Double the Impact of Your Gift to Juniper Formation Before Year’s End

Written By Jenny Whitcher (she/her)

A generous donor will match all new gifts or increases in gifts (both recurring and one-time gifts) made to Juniper Formation before year’s end!

This matching gift allows generous new and increased donations to go twice as far for Juniper Formation’s mission to prophetically reimagine the Church. 

To double your gift:

  • Make an online donation here before midnight on December 31, 2025, or 

  • Postmark your check and send it to Juniper Formation, PO Box 19541, Denver, CO 80219, by December 31st.

Thank you for your generosity and for sharing about Juniper Formation UCC's mission and ministries with your friends, family, and colleagues to help us invite new supporters who want to be a part of reimagining the Church.

Please forward this blog post and share our social media posts within your network of people who want to transform what is happening in our country.

Help us find new relationships, potential supporters who want to:

  • Help people who have been harmed by hate-filled and harmful theologies find spiritual grounding and belonging in progressive and inclusive theology and scripture in our Daily Ripple app community. 

  • Invest in incubating new ministries of radical love and justice, like the new Roots & Reckon racial justice Land story cohort and coaching ministry by Bry Brannan (they/them), Minister of Land Discernment and liff M.Div. Resident at Juniper Formation.

  • Connect experienced, effective, and Spirit-led ministers to journey alongside congregations discerning how to reimagine their ministries, struggling with conflict, or learning how to be in relationships of mutuality instead of just charity with the wider community.

  • Share God's expansive love through our Gender + Sexuality Ministry team, who lead workshops and cohorts through our signature Open and Affirming 2.0 Gender Expansiveness and Transgender Inclusion training, LGBTQ+ affirming processes, and Our Whole Lives comprehensive sexual and spiritual education.

  • Grow efforts of the wider Church and interfaith communities in truly loving our neighbors as ourselves through the Mutual Aid Sanctuary network of ecumenical and interfaith congregations organizing and committed to protecting and caring for targeted people like immigrants, LGBTQ+, and those seeking reproductive healthcare.

  • Offer liberative faith formation and worshiping community to people who don't live near a progressive church, who are disabled, who are neurodivergent, who don't have transportation, who aren't ready yet or maybe ever to enter a church building, or just need to worship from home some days through our bimonthly Zoom-based Gathering.

Read more about the work we did together in our 2025 Ministry Highlights here.

With your gift or increased gifts, we can continue our ongoing work in new prophetic ways, cocreating together.

DONATE HERE
Jenny Whitcher (she/her)

Rev. Dr. Jenny Whitcher is the Minister of Prophetic Formation and founder of Juniper Formation, an entrepreneurial and ecumenical faith community of the United Church of Christ (UCC), with the mission of "prophetically reimagining the Church from the margins."

She is a pastor, entrepreneur, community organizer, artist, public scholar, and theologian committed to liberation and social justice.

Her areas of expertise include: professional, personal, spiritual, and organizational formation and leadership; religion and public life; democratic culture, leadership, and pedagogy; community organizing; and social change theory and practice.

Whitcher previously served as the faculty Director of the Office of Professional Formation and Term Assistant Professor of Religion & Public Life at Iliff School of Theology, after serving as Iliff's Director of the Master of Arts in Social change (now M.A. in Social Justice & Ethics) and Director of Service Learning.

As an interdisciplinary public scholar committed to social justice and human rights, Whitcher bridges fields of religious, theological, and civic studies within local, national, and international contexts. Prior to working at Iliff, Whitcher served as Associate Director of the Center for Community Engagement & Service Learning (CCESL), where she taught Community Organizing and Denver Urban Issues and Policy courses; created and led student civic development curricula; trained faculty in public scholarship and pedagogy; led local and international Immersion Programs; and was the creator, editor, and contributing writer of the "Public Good Newsletter" at the University of Denver for five years.

Her career in higher education started in 2004 at the University of Denver's Office of Internationalization Study Abroad Program. Whitcher transitioned into higher education from the nonprofit sector where she worked locally in Denver with populations experiencing homelessness and globally on affordable housing with Habitat for Humanity International where she was also the "Advocacy Alert" columnist for Frameworks Magazine.

Whitcher's publications include book chapters, articles, and public resources on civic and spiritual development and formation, relational community organizing, experiences of organizers and public life, and democratic education. She is co-author and co-editor of the first and second editions of the Community Organizing Handbook (2009, 2010).

Whitcher's public scholarship, teaching, leadership, and ministry have included work with various local congregations and denominational leaders across the U.S. and across denominational, faith, and spiritual identities. In addition, she has worked with various nonprofits and foundations, including, but not limited to:  WorldDenver, La Academia at Denver Inner City Parish, Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF), Interfaith Alliance of Colorado, Diyar Consortium, Everyday Democracy, Colorado Progressive Coalition, Puksta Foundation, the Kettering Foundation, El Centro Humanitario, Denver Public Schools, American Commonwealth Project, Urban Peak, and Habitat for Humanity International.

Internationally, Whitcher has travelled and partnered with local leaders and communities in Palestine, Israel, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Haiti, India, Hungary, Italy, and Spain.

She is the recipient of the Peacemaker Award from the Rocky Mountain Conference of the United Church of Christ (2006) and the Young Philanthropist Award by Women in Development of Greater Boston (2004).

Ordination: Metro Denver Association of the Rocky Mountain Conference of the United Church of Christ (UCC).

Education:

B.A., New York University
M.A., University of Denver
Ph.D. Iliff School of Theology & University of Denver

https://www.jennywhitcher.com
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