Moral Ecology as a Response to the Moment
Eight distinctives of redemptive community—because how we build matters as much as what we build.
Each year, Praxis Co-Founder & CEO Dave Blanchard delivers an update in the form of a Community Letter. The following essay is adapted from Dave’s 2025 address on building a moral ecology together.
This is now my tenth letter to our Praxis community—an annual opportunity to write to a growing group of friends working around the world on the major issues of our time. Each year, I find myself drawn into a sort of “chaos in review.”
Our world is full of exploitation, and we have no shortage of leaders around the globe who choose to wreak havoc on those around them in different ways, through everything from war to wages. And somehow each year seems to confound more than the year prior.
At the same time, because the world is also full of promise, each year I’m privileged to give a “reason for hope,” in the form of a view into the Praxis community—a creative minority, compounding its influence through a redemptive way of working in the world.
While the data increasingly suggests that faith may be on the rise in the next generation, our hope is less in some form of cultural ascendance or even confidence that we are at an inflection point, but that, in the words of Bono, we might continue to “[make] the light a bit brighter; maybe just tear off a corner of the darkness.” May we encourage each other to keep going, knowing there is no shortage of redemptive leaders ready to unleash beauty on the world through their work.
Using the language of the Redemptive Frame, this is Why We Build. We do so not to pursue power or accumulate a war chest for change, but out of love for God and our neighbor, and a desire to be a demonstrated apologetic of the kingdom of God. We want our work to make a compelling case for faith modeled after the life of Jesus, in a confusing time for Christians and non-Christians alike.
This is of course connected to our imagination for What We Build as members of this community. We extend an invitation to a shared redemptive quest: “to awaken the Church’s creative and prophetic contribution on the major issues of our time.” To this end, our list of Opportunities for Redemptive Imagination (ORIs) provides a menu of issue- and industry-based theses for our community’s work in cultural renewal, reflecting the visionary leadership of so many of you while inviting others into a wider set of possibilities.
I hope one major differentiator of our community is that we identify the major issues of our time as distinct from the major issues of the moment. We live in an age of accelerated cultural tides, always seeking a new “current thing” to care about at the expense of a “recent thing” that has lost favor. Movement leaders who sense shifts across their idea’s Overton Window move quickly to consolidate resources and power, often generating social stigma and practical consequences for those not in line with what the tide demands.
I hope one major differentiator of our community is that we identify the major issues of our time as distinct from the major issues of the moment.
In this way, they simply exploit circumstances in the same way they were previously exploited by their opponents. Even as followers of Jesus, we are tempted to react to currents of cultural favor in this way, privately or publicly gloating about our wins or exploding in anger at the “other side” when we feel we are losing. And so go the so-called culture wars.
Instead, we are called to identify what is on God’s heart and creatively respond for the long term. We need only look over the past year to see substantial shifts, including within the Church, in conversations around race, globalization, foreign aid, war, and more.
To be sure, thoughtful, compassionate Christians will have different perspectives on the best approaches to such high-stakes issues, but there is no doubt that God cares about the protection of the vulnerable, the pursuit of justice and peace, and the restoration of flourishing for all his image-bearers.
So we take this up as our calling, our responsibility, our joyful response: to train our attention on the heart of God. To truly be thoughtful, compassionate, creative, and committed whatever the tides may be. This is why we are so intent on being a community known for advancing redemptive quests: forming thesis-driven founders and funders aiming for a “long obedience in the same direction.”
Community as Moral Ecology; Moral Ecology As A Response to the Moment
Of course, alongside What We Build and Why We Build on the Redemptive Frame is How We Build. Over fourteen years of Praxis, it has become apparent that the way we build as a community is perhaps our strongest charism, and if sustained, may be our most lasting contribution to the Church and the world.
We view this redemptive way of building as of equal importance to our more visible venture-building output. Ultimately, I believe we’re building more than just a community, but a moral ecology that requires our collective care, especially as we grow in size and reach. Consider the words of David Brooks, from The Second Mountain:
We’ve heard from many of you facing organizational crises over the past few months due to the political and cultural changes unfolding on a seemingly weekly basis. While there are necessary, practical answers to the question of “what should we do” when revenue is lost or supply chains are disrupted, the essential answer is to keep moving forward in redemptive practice and pursuit.
