R David Moore
M.Div., MBA, Th.D.
Author I Activist I Advocate I Ally
Curriculum Vital
PROFESSIONAL HISTORY
Mary Moore Institute for Diversity, Humanity & Social Justice – (2016-present).
Social change catalyst, foundry and fund committed to promoting cultural economic, and spiritual consciousness via research, advocacy, organizing, and empowerment. In addition to major initiatives and campaigns launched by the foundry and financially supported by the fund, MMI operates several ongoing programs:
Activist Empowerment Network – Provides financial and moral support to diverse, disadvantaged artists, activists and advocates tackling projects that make us a better people.
Words that Hurt Us – Culture campaigns designed to address bias, othering, and micro-aggressions embedded in commonly-used terms and phrases, including What Does a “Suspicious Person” Look Like? (Effort to draw attention to the unspoken bias evident in “We report suspicious persons…” signs that result in police calls and, subsequently, minority deaths).
Economic Underground Railroad (EUGRR) & American Anti-poverty Society (2024): organizing networks that support a growing movement committed to being to impoverishment what the Underground Railroad and the American Anti-slavery Society were to slavery.
Level Up Tech (www.EndPovertyInOneGeneration.com). – Makes anti-poverty, pro-diversity tools and technology available to activists and advocates worldwide. Fosters Corporate Economic Consciousness via assessments, trainings and certifications. Empowers individuals to leverage their economic power to combat exploitation. Based on Moore’s unique combination of lived experience in poverty, a developed understanding of impoverishment as a system, and research into what this unprecedented sociological shift means for our future, tools include an ecommerce marketplace where people can buy everything from baby formula to auto insurance at fair prices, a no-fee, credit non-contingent home rental website, and a diversity-calibrated job board.
HomeWorks – Real estate firm that helps the working poor bypass rentalship and move straight from homelessness to homeownership. Homeworks was founded by Crystal Crawford, Moore’s youngest and only surviving sibling, based on her own lived experience with poverty and homelessness both as a child and in adulthood. Key features:
A. The company’s signature program was designed to address the three barriers that prevent lower-income workers from becoming homeowners: lack of housing they can afford at pay rates of $15-$25/hour, home loans that are credit score contingent, and exorbitant down payments.
B. Market-driven business model based on purchasing distressed homes in areas with ready access to services and transit and redeveloping them as basic but good-quality multi-unit properties.
C. The program’s built-in safeguards prevent homeowners from becoming homeless again.
Lake Productions (www.lakeproductions.org) – Social justice-focused, ethnic diversity and LGBTQ+ affirming film production company committed to telling stories that highlight heroes of diversity and to infusing inclusion into our cultural narratives. Company designed to foster collective thriving in three ways: 1) Creating culturally competent that affirm diversity and shift the cultural narrative, 2) Continually expanding our definition of diversity to include previously underrepresented groups of all kinds, from mixed heritages and varied sexualities to chosen identities, and varied abilities both in front of and behind the camera, and 3) incorporated economic consciousness by implementing universal revenue sharing for cast and crew.
iPeerion – Advising Principal, Social Ergonomics and Inclusion (2018-present).
Social benefit tech innovator and accelerator that builds world-changing technologies that are socially beneficial, environmentally responsible, and built with diversity in mind in five ways: 1. Privacy-protecting, 2. Energy-saving, 3. Revenue-sharing, 4. Credit-non-contingent, and 5. Economically generative.
iPeerion’s starting assumption is that ALL technology is infused with the biases of its creators and therefore must be actively de-biased. For instance, neighborhood safety algorithms tend to overlook minority safety, including the likelihood of being a victim of racialized policing, or, for religious minorities and members of the LGBTQ+ community, encountering hate speech or hate crimes.
Medically Mandated Early Retirement (2013)
Relocation to Seattle for a range of treatments for simultaneous advanced-stage cancers.
Defy Ventures – Founding Chairperson, Advisor on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (2011-2012)
National felon-to-founder entrepreneurship program that helped people with felonies launch and lead their own companies instead of facing continual rejections from low-wage jobs. www.defyventures.org.
New York City Office of the Mayor – Bloomberg Administration
Diversity and Social Justice Consultant/Advisor (2010)
Obama Presidential Campaign (national)/”No on Prop 8” Campaign (California)
National Clergy Organizer, Evangelical Outreach Strategist (2008)
The Human Element – Principal (2007–2012)
Diversity, Ergonomics and Social Impact Consultancy/Advisory that helped organizations committed to social justice align their practices, processes and protocols to be a fit with America’s emerging demography. See “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Initiatives”.
