without explanation or analysis.

Divine

Primary SGC Definition: The infinite, mysterious source at the heart of all things—sometimes felt as presence, truth, love, or reality itself. The Divine cannot be fully contained in any image or concept and is approached with humility and reverence.
    

Synonyms: Sacred, God, Mystery, Ultimate Reality, Ineffable, Ground of Being
    

Antonyms: Profane, illusion, separation, disconnection
    

Critique: Defining the Divine too narrowly invites dogma. At SGC, we affirm many paths and expressions while holding space for the ineffable.
    

Retrieval: Felt during sacraments, in beauty, in silence, in the presence of awe or resonance—when something larger than “me” becomes unmistakable.
    

Common Definitions: Of, from, or like God or a god; supremely good or beautiful.

 

Divinity

Primary SGC Definition: The essence of sacred reality—ungraspable, yet deeply felt. At SGC, divinity is honored as both immanent (within) and transcendent (beyond), approached through reverence, practice, and presence.
    

Synonyms: God, Sacredness, the Divine, Holy Presence
    

Antonyms: Profanity, materialism (as total disconnection), spiritual dislocation
    

Critique: Attempts to define or monopolize divinity often create dogma and division. SGC resists such reductions in favor of open, reverent engagement.
    

Retrieval: Felt in ceremony, grief, awe, love, silence—whenever something more-than-personal moves through or around us.
    

Common Definitions: The state or quality of being divine; a god or supreme being.

 

Dogma

Primary SGC Definition: A fixed metaphysical truth-claim held as absolute. At SGC, we practice Least Dogma—resisting the urge to insist that any one framework is ultimate.
    

Synonyms: Doctrine, creed, belief system
    

Antonyms: Openness, inquiry, pluralism
    

Critique: Dogma can protect meaning but also become rigid and exclusive. SGC replaces authority with shared discernment and experience.
    

Retrieval: Awareness of when we’re clinging to being “right” rather than staying in connection.
    

Common Definitions: A principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true.

 

Entheogen

Primary SGC Definition: A plant or substance that, when engaged with reverently and intentionally, opens the practitioner to direct experience of the sacred. At SGC, entheogens are understood as sacraments, not drugs.

Synonyms: Sacred plant, teacher, psychedelic (in context), spiritual catalyst
    

Antonyms: Recreational drug, chemical escapism, addictive substance
    

Critique: The misuse of entheogens without preparation or integration can cause harm. SGC emphasizes sacred context, ethical guidance, and ongoing integration.
    

Retrieval: Encountered in sacramental ceremony, guided by facilitators and community commitment to safety and care.
    

Common Definitions: A psychoactive substance used in religious, shamanic, or spiritual contexts to induce altered states of consciousness.

Ethics

Primary SGC Definition: xx The ongoing inquiry into what is right, kind, and in alignment with sacred practice. At SGC, ethics are lived—not enforced—emerging from care, accountability, and community discernment.

Synonyms: Moral practice, integrity, right relationship
    

Antonyms: Harm, domination, unethical manipulation
    

Critique: Ethics become hollow when reduced to rules without context. SGC ethics evolve through relationship and reverence.
    

Retrieval: Embodied when we pause before action, ask “is this loving?”, and welcome reflection from trusted others.
    

Common Definitions: Moral principles that govern a person’s behavior or the conducting of an activity.

Minister (Primary SGC synonym - Facilitator)

Primary SGC Definition: A person who has been trained in and who deeply understands SGC’s core canon. Facilitators support sacred ceremonies with humility, presence, and permission from the community.
    

Synonyms: Facilitator, Pastor, Religious Steward, Ceremonial Leader
    

Antonyms: Guru, authority figure, unvetted leader
    

Critique: Facilitators are not infallible nor all-powerful. Within SGC, we ask every practicing Member (Practitioner) to grow personal strength, self-reliance and capacity for effective assisted meditations. At SGC, facilitation is earned through a history of practice, clear reflection and understanding of SGC’s catechism, and particularly in member relationships and shared ministry (talks, etc).
    

Retrieval: Embodied in clear guidance, self-reflective presence with less egoic emphasis, and readiness to serve the group’s process as effective.
    

