Written by Brenna Zeimet, a reflection following Operation Metro Surge
The year of our Lord 2026 has been a traumatic one for those of us that call Minnesota home. It has been a time where knowing and loving our neighbors has been tested in the fire of occupation and violence in our neighborhoods. The power of community turned the tides of Operation Metro Surge and we at RIH were able to be on the ground both in the crisis and in the healing and learning afterwards. I’d love to share with you some of the things we are testing out and dreams we have for future partnerships for healing and equipping neighborhoods locally and nationally going forward.
During the surge, I was able to be active on the ground in my neighborhood, showing up to resist and keep neighbors safe as well as building community wide networks of mutual aid to provide rent and food and transportation for our most targeted neighbors. What I learned in that time has been informing the future work of Riverside Innovation Hub as we think about how neighborhood ecosystems come together to support each other in good times and bad, informing community organizing strategies and relationship building techniques that can be incorporated into our curriculum and experiential learning.
In April, we were able to test out some immersive learning experiences by hosting groups from Kansas City and Portland here in Minneapolis. We explored ways that local churches and community networks organized during the surge and beyond to do rapid response and distribute food and build systems for safe rides and protecting schools and neighbors. The visiting teams were able to learn skills on the ground that they could take back to their networks and we were able to learn from them some of the best community organizing practices that are working well in their contexts.
We followed this hosting experience with a site visit of our own to Chicago in early May, where we were able to meet with organizers and mutual aid leaders to learn from them about how we can better resource our communities in sustainable ways during crisis times and times of relative peace. The wisdom and connections we brought home from Chicago are already informing teams on the ground here and curriculum planning for the future.
We have some dreams we are working on for the future that include immersive experiences here in the Twin Cities, visits to Portland to learn about community organizing around policy and legislation, somatic storytelling to help our Minnesota community heal and remember as we process the effects of Metro Surge, and future cohorts that pull in the wisdom of national community organizers to equip our churches and neighborhoods to build collaborative relationships that mend and protect your corner of the universe. As our new programs and learning events take shape, we hope you’ll accept our invitation to join in this new and exciting learning pathway. More information will be coming your way soon!
Three years ago at this time, our RIH team was making preparations to host 50 young adults on campus at Augsburg University from across the country. The purpose of this gathering was to listen to the stories of younger generations as they shared their experiences of gratitude, hopefulness and frustration in the church. Collectively these stories spoke to the hunger of this generation for a more hopeful and thriving world. The young adults gathered also shared a belief that God is calling the church to engage seriously in that vision, no matter the challenges.
“Rivers carved stones, not by force, but by showing up day after day until Earth remembers.”
Picture this: teams scattered around tables, sharing their stories – not the clean sanitized versions they tell at board meetings, but the messy truth. The breakthroughs mixed with grief. The celebrations tangled up with the spaces where they’re stuck.
There’s something that happens when you stop theorizing about interconnection and start looking at it. Actual roots. Actual water flow. Actual evidence of what thrives and what doesn’t, and why.