Chaplain – Hurricane Katrina Relief Effort, New Orleans – Refugee Relocation Director (2006)
Built network of congregations, primarily in the Houston and Dallas metropolitan areas to help families and individuals restart their lives there and find a welcoming, culturally inclusive home in those communities.
Clergy Activist/Graduate Student – Columbia University – New York, NY (2002-2005)
Home in Harlem Social Justice Initiative: Advocacy on behalf of long-time Harlem residents in danger of being displaced by gentrification and the expansion of Columbia University above 125th Street.
Organizing against the War on Iraq: Coordinated with pastors, priests, rabbis, imams, and other clergy across New York City to send the message to the rest of the United States that New Yorkers were, by a plurality, opposed to the war and did not blame Iraq for 9/11.
Chaplain – 9/11 Workers and Survivors – New York, NY (2002-2005)
Provided trauma therapy and bereavement counseling for on-site workers, family members and New Yorkers. Utilized tactics developed in San Francisco’s AIDS crisis to help New Yorkers heal. Engaged in interfaith organizing to provide emotional, practical and spiritual relief.
Chaplain – HIV/AIDS Epidemic – San Francisco (1989-1999)
Provided spiritual care and support to AIDS victims, helping them to bring closure to their lives on their own terms and to establish the legacies they wanted to leave. Served as caseworker, care coordinator and advocate for basic needs spanning from housing to hospice services.
College Kids – Chief Operating Officer (1997-1999)
Education nonprofit that helped put primary school students in high-poverty communities on track to attend college by practically addressing the barriers that lock them out. Used personal lived experience and that of others to strategize needed supports.
Big Brothers/Big Sisters – Case Manager/Diversity Consultant (1996).
BayMarin Community Church/Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary (1988-1995)
BayMarin – Co-founder, Community Minister
An intentionally diverse, socially inclusive congregation in the SF Bay Area committed to social justice. Led advocacy, activism, and social justice efforts, including Raise the Roof – a county-wide, interfaith effort that raised money for the 30+ burned, historically black congregations in the early 1990s.
Golden Gate – Adjunct Professor, Activist in Residence (1995-1997)
Adjunct Professor (Your Mouth to God’s Ears: How the Songs We Sing Shape Our Posture toward the World, Be Reconciled: What White Congregations Need to Know About Racial Justice).
DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION INITIATIVESDiversity Nonprofit Executive Recruitment
An executive search firm was struggling to identify diverse candidates for top leadership roles because of how job descriptions had been developed. For instance, by making “proven fundraising experience” mandatory, they automatically weeded out the majority of immensely qualified candidates who, being from low-income backgrounds, deeply understand the problem and how to solve it. But that same background means they don’t have the personal network needed to raise funds. Making doctoral degrees, irrespective of other experience, mandatory had a similar, disproportionately adverse impact on minority candidate recruitment.
Diversity Fellowship and Scholarship Candidates
A new corporate foundation focused on education sought to award fellowships and scholarships to minority youth from low-income communities, but despite significant publicity, they received few applications. The problem, however, wasn’t a lack of interest but a lack of access. The web-based application required a personal computer, which few students had, in addition to letters of reference submitted by email. Making changes to the process so that students could submit their applications right then, using laptops provided by the foundation representative, and adding phone calls as a way of receiving recommendations increased applications by more than tenfold.
Diversity Mentor Pairings
National youth mentoring program that had a significant number of minority program participants but few minority mentors. They also had a gender challenge. They had boys who’d been on the waiting list for a mentor for years and women who were likewise waiting for someone to mentor. Together, we devised a two-pronged strategy. To increase the number of ethnic minority mentors, we broadened their recruitment methods, changed eligibility requirements (which, at the time, disqualified people previously convicted of a felony and members of the LGBTQ+ community), and encouraged former beneficiaries of the program to become mentors. We also implemented cross-gender matches for those who were interested. The majority of both the boys and the women on the waiting list signed up.
Diversifying Public Office
An organization that sought to encourage everyday citizens to run for political office recognized the relative lack of diversity among the candidates they were supporting, despite efforts to reach out to minority communities. What was missing was an understanding of the economic barriers. In addition to the prohibitive costs of running for office, few state and local politicians make a living wage, which means that only people of means can afford to serve.
