Land Acknowledgement

This land, now Oklahoma, once served as a hunting ground, trade point, and migration route for the Apache, Comanche, Kiowa, and Osage nations. Due to settler colonial policies, 39 tribal nations reside in Oklahoma today. Mend respects the Indigenous peoples and their connection to this land and supports the sovereign rights of Oklahoma’s tribal nations.

Mend Core Values

1. Truth-Telling & Restorative Justice: We believe repair is impossible without truth. We name harm, listen deeply, and walk toward justice—not to punish, but to restore wholeness.

2. Mutual Flourishing: We seek not domination but wholeness for all. Mutual flourishing entails rejecting hierarchies and co-creating spaces where everyone has access to what they need to thrive.

3. Embracing Belonging: We honor differences as sacred. We actively nurture environments where all people are valued, affirmed, and protected. We do not have to earn our place here. We belong. We cultivate spaces where authenticity is welcomed, and rest is honored. We care for the work as a gardener cares for a garden, not by being perfect, but by loving the soil, the seed, and each plant.

4. Embodied Peacemaking: Our peace is not the absence of conflict—it is the presence of justice. We practice a positive peace rooted in truth, repair, and community. Peacemaking is not passive but embodied, brave, and rooted in love.

5. Creativity & Sacred Imagination: We believe in the prophetic power of rest, the arts, imagination, and dreaming. Our work is not only administrative—it is liminal. We make room for wonder, play, beauty, and mystery. We invite others into sacred rest, embodied wisdom, interconnectedness, restorative justice, and wholeness.