Kindred Abundance: Learning Reciprocity at the Altar

JULY 17, 2026

Relfections from the ReStorying Institute: Weaving New Worlds

What if abundance was not measured by accumulation, but by relationship?

At this year’s ReStorying Institute: Weaving New Worlds, co-hosted by McCormick’s Sacred Memory Project, participants were invited to wrestle with that question through Kindred Abundance, a powerful framework for reimagining how we relate to one another, to resources, and to community. At the heart of this learning was the Reciprocity Altar — a sacred teaching space that challenged participants to move beyond scarcity, charity, and transactional exchange toward a deeper ethic of shared flourishing.

The Reciprocity Altar teaches that reciprocity is more than generosity; it is infrastructure. Rooted in African cosmologies and the enduring wisdom of “I am because we are,” reciprocity calls us to organize power, resources, and relationships so that care moves in every direction with dignity. Rather than dividing people into givers and receivers, the altar reminds us that we are all both — each carrying gifts, needs, wisdom, and responsibility. In this vision, abundance is not something possessed by a few, but something cultivated together through mutual accountability and interdependence.

Through sacred artifacts — including symbols such as Ubuntu, Sankofa, Mate Masie, and the ceremonial open hand — participants encountered a living grammar of reciprocity. Each object offered a distinct lesson: the importance of returning to ancestral wisdom, the power of deep listening, and the sacred obligation to reinvest in the communities that make transformation possible. Together, these symbols challenged participants to ask not simply What do we have to give? but also What are we called to receive, repair, and return? The altar became a space where memory, spirituality, and practice converged — inviting a radical reordering of how institutions, communities, and individuals imagine abundance.

As a resource outcome of the ReStorying Institute, Kindred Abundance offers more than a framework for understanding reciprocity — it offers a glimpse into the kind of transformational formation that defines the Sacred Memory Project at McCormick. Through ritual, storytelling, ancestral wisdom, and embodied practices like the Reciprocity Altar, participants learn to remember what has been forgotten, restore what has been fractured, and imagine new possibilities for ministry rooted in healing, repair, and collective flourishing. This is the heart of Sacred Memory: not simply recovering the past, but allowing ancient wisdom to shape faithful responses to the realities of the present.

This same formational journey continues through the Sacred Memory Cohort, McCormick's two-year Master of Theological Studies microcredential program, where participants develop the theological imagination, research practices, and ministry skills needed to build communities of healing and restoration. Applications open soon for the 2026 cohort. We invite those called to ministry, justice, and community transformation to explore how Sacred Memory can deepen both their personal formation and their public witness. Because when we remember well, we are better equipped to re-story our communities — and together, weave new worlds.