Minority Concentration in Lower Roles
An education organization had sought to diversify its team but had given little thought to its underlying assumptions. As a result, all of their nearly 40 ethnic minority hires except one ended up in low-wage, non-management roles. In addition, the company issued complimentary smartphones to those in management roles, a practice that inadvertently took on a racial dynamic.
Diversity Conscious Corporate Practices:
Built job profiles around abilities rather than credentials. Revised interview processes to treat people respectfully - as current stakeholders and potential partners rather than “applicants.”
Eliminated the use of background and credit checks, which disproportionately discriminate against ethnic minorities and lower-income workers.
Built systems that reduce systemic comp inequity. Equalized pay across traditionally male/female roles, eliminated salary negotiations (which skew salaries in favor of Euro Americans and men), introduced comp transparency, and decoupled raises and bonuses from individual performance appraisals.
Launched Micro-business Partnership program that enables undocumented immigrants to successfully compete for contracts. Made it company policy to compensate contractors a 30% premium over employee hourly rates in order to help offset their additional costs. Offered universal equity to all employees and contractors, at every level.
Redesigned benefits so that minority workers and diverse households receive the same effective compensation, including health insurance that allows for the coverage of any adult household member (as is often the case for ethnic minority heads of households, who are likely to have their parent living with them), makes paid maternity/paternity leave available to everyone as “family leave”, allowing employees to take time off for everything from caring for a sick child to addressing the needs of aging parents.
ACTIVISM AND ADVOCACYLegislative Advocacy:
Yes on Proposition K – Local effort to reinstate San Francisco’s domestic partnership registry and the legal protections it provided the city’s LGBTQ+ community, especially in the face of AIDS
National effort to engage Southern Baptist ministers and historically white congregations in observances of Martin Luther King’s birthday (1990)
Evangelicals for Marriage Equality (2008)
Ministerial support for the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act (2010)
George Floyd Justice in Policing Act (2020)
John Lewis Voting Rights Act (2021)
Clergy effort appealing to Vice President Kamala Harris, as Presiding Officer of the Senate, to help advance a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants (2021)
Clergy sponsor: Multi-faith Statement of Solidarity with Transgender Children (2021)
Member: American Sustainable Business Network’s Business for Democracy working group (2022)
Culture Activism:
Dark Dolls – Consciousness campaign that raises awareness regarding how using darkness as a pejorative is a micro-aggression that has a devastating impact, especially on our kids, as evidenced by the Doll Studies.
Artists for Equality – Engagement campaign that encouraged music artists to take a stand against homophobia, racism, disrespect of women, and transphobia, including assessing their lyrics and helping prevent teen suicide.
Change Artists, a production support program for artists committed to social justice.
Human Harmony Project: Nationwide music events held in conjunction with the tenth anniversary of UNESCO’s International Day for Tolerance.
Diversity in Public Office:
Canvasser, Richard Arrington, first African American mayor of Birmingham, AL (1979)
Organizer: Terri Carr, Oklahoma University’s first female and African American student body president (1986)
Organizer, Gavin Newsom, San Francisco Board of Supervisors (1998)
National Clergy Organizer, Evangelical Outreach Strategist, Obama Campaign (2008, 2012)
Campaign Strategy Advisor, Angel Taveras, first Latinx mayor of Providence, Rhode Island (2011)
Advocate, NY State Senator Brad Hoylman’s bid to become the first LGBT+ Manhattan Borough President (2021)
Community Advocacy:
Co-organizer of the first Northern California MLK Day of Service (1994)
Advocated for fair treatment of Harlem residents as the City auctioned off residential properties, as President Bill Clinton and NBA All-Star Magic Johnson made initial investments along Harlem’s 125th Street, and as Columbia University sought to extend its campus to Manhattanville. (2003)
Activism Affiliations:
National Conference on Race and Ethnicity (NCORE), Human Rights Commission, GLAAD, No Price on Justice Coalition, Color of Change, B-Labs, American Sustainable Business Network.
FAITH-BASED SOCIAL JUSTICECo-founder, Deacon, Ensley Church (Birmingham, AL); Co-founder, BayMarin Church (San Rafael, CA).