Common Definitions: A person who helps a group work together more effectively.

 

Inclusion

Primary SGC Definition: A practice of welcoming and affirming the sacred presence of all beings, without exception, so long as they will do the same. Within SGC, inclusion is not tolerance, nor does it follow a particular political or cultural ideology. Following our Least Dogma, SGC is radically inclusive, practicing humble and active celebration of difference within unity.
    

Synonyms: Welcome, affirmation, radical hospitality
    

Antonyms: Exclusion, tokenism, gatekeeping
    

Critique: Inclusion can be used as a checkbox or performative value. SGC calls for lived commitment to mutual respect, not slogans.
    

Retrieval: Practiced through invitation, adaptation, shared power, and spiritual humility.
    

Common Definitions: The action or state of including or being included within a group or structure.

 

Initiate / Initiation

Primary SGC Definition: Someone who has entered into a path of practice or community, often through a sacred process of preparation or affirmation. /Entering into communion.
    

Synonyms: Beginner, New Member Practitioner (Practitioner) within SGC, who has yet to complete at least two initiatory assisted meditations
    

Antonyms: Outsider, bystander, spectator, SGC visitor or Member who has not yet become a Practitioner
    

Critique: Initiation is not elitism, it’s a sign of careful introduction and readiness to engage initial practice. SGC honors a variety of paths and stages - from New Member to Initiate, Practitioner, Mature Practitioner

    

Retrieval: Recognized through participation, trust-building, and devotion—not title alone.
    

Common Definitions: A person who is new to a rite or secret knowledge; someone recently admitted into a group.

Integration

Primary SGC Definition: The conscious incorporation of insights, emotions, or shadow material into one’s lived experience. Integration is the bridge between experience and transformation - meaning making, integrating insight into life, becoming whole.
    

Synonyms: Embodiment, wholeness, healing, alignment
    

Antonyms: Fragmentation, denial, repression
    

Critique: Without effective integration, spiritual experiences may become escapist or even harmful. SGC centers integration as a critical part of post-meditation / post-ceremony practice.
    

Retrieval: Journaling, spiritual direction, support circles, sacred conversations—tools for grounding lessons into life.
    

Common Definitions: The act of combining or adding parts to make a unified whole; in psychology, making disparate parts of the self work together.

Integrity

Primary SGC Definition: The alignment of our inner values with our outer actions. At SGC, integrity is not perfection but a continual return to truth.
    

Synonyms: Wholeness, congruence, authenticity, honesty
    

Antonyms: Hypocrisy, fragmentation, dishonesty
    

Critique: Integrity requires both self-reflection and accountability. It is not rigid, but responsive and real.
    

Retrieval: Noticing when we stray from our values and gently returning. Speaking truth and living aligned.
    

Common Definitions: The quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness.

Intention

Primary SGC Definition: The immaterial direction an individual or group’s actions manifest toward. In sacred contexts, intention creates the spiritual field of meaning.
    

Synonyms: Aim, focus, direction, purpose, prayer, wish
    

Antonyms: Aimlessness, accident, coercion
    

Critique: Intention without accountability can become a deflection. SGC emphasizes integrity between intent and impact.
    

Retrieval: Naming our purpose aloud before ceremony, in prayer, or when choosing how to act.
    

Common Definitions: A thing intended; an aim or plan.

Liturgy

Primary SGC Definition: The sacred structure of a ceremony or service, often spoken or ritualized, that guides a community into shared intention. At SGC, liturgy is a living form—not fixed, but rooted.
    

Synonyms: Sacred script, ceremonial form, rite, ritual
    

Antonyms: Chaos, improvisation (when unsafe), disconnection
    

Critique: Liturgy can become rote and lifeless when divorced from spirit. SGC affirms liturgy as a vessel for presence, not performance.
    

Retrieval: Recited in community, offered in silence, or expressed through movement in aligned containers.
    

Common Definitions: A form or formulary according to which public religious worship is conducted.

 

Medicine

Primary SGC Definition: A term occasionally used for plant-based sacraments, though SGC prefers “Sacrament” to avoid confusion with clinical or therapeutic models.
    

