By Mary C. Frances, Senior Associate Consultant

Every four years my husband and I spend two weeks out of the summer doing what we call “our homework.” That means that we watch the conventions of the two major political parties. During one of them, I was interested to hear the speaker talk about growing up in a small town and being there for others regardless of their belief, their race, what they do or who they love. In other words, this person was talking about loving their neighbor.

Neighbor is a word we use a lot at FaithX. We talk about the importance of knowing your neighbor in order to do ministry in your neighborhood. As I thought about those two important words – neighbor and neighborhood – I decided to dig into them just a little bit deeper.

In the story of the Good Samaritan, the Samaritan asks Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?”. Many of us might just think those are the people in proximity to us, and you wouldn’t be all wrong. A neighbor is often defined as someone who is situated nearby. And a neighborhood is often defined as an area forming a community within a larger town or city. But I think Jesus was talking about more than proximity. Then I found some other words that intrigued me. A neighborhood is also described as localized, social and having considerable face to face interactions. I wonder how the last 4 years have changed some of that. Do neighborhoods always include considerable face to face interactions? I think perhaps not. And as a result, we may not always know anymore the distinguishing characteristics that make up a particular neighborhood – even if it’s our own.

The Neighborhood Insights Report (NIR) helps congregations and judicatories look at a localized area within a city, town or county and understand the distinguishing characteristics of that neighborhood. Because the NIR is customizable, you can define your neighborhood as a certain drive time, or a radius or some other metric that makes sense to you. And then you can dig in to find the distinguishing characteristics that define that neighborhood. What kind of people live there? What race is predominant? What age is predominant? Are there families with children or more retired people in your neighborhood? What kind of work do people do? And what kind of housing is available? What strengths support this population and what risk factors are present?

All of this information and more interactive data points help congregations like yours see neighbor as more than a term that means someone in proximity but rather someone to whom we are called to show God’s love. Interested in seeing the distinguishing characteristics of your neighborhood? Reach out to us at info@faithx.net