San Francisco Interfaith Gospel Choir; Founder and Director
After Exodus, Founder and Facilitator – Support group for LGBTQ+ Christians traumatized by ex-gay programs like Exodus International, reparative therapy, and religious persecution.
Chaplain: Provided spiritual care for San Francisco AIDS victims and San Quintin death row inmates. Trauma Chaplain for New Yorkers in the wake of 9/11 and Katrina. Support group leader for cancer patients and others seeking to, despite their diagnosis, make the most of their lives.
Incarnational Theologian: Authority on Kingian-era social theology and the spiritual ethos that undergirded much of the Civil Rights movement. Develops theological frameworks that separate humanitarian spirituality from social supremacy. Proponent of inclusive, humanitarian, Christian spirituality committed to a world that reflects the Beloved Community. “Thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The beating heart of Christian spirituality isn’t about getting individuals into heaven. It’s about us, collectively, through our individual lives, manifesting the realm of goodness here on earth. It’s about bringing heaven down.
Creator: Be Reconciled, Creator and Facilitator – Anti-racism workshop focused on helping white-identifying congregations, based on Matthew 25: (“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.”), recognize how they’d benefitted from racism and engage in making amends.
Organizer: Raise the Roof, Organizer – A joint interfaith effort that brought together people of diverse spiritualities and non-spiritualities for a fundraising concert in California to stand in solidarity with and help rebuild the over 30 historically black churches burned in the early 1990s.
Creator: Songs We Can Sing Together – Workshop for sacred music composers who want to write songs that are rooted in humanitarian spirituality in three core ways: 1. They’re inclusive of people of diverse faiths and spiritual paths; 2. They don’t promote genderized, paternalistic, or imperialistic (above us rather than among/within us) images of God; and 3. They call us to be co-participants in the sacred work of manifesting the Beloved Community (described in the language of that time as the “Kingdom of Righteousness-God-Heaven). The workshop utilizes Negro spirituals, Jubilee songs, and spiritual songs of the Civil Rights movement as examples.
CREATIVE CONTENT
Additional Films
Tipping Point: What the Portland Protests Tell Us About the State of America (narrative advisor) – documentary film about the 2020 Portland Protests.
The Patient – documentary about three individuals who found ways to thrive while fighting cancer.Additional Writing
Screenplay co-writer – The Falls, Testament of Love, The Falls, Covenant of Grace, LUZ
LGBTQIA Teen Bill of Rights (“Q-Bill”)
Published composer – ASCAP, BMI, CCLI
Lectures/Workshops
Why Kingian Philosophy Matters More than Ever
What We Get Wrong about Diversity
What Theocracy does to Democracy
Why I Can’t Sing “Amazing Grace”
How America Created Whiteness (and Why)
Race Fatigue
Discredit Yourself – How Credit Scores Drive America’s Problem with Racial Injustice
From Conformity to Diversity: Changing Our Social Orientation
Diversity Trainings
Why Our Diversity Efforts Backfire
You’re not Racist, but Your HR Policies Are
Recruiting – You Built It, But They Didn’t Come (Why Your Process Isn’t Attracting Diversity)
Why They Leave
Diversifying Our Idea of Diversity
Edward Executive and Wilma Worker
Why Gays, Dyslexics and Women Rule as Leaders
EDUCATIONUniversity of Oklahoma – BA, Industrial-Organizational Psychology
Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary – M.Div., Urban Ministry and Social Justice
Columbia Business School – MBA, Organizational Behavior and Leadership
Columbia Teachers College – doctoral program, Social Psychology, Adult Learning & Leadership
Capstone University, School of Theology – Th.D. Spiritual Direction - Dissertation: An Incarnational Theology of Living, Loving, and Changing the World.
Certifications and Continuing Education:
Ordained and licensed minister
Human Resources Management
EEO and Affirmative Action
Discrimination-free Workplace
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Palliative Chaplaincy
Emergency Services Chaplaincy
Mediation and Conflict Resolution
LGBTQ Affirmative Counseling Competencies
Organizational Culture Change
CPR
M.Div., MBA, Th.D.
Author I Activist I Advocate I Ally
Curriculum Vital
PROFESSIONAL HISTORY
Mary Moore Institute for Diversity, Humanity & Social Justice – (2016-present).
Social change catalyst, foundry and fund committed to promoting cultural economic, and spiritual consciousness via research, advocacy, organizing, and empowerment. In addition to major initiatives and campaigns launched by the foundry and financially supported by the fund, MMI operates several ongoing programs:
Activist Empowerment Network – Provides financial and moral support to diverse, disadvantaged artists, activists and advocates tackling projects that make us a better people.