Synonyms: Healing agent, sacrament (in context), plant teacher
    

Antonyms: Poison, toxin, addictive substance
    

Critique: The word “medicine” risks medicalizing spiritual work. SGC emphasizes that our practice is sacred, not therapeutic.
    

Retrieval: Seen in reverent relationship with plants, traditions, and safe, intentional practice.
    

Common Definitions: A compound used to treat illness; a healing substance.

Modernity

Primary SGC Definition: A near-global cultural and historical period marked by a “master narrative” approach, and characterized by industrialization, individualism, growth in human separation from and influence over nature, secularism and faith in reason and progress. For SGC’s founding Pastor, modernity is honored for its insights and questioned for its disconnect from nature and the sacred.
    

Synonyms: Age of enlightenment, empiricism, rationalism, secularism
    

Antonyms: Indigeneity, traditionalism, spiritual continuity, ancestral practice (also distinct from post-modernity and post-secularism)
    

Critique: Modernity often isolates people from nature, ritual, and communal wisdom. SGC seeks to integrate modern insights and capacities with its experiences and insights of divinity and the sacred.
    

Retrieval: When we examine our worldview, question default systems, and reclaim spiritual presence within a modern world.
    

Common Definitions: The quality or condition of being modern; relating to the current period of history.

 

Ordination

Primary SGC Definition: The sacred recognition of a person's readiness to serve in a ministerial role within the community. At SGC, ordination is not a rank but a communal blessing and affirmation of trust.
    

Synonyms: Blessing, commissioning, sacred affirmation
    

Antonyms: Exclusion, unauthorized leadership, spiritual performance
    

Critique: Ordination can create harmful hierarchies if used to imply spiritual superiority. SGC affirms shared leadership rooted in presence and service.
    

Retrieval: Offered through ceremony, after demonstrated integrity, spiritual maturity, and alignment with SGC values.
    

Common Definitions: The process by which someone is consecrated and officially recognized as a religious leader.

Postmodern

Primary SGC Definition: A worldview that questions grand narratives, fixed truths, and universal authority. At SGC, postmodernity is embraced as a tool for humility, creativity, and spiritual diversity.
    

Synonyms: Deconstruction, pluralism, creative questioning
    

Antonyms: Absolutism, certainty, hierarchy
    

Critique: Postmodernism can become detached or ironic. SGC affirms the sacred within its critique—welcoming meaning without rigidity.
    

Retrieval: Through recognizing multiple truths, challenging assumptions, and creating new forms of ritual and relationship.
    

Common Definitions: A cultural, artistic, and intellectual movement characterized by skepticism toward universal truths and traditional authority.

 

Post-secular
  

Primary SGC Definition: A framework that transcends the secular/religious divide, making room for spiritual experience without dogma. At SGC, post-secularity invites shared meaning beyond belief systems.
  

Synonyms: Beyond dualism, spiritual pluralism, sacred openness
  

Antonyms: Rigid secularism, theocracy, spiritual exclusion
  

Critique: Post-secular spaces risk becoming vague if they lack commitment. SGC roots this stance in shared practice and community care.
  

Retrieval: Found in dialogue between science and spirit, ritual and reason, personal faith and collective inquiry.
  

Common Definitions: A term used in philosophy and sociology to describe the resurgence of religion in a secular age.

 

Practitioner (Within SGC - Confirmed Member who is safety screened and ready for Practice)

Primary SGC Definition: A confirmed, safety-screened member of the church who works with experienced facilitators in sacred plant practice. Practitioners understand and live the SGC catechism.
    

Synonyms: Practicing member, participant, initiate
    

Antonyms: Outsider, observer, patient
    

Critique: Practitioners are not clients or customers. Their role is active, relational, and sacred.
    

Retrieval: Felt in readiness to participate in sacrament, with both reverence and responsibility.
    

Common Definitions: A person engaged in the practice of a profession or discipline, often spiritual or healing.

Psychedelic (entheogen, Sacrament)

Primary SGC Definition: A substance or experience that opens the mind to non-ordinary states of consciousness, particularly well suited to sincere religious practice as an “entheogen” (inspiring direct experience of and connection to the divine). At SGC, psychedelics are approached with reverence, as sacraments.
    

