Our Story
Kendall & Erin Dooley
If you want to know a little bit about us, the short version is that we met in Phoenix in 2020, got married in 2021, and our journey together is leading us to Durham, NC in the summer of 2025. But how? Why? Well, the long version is…
At the end of 2020 I (Kendall) started fundraising for my new position at Neighborhood Ministries which I started in 2021. Since working there, I have been deeply formed in the ways of what it means to serve those who are poor and disadvantaged and have adopted the language of how God is for the oppressed both biblically and theologically.
The pandemic and racial reckoning of 2020 ignited a deep desire in Erin to unlearn White Supremacy and relearn the Scriptures from a liberated lens. January 2021 was a new beginning for her as well when she began pastoring full-time at Kaleo Phoenix – preaching the Brown Jesus and learning to operate in shared leadership.
At CCDA in November of 2021, we were opened up to a world of understanding the philosophy of Community Development and were deeply stirred by a message from Rev. Dr. Cassandra Gould about the power of remembering who you are. It was in that space of CCDA that we felt like we found our people and flocked to voices that were saying all the things we longed to be about. Preachers and orators such as Terrence Hawkins, Sandra Van Opstal, Mark Charles, Soong Chang Rah, and Rene August profoundly formed us and continue to form us.
We then attended the Faith In Action conference in February 2022 by invitation from Corazón – a Community organizing federation in Phoenix, AZ that was birthed out of Neighborhood Ministries. While there we learned about community organizing and on this trip, the founder of Neighborhood, Kit Danley, explained to us the differences between community development and community organizing. She shared that both are necessary but have two very different theories of change.
Community development is focused on pulling the babies out of the river. Community organizing is focused on going upstream to stop whoever is throwing the babies in the river. Community Development is focused on developing leaders within a community, working alongside them, and giving them the resources they need to be successful. Community organizing is focused on speaking truth to power and interrogating systems that often get in the way of justice and freedom for all people.
Understanding these two theories of social change has inspired us to engage in both in a way that is authentic to us. Although I’m currently at Neighborhood and Erin is at Kaleo, we always knew we wanted to do ministry together at some point.
On MLK Day in March 2021, we had the privilege of having dinner with a Black matriarch in our city named Linda Morris and her husband. It was at that dinner that she shared with us the power of knowing our ancestry and the liberation that comes from knowing your family history. This motivated us to research the genealogy of our families and continue on the legacy of those who came before us.
As time went on, Erin began to have this desire to further her education as a pastor but refused to be taught by White people. Most of her previous ministry experience has been in White spaces so she longed to learn from people that look like her…more specifically, Black women. She searched for seminaries for Black women but couldn’t find what she was looking for and so decided to create her own learning experience via direct study. Interestingly enough, Rev. Dr. Cassandra Gould spoke at both the CCDA and Faith In Action conferences, so she was intrigued to reach out to her – a Black woman pastor and activist that has been doing the work for more than 30 years.
Erin sought out her mentorship and began being coached by her in July 2022. While being coached, Dr. Gould gave her the assignment to dream up what the future may look like in ministry. Erin brought me into this assignment and while we talked about what our future may hold together, we couldn’t help but reflect on our family's past. We noticed how both of our parents grew up in what was the beginning of a desegregated America. They grew up in Black communities but after college moved their families to the suburbs where we engaged in predominantly White spaces. We, the product of our parents, grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and Cedar Rapids.
Erin began to realize more and more that she longed to return to sacred Black spaces and nourish her Black identity. She mentioned this at her next meeting with Dr. Gould and was introduced to this term called reverse migration in the book The Devil You Know by Charles M. Blow. Erin bought the book and couldn’t put it down! It was this book that gave us the language we needed and confirmed some of our thoughts and feelings to move us forward in what we believe is a divine transition.
The book discusses the migration of Blacks from the South to the North and Midwest and how they traded the “devil they knew” in the South for the devil they didn’t know in the North and Midwest. The author calls for Black readers to move back to the South to concentrate their gifts, talents, and passions and create a powerful influence in the Black community that will have a larger impact on the nation.
We desire to be a part of Black stories rising in this nation and fight for liberation, justice, and equity to strengthen communities for the better. Like ingredients put into a stew, all of the encounters we’ve had have created what we believe the Holy Spirit to be doing in us, leading us to move to a Black community and participate in the community development and the community organizing work that is already there.
Our heart is that the organizations that we’ve worked with in Phoenix (Neighborhood Ministries and Kaleo Phoenix) would be an ongoing partnership we continue to nurture, are launched out of, and consistently give back to.
Thank you for your support and we look forward to staying in touch!
Kendall & Erin Dooley 🖤
Organizations that shaped and launched us.