Words that Hurt Us – Culture campaigns designed to address bias, othering, and micro-aggressions embedded in commonly-used terms and phrases, including What Does a “Suspicious Person” Look Like? (Effort to draw attention to the unspoken bias evident in “We report suspicious persons…” signs that result in police calls and, subsequently, minority deaths).
Economic Underground Railroad (EUGRR) & American Anti-poverty Society (2024): organizing networks that support a growing movement committed to being to impoverishment what the Underground Railroad and the American Anti-slavery Society were to slavery.
Level Up Tech (www.EndPovertyInOneGeneration.com). – Makes anti-poverty, pro-diversity tools and technology available to activists and advocates worldwide. Fosters Corporate Economic Consciousness via assessments, trainings and certifications. Empowers individuals to leverage their economic power to combat exploitation. Based on Moore’s unique combination of lived experience in poverty, a developed understanding of impoverishment as a system, and research into what this unprecedented sociological shift means for our future, tools include an ecommerce marketplace where people can buy everything from baby formula to auto insurance at fair prices, a no-fee, credit non-contingent home rental website, and a diversity-calibrated job board.
HomeWorks – Real estate firm that helps the working poor bypass rentalship and move straight from homelessness to homeownership. Homeworks was founded by Crystal Crawford, Moore’s youngest and only surviving sibling, based on her own lived experience with poverty and homelessness both as a child and in adulthood. Key features:
A. The company’s signature program was designed to address the three barriers that prevent lower-income workers from becoming homeowners: lack of housing they can afford at pay rates of $15-$25/hour, home loans that are credit score contingent, and exorbitant down payments.
B. Market-driven business model based on purchasing distressed homes in areas with ready access to services and transit and redeveloping them as basic but good-quality multi-unit properties.
C. The program’s built-in safeguards prevent homeowners from becoming homeless again.
Lake Productions (www.lakeproductions.org) – Social justice-focused, ethnic diversity and LGBTQ+ affirming film production company committed to telling stories that highlight heroes of diversity and to infusing inclusion into our cultural narratives. Company designed to foster collective thriving in three ways: 1) Creating culturally competent that affirm diversity and shift the cultural narrative, 2) Continually expanding our definition of diversity to include previously underrepresented groups of all kinds, from mixed heritages and varied sexualities to chosen identities, and varied abilities both in front of and behind the camera, and 3) incorporated economic consciousness by implementing universal revenue sharing for cast and crew.
iPeerion – Advising Principal, Social Ergonomics and Inclusion (2018-present).
Social benefit tech innovator and accelerator that builds world-changing technologies that are socially beneficial, environmentally responsible, and built with diversity in mind in five ways: 1. Privacy-protecting, 2. Energy-saving, 3. Revenue-sharing, 4. Credit-non-contingent, and 5. Economically generative.
iPeerion’s starting assumption is that ALL technology is infused with the biases of its creators and therefore must be actively de-biased. For instance, neighborhood safety algorithms tend to overlook minority safety, including the likelihood of being a victim of racialized policing, or, for religious minorities and members of the LGBTQ+ community, encountering hate speech or hate crimes.
- B-App Engine – Blockchain-based app platform that powers apps for B Corps and nonprofits, and that allows activists to use technology to address everything from impoverishment to disenfranchisement.
- Patent-pending AI program structured to distribute shares to offset job displacement,
- Digital economic hub that dramatically increases asset ownership among the global working class.
Medically Mandated Early Retirement (2013)
Relocation to Seattle for a range of treatments for simultaneous advanced-stage cancers.
Defy Ventures – Founding Chairperson, Advisor on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (2011-2012)
National felon-to-founder entrepreneurship program that helped people with felonies launch and lead their own companies instead of facing continual rejections from low-wage jobs. www.defyventures.org.
New York City Office of the Mayor – Bloomberg Administration
Diversity and Social Justice Consultant/Advisor (2010)
Obama Presidential Campaign (national)/”No on Prop 8” Campaign (California)
National Clergy Organizer, Evangelical Outreach Strategist (2008)
- Leading proponent of a shift in Democratic strategy to no longer abdicate the white, evangelical vote. Co-organizer of the Saddleback Conversation, an informal debate between Senator Obama and Senator McCain held at Saddleback Community Church and moderated by Pastor Warren in 2008.