Synonyms: Entheogen, visionary compound, plant teacher
    

Antonyms: Drugs, numbing agents, escapist tools, recreational abuse,
    

Critique: The term “psychedelic” has been commercialized and medicalized in ways that obscure its spiritual potential. SGC reclaims it within sacred, communal frameworks.
    

Retrieval: Within prepared, consecrated space, the psychedelic invites surrender, insight, and communion with the Mystery.
    

Common Definitions: A drug that causes changes in perception, mood, and cognition; often associated with hallucinogens.

Religion

Primary SGC Definition: 1) The feelings, acts, and experiences of individuals, [and communities], so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider divine.  - from W James, Varieties of the Religious Experience
2) Coherent and self-defined communities, resources and practices intended to guide individuals and communities towards connection to the divine.
Etymology: from “re-ligare” - to reconnect to the Divine

Synonyms: Wisdom Tradition, Spiritual Community, Tradition of Practice
Antonyms: Apostasy, no-nothingism, secularism, tergiversation, unfaith

Critique: SGC does NOT see religion as power-hoarding or as fundamentally dogmatic metaphysical framework that demands ideological and behavioral alignment with complex cultural expectations, at threat of punishment; or any metaphysical framework that asserts unassailable superiority to all others.
Retrieval: Sincere and epistemically humble (within SGC, following Least Dogma) practice and/or relational engagement intended to help grow connection with and/or experience of whatever the practitioner or community believes in or experiences as divine. 

Common Definitions related to but not identical to SGC: Holding complex, rigid metaphysical beliefs. Belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods

 

Respect

Primary SGC Definition: A feeling of admiration and humble consideration for someone or something based on their abilities, qualities, or achievements. It also refers to treating others with care, trust, kindness, and honor—recognizing their rights, feelings, and dignity. Recognizing that there is already a ‘there’ there when you enter a new environment or meet a new person - avoid micro-colonizing!

 

Synonyms: Esteem, regard, offer the benefit of the doubt, assume positive intentions absent evidence to the contrary, sacred listening
Antonyms: Scorn, contempt, insult, disregard, threaten, dominate

Critique: Within SGC we do not intend respect as a threat or claim to power. For example, we don’t mean “You must respect me or you will be punished.” Respect isn’t necessarily always grave - it can include humor, lightheartedness, laughter, …

 

Retrieval: Respect means “looking again.” Even if we may disagree, we recognize that each of us brings a lifetime of experience and healing, divine intention. We don’t have to understand something or someone to show respect (and we’re certainly not entitled to understanding). We simply have to pause to look again and see what is. We can support one another in growing respectful discernment across diverse perspectives. SGC recognizes that growing respect can take time, perhaps even spanning generations. SGC offers respect to all incoming members and asks that its members offer at least an intention to be respectful and to grow respect for the church and its membership. Practiced through listening, pausing before reacting, and recognizing the divine in difference.

 

Common definitions (from chatgpt):

Personal respect: Valuing yourself and your boundaries.
Interpersonal respect: Acknowledging others' worth by listening, being polite, and not judging unfairly.

Cultural/social respect: Recognizing and honoring different traditions, customs, and ways of life

Respect can show up in both attitudes and actions—like listening when someone speaks, not interrupting, and accepting differences even when you don't agree. In general, we invite you to do whatever you want that aligns with your understanding of respectful conduct in a sacred space. We care about your perspective and, respectfully, will carefully "look again" if we are puzzled or upset by anything you offer.

 

Revelation

Primary SGC Definition: A moment of sudden clarity or sacred knowing, often arising from within or through direct experience. At SGC, revelation is respected as deeply personal and not infallible.
    

Synonyms: Insight, unveiling, realization, sacred message
    

Antonyms: Obscurity, confusion, suppression
    

Critique: Revelation must be discerned and integrated. SGC avoids equating revelation with absolute truth.
    

Retrieval: Occurs in ceremony, silence, nature, or through spiritual practice—often as a soft unfolding rather than a dramatic vision.
    