Keep stepping into brokenness with creative restoration and sacrifice. Don’t allow your heart, mind, soul, and strength to change. Communities like ours can and should grow stronger in times of challenge: we see each other’s needs more vividly, and our prayerful imagination should be made for the moment.
In reflecting on this idea of Praxis-as-moral-ecology, I want to share eight traits that I think comprise our “community culture”—our distinctive norms, assumptions, beliefs, and habits of behavior:
01 // The community is an embodiment of the Redemptive Frame.
We’re actively working on the major issues of our time with a big imagination for renewal; we seek to bless each other while we do it; and we aim for a humble, holy ambition. We don’t simply have shared language, but are committed to practicing what we preach. We’re actually interested in loving God and loving our neighbors as ourselves, knowing that when we sacrifice, we gain as a community.
02 // Our dominant identity is citizenship in the kingdom of God.
We see each other first and foremost as made in the image of God, amidst a world that encourages competitive identities that divide the body of Christ—through achievements, family background, class, or other tribes and affiliations. We hold an expansive view of our neighbor and delight in the diversity of the people of Christ.
03 // We embrace and encourage meaningful risk.
We’re an avid source of encouragement for people with creative and prophetic imagination who pursue redemptive quests. As adventurous contemplatives in action, we cheer on the Spirit-led re-risking of resources, reputation, and comfort when considered discerningly and for the good of the world. We pay respect and offer second chances to builders who have faithfully failed at a worthy project.
04 // We’re “eternal” optimists, working with the long view in mind.
We fight off resignation, pessimism, and cynicism, choosing to focus on the light of each other’s work and lives in the never-ending story of the global Church. And though we long for more of the kingdom on earth, we are comfortable as a creative minority. We know we are not messiahs nor do we need to be, and we need not exchange our witness for greater power, money, or impact.
05 // We value people over projects.
We believe that trust-filled relationships are far more effective than utility-driven partnerships aimed at fast, forceful impact. In our interactions, we hold high expectations for both excellence and grace, speaking the truth in love and investing in reconciliation. We believe real friendship involves honesty and vulnerability, traits not often valued in entrepreneurial life.
06 // We are givers before we are takers.
With each other and with the world, we major in unreasonable hospitality and multi-faceted generosity, asking how we can help others on their quests and in their lives, instead of how we can personally “win.’’ At our best, each of us acts as a pillar for the community, holding it up, rather than using the community as a platform for our ambition.
07 // We have a bias to action, not argument.
Instead of declaring intellectual superiority, we provide intellectual hospitality, listening with curiosity to each other’s perspectives while being confidently grounded in orthodoxy. On the major issues of our time, we act through the hard work of venture-building, rather than speak through attention-seeking hot takes. Where we cannot reconcile or find common ground, we bless, even as we part ways.
08 // Our ultimate operating model is the fruit of the Spirit.
Encounters among us should be marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. We’re professionals, but we love to pray, laugh, sing, and cry together. The community curates itself to this end, referring and refining itself not towards the world’s definition of success but towards a dense network of friends in pursuit of union with Christ and true faith in action.
Back to the quote from Brooks, notice that he doesn’t say that healthy moral ecologies are the style of a collective response to the problems of any moment—they are the collective response.
Many of the most pressing problems of our moment are as much about “How We Build” as “What We Build”: exploitative and tribalized leadership, consolidation and preservation of power, short-term mindsets, a cynical disregard for persons and truth, brutal take-downs, and a steady decline of the fruit of the Spirit in society overall.
We can be, should be, and are a growing case for a different way to the world around us. These characteristics not only represent how people encounter and experience us, but they also empower the way our mission and vision are advanced.
In Growth, Depth
As we continue to grow as a community, I hope our embodiment of the Frame is not only deepened by our practice but also experienced more and more by those in the world who may be discouraged, frustrated, or disillusioned. David Brooks says that “the most substantial thing someone can leave behind is a moral ecology—a system of belief and behavior that outlives them.” We hope and believe that could be true for each of you, and all of us together.