- Evangelicals against Prop 8, Clergy against Prop 8.
- Founder of United Ministers Network, a national grasstops organizing effort that equipped clergy in low-income, high-ethnic communities to engage their congregations in civic action, both at the national level and closer to home with mayors, city councils, police chiefs, and district attorneys.
The Human Element – Principal (2007–2012)
Diversity, Ergonomics and Social Impact Consultancy/Advisory that helped organizations committed to social justice align their practices, processes and protocols to be a fit with America’s emerging demography. See “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Initiatives”.
Chaplain – Hurricane Katrina Relief Effort, New Orleans – Refugee Relocation Director (2006)
Built network of congregations, primarily in the Houston and Dallas metropolitan areas to help families and individuals restart their lives there and find a welcoming, culturally inclusive home in those communities.
Clergy Activist/Graduate Student – Columbia University – New York, NY (2002-2005)
Home in Harlem Social Justice Initiative: Advocacy on behalf of long-time Harlem residents in danger of being displaced by gentrification and the expansion of Columbia University above 125th Street.
Organizing against the War on Iraq: Coordinated with pastors, priests, rabbis, imams, and other clergy across New York City to send the message to the rest of the United States that New Yorkers were, by a plurality, opposed to the war and did not blame Iraq for 9/11.
Chaplain – 9/11 Workers and Survivors – New York, NY (2002-2005)
Provided trauma therapy and bereavement counseling for on-site workers, family members and New Yorkers. Utilized tactics developed in San Francisco’s AIDS crisis to help New Yorkers heal. Engaged in interfaith organizing to provide emotional, practical and spiritual relief.
Chaplain – HIV/AIDS Epidemic – San Francisco (1989-1999)
Provided spiritual care and support to AIDS victims, helping them to bring closure to their lives on their own terms and to establish the legacies they wanted to leave. Served as caseworker, care coordinator and advocate for basic needs spanning from housing to hospice services.
College Kids – Chief Operating Officer (1997-1999)
Education nonprofit that helped put primary school students in high-poverty communities on track to attend college by practically addressing the barriers that lock them out. Used personal lived experience and that of others to strategize needed supports.
Big Brothers/Big Sisters – Case Manager/Diversity Consultant (1996).
BayMarin Community Church/Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary (1988-1995)
BayMarin – Co-founder, Community Minister
An intentionally diverse, socially inclusive congregation in the SF Bay Area committed to social justice. Led advocacy, activism, and social justice efforts, including Raise the Roof – a county-wide, interfaith effort that raised money for the 30+ burned, historically black congregations in the early 1990s.
Golden Gate – Adjunct Professor, Activist in Residence (1995-1997)
Adjunct Professor (Your Mouth to God’s Ears: How the Songs We Sing Shape Our Posture toward the World, Be Reconciled: What White Congregations Need to Know About Racial Justice).
DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION INITIATIVESDiversity Nonprofit Executive Recruitment
An executive search firm was struggling to identify diverse candidates for top leadership roles because of how job descriptions had been developed. For instance, by making “proven fundraising experience” mandatory, they automatically weeded out the majority of immensely qualified candidates who, being from low-income backgrounds, deeply understand the problem and how to solve it. But that same background means they don’t have the personal network needed to raise funds. Making doctoral degrees, irrespective of other experience, mandatory had a similar, disproportionately adverse impact on minority candidate recruitment.
Diversity Fellowship and Scholarship Candidates
A new corporate foundation focused on education sought to award fellowships and scholarships to minority youth from low-income communities, but despite significant publicity, they received few applications. The problem, however, wasn’t a lack of interest but a lack of access. The web-based application required a personal computer, which few students had, in addition to letters of reference submitted by email. Making changes to the process so that students could submit their applications right then, using laptops provided by the foundation representative, and adding phone calls as a way of receiving recommendations increased applications by more than tenfold.
Diversity Mentor Pairings
National youth mentoring program that had a significant number of minority program participants but few minority mentors. They also had a gender challenge. They had boys who’d been on the waiting list for a mentor for years and women who were likewise waiting for someone to mentor. Together, we devised a two-pronged strategy. To increase the number of ethnic minority mentors, we broadened their recruitment methods, changed eligibility requirements (which, at the time, disqualified people previously convicted of a felony and members of the LGBTQ+ community), and encouraged former beneficiaries of the program to become mentors. We also implemented cross-gender matches for those who were interested. The majority of both the boys and the women on the waiting list signed up.