Common Definitions: A surprising and previously unknown fact made known; in religious contexts, divine disclosure.

 

Sacrament

Primary SGC Definition: A consecrated act or element that facilitates connection of the practitioner to direct experience of the divine, divine presence or divinity. At SGC, Sacrament includes sacred recognized and consecrated plants, fungi and molecules experienced within a context of shared faith, values and practices.
    

Synonyms: Teonanactl (body of God), Sacred Material and/or Practice    

Antonyms: Profane misuse, casual consumption, empty ritual
    

Critique: Sacrament may become dogma and/or corrupted when separated from sincere religious practice and direct experience. SGC treats sacrament as natural, relational and alive.

Retrieval: Engaged through sincere meditation or ceremony, with care, respect, trust and intention—offered with guidance and humility.
    

Common Definitions: A religious ceremony or act regarded as an outward and visible sign of inward and spiritual divine grace.

 

Shadow

Primary SGC Definition: The hidden or rejected aspects of self that influence thoughts, feelings, and actions—often born from trauma or fear. At SGC, shadow work is sacred integration, not self-rejection.
    

Synonyms: Blind spots, inner demons, subconscious patterns
    

Antonyms: Awareness, integration, embodiment
    

Critique: Shadow is not inherently “bad.” It is unconscious, often protective, and waiting to be loved back into wholeness.
    

Retrieval: Trigger moments, projection, emotional surges—these are invitations to meet the shadow with grace.
    

Common Definitions: An unconscious aspect of the personality which the conscious ego does not identify in itself.

 

Trust

 

Primary SGC Definition: The quality of being reliably aligned in word, action, and intention. At SGC, trustworthiness grows through presence, humility, and relational consistency. A belief or confidence in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something. It’s the expectation that someone or something will act in a way that is consistent with their own understanding and self-presentation. SGC recognizes that growing trust can take time, perhaps even spanning generations. When first moving into SGC, this can simply mean being open to the possibility of integrity, ‘offering the benefit of the doubt’ to you, to the church and to all SGC Members. 

 

Synonyms: Faith, confidence, reliance, credence
Antonyms: Skepticism, doubt, suspicion

Common definitions (from chatgpt):

In relationships: Trust means believing that someone will act with your best interest in mind, keep their promises, and be truthful.

In business or professional settings: Trust often relates to competence, reliability, and integrity—believing that a person or system will deliver what they’re supposed to.

In technology/security: Trust can refer to how much confidence you place in a system or entity to operate securely and without malicious intent.

 

In practice, trust shows up in the small, consistent choices we make to relax with, support or  rely on someone or something—often without needing constant proof or reassurance. If something is going on that we don’t understand, we assume the best intentions in that situation and explore with calm curiosity.

 

Critique: Within SGC we do NOT mean trust as division, for example, “You can only trust us, not anyone else.”

Retrieval: SGC asks each community member to engage in sincere practice, to grow personal integrity in our thoughts and actions. Further, we ask to bring the benefit of the doubt to others in the community, as an exercise in growing trust with patience and discernment. Experienced when someone follows through, names their edges, and acts from alignment over time. "Trustful people are pure at heart, as they are moved by the zeal of their own trustworthiness."  - Criss Jami

 

We invite you to bring the benefit of the doubt to each other and to our community, to be "open to the possibility" that everyone in our community intends to be present with care, respect and trust. As we trust your positive intentions and integrity, we ask you to offer the same gift to us.
    

Worship

Primary SGC Definition: A reverent act of attention, devotion, or communion with the sacred. At SGC, worship is not limited to praise or ritual, it includes silence, service, awe, and everyday acts of love.
    

Synonyms: Revere, sacred offering, devotion, communion
    

Antonyms: Slavish commitment to a guru or cult, rote performance
    

Critique: Worship can be blind, performative, hierarchical, dominating, even punitive. SGC reclaims worship as humble, sincere, authentic connection - not obligation or spectacle.
    

Retrieval: Expressed in song, stillness, gardening, laughter, grief, and any moment offered in conscious alignment with the divine.
  

Common Definitions: The feeling or expression of reverence and adoration, often for a deity.