The Power of Partnership

How It Started

In 2005, the Mira Vista UCC congregation sold its large campus on Cutting Blvd., invested the proceeds, and began renting space from Christ Lutheran Church on Ashbury Ave. While “camping” with the Lutherans, the congregation solidified its identity as a community of believers and deepened their spiritual practice together. One previous student has even described Mira Vista, now known as The Good Table, as being somewhat “monastic” in their commitments to shared meals, contemplative practice, and serious spiritual inquiry.

As spirit-filled contemplatives, the congregation does a great job of “being” church right here and now, but does struggle with how to share this bounty more effectively so as to ensure a sustainable future. Therefore, the congregation called Rev. Dr. Melinda V. McLain in Fall 2014 with the express purpose of discerning and implementing a new, sustainable model of ministry. Since then, McLain and the congregation have come to understand that the congregation’s three passions: food, justice, and the arts could be well-lived out by becoming a café church.

In Spring of 2016, the congregation participated in the New Business Law Practicum at U.C. Berkley’s Boalt Hall and learned how to be a non-profit running a business. Over the summer of 2015, a draft business plan for The Good Table came into being that envisions a pay-what-you-can and pay-it-forward cafe/coffeeshop, local food and crafts marketplace, and gathering space for spiritual celebrations, educational events, pay-what-you-can yoga and a venue for live music.

In 2018, the church learned that the wonderful Adachi nursery has been sold to a developer to become a gas station. Sensing an opportunity, the congregation tried to buy the property, but the owner wanted too much money. Meanwhile, Planting Justice had also been talking with the owner of the property about the possibility of opening a retail tree and plant nursery. On September 11, 2018, Melinda V. McLain and Colleen Rodger met with Gavin Raders of Planting Justice and by April 2019, the two nonprofits had created The Good Table LLC and purchased the Adachi site, saving the historic 1966 building by local architects Shigamura Komatsu and Donald Harding from destruction and with plans to create fantastic new way of serving the community.

The plan will seek to develop a triple bottom-line of financial sustainability, social service benefits, and spiritual development. Our vision will also include an organic tree and plant nursery and weekly Farmer’s Market operated by Planting Justice at the site of the former Adachi nursery in El Sobrante. Come join us on this great journey! We plan to open in mid- 2024!