Diversifying Public Office
An organization that sought to encourage everyday citizens to run for political office recognized the relative lack of diversity among the candidates they were supporting, despite efforts to reach out to minority communities. What was missing was an understanding of the economic barriers. In addition to the prohibitive costs of running for office, few state and local politicians make a living wage, which means that only people of means can afford to serve.
Minority Concentration in Lower Roles
An education organization had sought to diversify its team but had given little thought to its underlying assumptions. As a result, all of their nearly 40 ethnic minority hires except one ended up in low-wage, non-management roles. In addition, the company issued complimentary smartphones to those in management roles, a practice that inadvertently took on a racial dynamic.
Diversity Conscious Corporate Practices:
Built job profiles around abilities rather than credentials. Revised interview processes to treat people respectfully - as current stakeholders and potential partners rather than “applicants.”
Eliminated the use of background and credit checks, which disproportionately discriminate against ethnic minorities and lower-income workers.
Built systems that reduce systemic comp inequity. Equalized pay across traditionally male/female roles, eliminated salary negotiations (which skew salaries in favor of Euro Americans and men), introduced comp transparency, and decoupled raises and bonuses from individual performance appraisals.
Launched Micro-business Partnership program that enables undocumented immigrants to successfully compete for contracts. Made it company policy to compensate contractors a 30% premium over employee hourly rates in order to help offset their additional costs. Offered universal equity to all employees and contractors, at every level.
Redesigned benefits so that minority workers and diverse households receive the same effective compensation, including health insurance that allows for the coverage of any adult household member (as is often the case for ethnic minority heads of households, who are likely to have their parent living with them), makes paid maternity/paternity leave available to everyone as “family leave”, allowing employees to take time off for everything from caring for a sick child to addressing the needs of aging parents.
ACTIVISM AND ADVOCACYLegislative Advocacy:
Yes on Proposition K – Local effort to reinstate San Francisco’s domestic partnership registry and the legal protections it provided the city’s LGBTQ+ community, especially in the face of AIDS
National effort to engage Southern Baptist ministers and historically white congregations in observances of Martin Luther King’s birthday (1990)
Evangelicals for Marriage Equality (2008)
Ministerial support for the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act (2010)
George Floyd Justice in Policing Act (2020)
John Lewis Voting Rights Act (2021)
Clergy effort appealing to Vice President Kamala Harris, as Presiding Officer of the Senate, to help advance a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants (2021)
Clergy sponsor: Multi-faith Statement of Solidarity with Transgender Children (2021)
Member: American Sustainable Business Network’s Business for Democracy working group (2022)
Culture Activism:
Dark Dolls – Consciousness campaign that raises awareness regarding how using darkness as a pejorative is a micro-aggression that has a devastating impact, especially on our kids, as evidenced by the Doll Studies.
Artists for Equality – Engagement campaign that encouraged music artists to take a stand against homophobia, racism, disrespect of women, and transphobia, including assessing their lyrics and helping prevent teen suicide.
Change Artists, a production support program for artists committed to social justice.
Human Harmony Project: Nationwide music events held in conjunction with the tenth anniversary of UNESCO’s International Day for Tolerance.
Diversity in Public Office:
Canvasser, Richard Arrington, first African American mayor of Birmingham, AL (1979)
Organizer: Terri Carr, Oklahoma University’s first female and African American student body president (1986)
Organizer, Gavin Newsom, San Francisco Board of Supervisors (1998)
National Clergy Organizer, Evangelical Outreach Strategist, Obama Campaign (2008, 2012)
Campaign Strategy Advisor, Angel Taveras, first Latinx mayor of Providence, Rhode Island (2011)
Advocate, NY State Senator Brad Hoylman’s bid to become the first LGBT+ Manhattan Borough President (2021)
Community Advocacy:
Co-organizer of the first Northern California MLK Day of Service (1994)
Advocated for fair treatment of Harlem residents as the City auctioned off residential properties, as President Bill Clinton and NBA All-Star Magic Johnson made initial investments along Harlem’s 125th Street, and as Columbia University sought to extend its campus to Manhattanville. (2003)
Activism Affiliations:
National Conference on Race and Ethnicity (NCORE), Human Rights Commission, GLAAD, No Price on Justice Coalition, Color of Change, B-Labs, American Sustainable Business Network.
