Learning Objectives

The IMP Certificate Program connects personal development, an understanding of community systems, and the practice of shared leadership.

Each term builds on the learning before it. The objectives below describe the understanding and practical capacities participants will work toward through study, reflection, dialogue, and application.

Term 1: Foundations of Integral Ministry Practice

By the end of Term 1, participants will work toward being able to:

  • Describe the characteristics of Teal and Second-Tier organizations, including their approaches to purpose, leadership, and participation.

  • Explain how IMP supports the development of these characteristics in spiritual community.

  • Identify leadership capacities that support evolutionary change.

  • Recognize patterns that can hinder personal and community development.

  • Distinguish problems that can be resolved from ongoing tensions, or polarities, that require continued attention.

  • Identify meaningful indicators of personal transformation and the community’s contribution to the world.

  • Explain how Conscious Living Circles and Conscious Leadership Circles support development.

  • Facilitate the Quantum Living Process with teams.

  • Explain how Evolutionary Purpose, the Quantum Living Process, and the circles work together within IMP.

Term 2: Awakening the Beloved Community

By the end of Term 2, participants will work toward being able to:

  • Identify the capacities and practices of conscious leadership.

  • Recognize patterns that hinder cultural and developmental change.

  • Evaluate how a community’s welcoming practices support connection and participation.

  • Apply practices that address gaps in community systems.

  • Facilitate the Genogram Activity to explore the ministry’s history and recurring patterns.

  • Explain and apply the principles of the Spiritual Cooperative.

  • Describe the qualities of the Beloved Community.

  • Implement an Integral Membership System.

  • Identify key elements of Spiritual Intelligence (SQ).

Term 3: Integrating Practice and Leadership

By the end of Term 3, participants will work toward being able to:

  • Formulate questions that connect the Living Curriculum with the community’s experience.

  • Explain how elements of the IMP curriculum support cultural development.

  • Facilitate guided meditation as a whole-body practice.

  • Describe the purpose and elements of the Evolutionary Council.

  • Describe developmental stages of ministry.

  • Align job descriptions with IMP principles and practices.

  • Identify the elements of the Integral Employee Review Process.

  • Identify the three Faces of God.

  • Describe the elements involved in creating a Sacred Service Ministry.

  • Explain the distinction between Sacred Service and volunteerism.

  • Identify the competencies of an Integral Ministry Practitioner.

View Curriculum and Themes

Term 1 — Required Texts

  • Reinventing Organizations (illustrated version) — Frederic Laloux

  • Weird Church — Beth Ann Estock and Paul Nixon

  • A Theory of Everything — Ken Wilber

  • The Emerging Church — Bruce Sanguin

  • Integral Ministry Practice: A New Architecture for Spiritual Community — Gary Simmons

Term 2 — Required Texts

  • Being the Beloved Community — Jim Lockard

  • SQ21: The Twenty-One Skills of Spiritual Intelligence — Cindy Wigglesworth

  • The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership — Jim Dethmer, Diana Chapman, and Kaley Warner Klemp

  • Integral Ministry Practice: A New Architecture for Spiritual Community — Gary Simmons

Term 3 — Required Texts

  • Radical Wholeness — Philip Shepherd

  • Integral Christianity — Paul Smith

  • What’s in the Way Is the Way — Mary O’Malley

  • The Abundance Project — Derek Rydall

  • Integral Ministry Practice: A New Architecture for Spiritual Community — Gary Simmons