Hosted on Discord, Zao's Digital Commons is the online equivalent of our church building - it's designed to be a space that is both sacred and accessible, combining the intention of a spiritual home with the rhythms and joy of a community-building common space.

By joining the discord server, you enter more deeply into the Zao Church Collective community. There you can introduce yourself to other community members, join our discussion spaces, participate in meetups and activities, take part in our spiritual reflection conversations, and fully engage the life of the community - moving from viewer to true participant in church life, all online.

Still, we hope that you don't stop there. From the Zao Digital Commons, you can find or start a local, weekly, IRL church gathering, called a Zao Harbor.

At Zao, our Harbors are the site of weekly worship, transformational discipleship, and intentional relationships. Harbors are hosted in local living rooms, where groups gather in person on a weekly basis around the elements of worship: music, scripture, sermons, ritual, and collective prayer. Drawing on the rich history of house churches, these gatherings allow our community members to go deeper than most Sunday morning gatherings by also allowing space for discussion, personal connection, sharing of meals, and more.

Local harbors bring the shared values, resources, and identity of the whole Zao Church Collective to their specific communities. The work of justice, mutual aid, volunteering and more are contextualized by the locality of each harbor and the gifts each member brings. Even the format of worship may change depending on who is there and what needs arise. In this way, each local harbor is unique and creative, expressing one aspect of our shared community across the whole collective.

Harbors can collaborate with one another intentionally to take on shared justice projects, children's ministry initiatives, creative endeavors, and more. For those harbors that are geographically close, they can even arrange multi-harbor meet-ups!

For those living in places where there is not yet a harbor gathering, there are two ways to go deeper. The first is to consider starting one! Work with the Zao pastors and nearby harbor leaders to start a new gathering, wherever you are. Another option is to join a virtual harbor - particiapting in worship with the same cohort of people, still collaborating and building intentional relationship, just online and across distance.