FAITH-BASED SOCIAL JUSTICECo-founder, Deacon, Ensley Church (Birmingham, AL); Co-founder, BayMarin Church (San Rafael, CA).
San Francisco Interfaith Gospel Choir; Founder and Director
After Exodus, Founder and Facilitator – Support group for LGBTQ+ Christians traumatized by ex-gay programs like Exodus International, reparative therapy, and religious persecution.
Chaplain: Provided spiritual care for San Francisco AIDS victims and San Quintin death row inmates. Trauma Chaplain for New Yorkers in the wake of 9/11 and Katrina. Support group leader for cancer patients and others seeking to, despite their diagnosis, make the most of their lives.
Incarnational Theologian: Authority on Kingian-era social theology and the spiritual ethos that undergirded much of the Civil Rights movement. Develops theological frameworks that separate humanitarian spirituality from social supremacy. Proponent of inclusive, humanitarian, Christian spirituality committed to a world that reflects the Beloved Community. “Thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The beating heart of Christian spirituality isn’t about getting individuals into heaven. It’s about us, collectively, through our individual lives, manifesting the realm of goodness here on earth. It’s about bringing heaven down.
Creator: Be Reconciled, Creator and Facilitator – Anti-racism workshop focused on helping white-identifying congregations, based on Matthew 25: (“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift.”), recognize how they’d benefitted from racism and engage in making amends.
Organizer: Raise the Roof, Organizer – A joint interfaith effort that brought together people of diverse spiritualities and non-spiritualities for a fundraising concert in California to stand in solidarity with and help rebuild the over 30 historically black churches burned in the early 1990s.
Creator: Songs We Can Sing Together – Workshop for sacred music composers who want to write songs that are rooted in humanitarian spirituality in three core ways: 1. They’re inclusive of people of diverse faiths and spiritual paths; 2. They don’t promote genderized, paternalistic, or imperialistic (above us rather than among/within us) images of God; and 3. They call us to be co-participants in the sacred work of manifesting the Beloved Community (described in the language of that time as the “Kingdom of Righteousness-God-Heaven). The workshop utilizes Negro spirituals, Jubilee songs, and spiritual songs of the Civil Rights movement as examples.
CREATIVE CONTENT
Additional Films
Tipping Point: What the Portland Protests Tell Us About the State of America (narrative advisor) – documentary film about the 2020 Portland Protests.
The Patient – documentary about three individuals who found ways to thrive while fighting cancer.Additional Writing
Screenplay co-writer – The Falls, Testament of Love, The Falls, Covenant of Grace, LUZ
LGBTQIA Teen Bill of Rights (“Q-Bill”)
Published composer – ASCAP, BMI, CCLI
Lectures/Workshops
Why Kingian Philosophy Matters More than Ever
What We Get Wrong about Diversity
What Theocracy does to Democracy
Why I Can’t Sing “Amazing Grace”
How America Created Whiteness (and Why)
Race Fatigue
Discredit Yourself – How Credit Scores Drive America’s Problem with Racial Injustice
From Conformity to Diversity: Changing Our Social Orientation
Diversity Trainings
Why Our Diversity Efforts Backfire
You’re not Racist, but Your HR Policies Are
Recruiting – You Built It, But They Didn’t Come (Why Your Process Isn’t Attracting Diversity)
Why They Leave
Diversifying Our Idea of Diversity
Edward Executive and Wilma Worker
Why Gays, Dyslexics and Women Rule as Leaders
EDUCATIONUniversity of Oklahoma – BA, Industrial-Organizational Psychology
Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary – M.Div., Urban Ministry and Social Justice
Columbia Business School – MBA, Organizational Behavior and Leadership
Columbia Teachers College – doctoral program, Social Psychology, Adult Learning & Leadership
Capstone University, School of Theology – Th.D. Spiritual Direction - Dissertation: An Incarnational Theology of Living, Loving, and Changing the World.
Certifications and Continuing Education:
Ordained and licensed minister
Human Resources Management
EEO and Affirmative Action
Discrimination-free Workplace
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Palliative Chaplaincy
Emergency Services Chaplaincy
Mediation and Conflict Resolution
LGBTQ Affirmative Counseling Competencies
Organizational Culture Change
CPR