Community Covenant

Section 1: The Nature of the Covenant

Membership in Thronos is more than access to an organization or platform.

It is an agreement to participate in a community of people who seek to grow, build, serve, and help one another.

By joining Thronos, a member agrees to uphold the character and purposes of the organization and to contribute, according to their ability, to the health of the community.

This covenant does not require every member to possess the same abilities, beliefs about every matter, interests, or ambitions.

It requires a shared commitment to the principles upon which Thronos is founded.

Section 2: We Will Help and Be Helped

Members of Thronos agree to be willing both to give help and to receive help.

No member is expected to know everything, possess every skill, or solve every problem alone.

A member may ask for knowledge, advice, encouragement, collaboration, accountability, or other forms of assistance appropriate to the community.

Likewise, members are encouraged to offer what they can when another person is in need.

The purpose is not to create dependency, but mutual growth.

A person may enter the community needing help and, through growth and experience, eventually become someone capable of helping others.

We therefore reject the posture of the permanent observer: someone who continually receives from the community while refusing every reasonable opportunity to contribute to it.

Section 3: We Will Treat One Another With Dignity

Members agree to treat one another with dignity, patience, honesty, and love.

We recognize that people will differ in personality, experience, ability, background, profession, age, ambition, and stage of life.

These differences are not obstacles to community.

Members should therefore seek to encourage rather than humiliate, correct rather than condemn, and disagree without treating disagreement as permission for contempt.

The Christian character of Thronos requires that the dignity of another person not depend upon their usefulness to us.

Section 4: We Will Pursue What Is Worthwhile

Thronos exists to help people pursue worthwhile purposes.

Members therefore agree to use the community in ways consistent with that purpose.

Projects, discussions, and other substantial activities hosted within Thronos should seek some meaningful connection to real life and should not be built merely around attention, vanity, status, or the pursuit of influence for its own sake.

Not every worthwhile undertaking must be large.

A project may concern a person's family, education, profession, business, spiritual development, neighbourhood, craft, or community.

What matters is that it represents a genuine attempt to learn, build, improve, serve, create, or otherwise contribute something worthwhile.

Section 5: We Will Exercise Responsibility

Members remain responsible for the things they undertake.

Thronos may provide community, knowledge, relationships, resources, guidance, and accountability, but it cannot assume responsibility for every decision or outcome of its members.

A member should therefore exercise reasonable judgment before beginning an undertaking and should take responsibility for its consequences.

Thronos does not guarantee the success of a Project, nor does membership constitute an endorsement by Thronos of every action taken by an individual member.

Section 6: We Will Be Honest About Reality

Members agree to pursue truth rather than merely confirmation.

We encourage people to present their ideas honestly, acknowledge uncertainty, accept correction, and examine evidence.

A member should not deliberately misrepresent their work, abilities, results, intentions, or circumstances in order to obtain support, recognition, or influence.

The community should be a place where a person can say:

“I don't know.”

“I was wrong.”

“This didn't work.”

“I need help.”

and still remain a valued member of the community.

Section 7: We Will Respect the Christian Foundation

Thronos is founded upon the Christian faith and its community is therefore governed by the Christian foundation established in this Constitution.

Members are not required to pretend to have perfect understanding, perfect faith, or perfect conduct.

They are, however, expected to respect the Christian character of the organization and to refrain from deliberately using Thronos to promote purposes fundamentally opposed to its stated Christian foundation.

Projects or activities whose purposes are incompatible with the Biblical worldview of Thronos may be rejected or removed according to the organization's established procedures.

Section 8: We Will Care for the Community

Every member has some responsibility for the condition of the community.

Members are encouraged to report serious misconduct, harmful activity, abuse, or projects that appear to violate the purposes or standards of Thronos.

Reporting is not an invitation to vigilantism, harassment, or personal retaliation.

Concerns should be brought through the appropriate channels so that they can be examined fairly and responsibly.

Thronos will seek to protect the community without creating a culture of suspicion in which members are afraid to make mistakes or ask difficult questions.

Section 9: We Will Not Turn Community Into Transaction

Thronos is not a crowdfunding platform.

Membership does not create an entitlement to financial support from other members.

Members therefore agree not to use the Thronos community to pressure, manipulate, or repeatedly solicit fellow members for money.

This does not prevent members from voluntarily helping one another outside the obligations of Thronos.

Where members independently choose to support one another, such assistance remains their own voluntary decision and does not create an obligation upon Thronos or its membership.

Section 10: We Will Not Use People

The relationships of The Third Place are not merely instruments for advancement.

Members should not treat every person they meet as a potential customer, investor, employer, employee, connection, audience, or source of opportunity.

Business relationships and collaboration are welcome where appropriate.

But friendship should be allowed to remain friendship.

Conversation should be allowed to remain conversation.

Hospitality should be allowed to remain hospitality.

A community becomes impoverished when every relationship is reduced to what one person can obtain from another.

The Third Place should therefore remain a place where people are valued as people.

Section 11: We Will Contribute to the Culture We Desire

The culture of Thronos will be shaped by the people who participate in it.

Members therefore agree, insofar as they are able, to contribute to the kind of community they wish to inhabit.

If we desire generosity, we should be generous.

If we desire thoughtful conversation, we should think carefully.

If we desire honesty, we should speak honestly.

If we desire people willing to help, we should become people willing to help.

If we desire a community where people can rest and simply be, we should make room for people who have nothing to prove.

If we desire a community shaped by the way of Jesus, we must seek to embody His way in our relationships with one another.

Section 12: When We Fail

This covenant is not a declaration that members will never fail.

They will.

People will misunderstand one another.

They will make poor decisions.

They will speak carelessly.

They will sometimes fail to fulfil their commitments.

They will sometimes act contrary to the values they profess.

The existence of failure does not invalidate the covenant.

When failure occurs, we seek truth, repentance where appropriate, reconciliation where possible, correction, and restoration.

At the same time, forgiveness does not mean that harmful behaviour must be tolerated indefinitely. Serious or persistent violations may require appropriate action under the governance and disciplinary provisions of Thronos.

Section 13: Our Commitment

By joining Thronos, a member agrees to enter this community in good faith.

They agree to:

Be willing to help. Be willing to be helped. Treat people with dignity. Pursue worthwhile things. Take responsibility. Tell the truth. Respect the Christian foundation of Thronos. Care for the community. Refuse to turn community into exploitation or transaction. And contribute to the culture they wish to inhabit.

This is the covenant of The Third Place.

We do not enter it because we expect perfect people.

We enter it because we believe people can grow, and that they can become better together than they would have become alone.