Indivisible RuCo Coalition Introduction Guide

If you’re new here, one of the first things you’ll probably notice is that there are several different organizations, projects, committees, and community efforts all sharing space, volunteers, and resources. We know that can seem confusing at first, especially if you're new to grassroots organizing, so this guide exists to explain who we are, how we relate to one another, and why we organize this way.

What Is a Coalition?

Indivisible RuCo is a coalition. That means that it's not a single organization acting alone, but rather a collaborative network of people, groups, volunteers, and projects that share enough common goals to work together cooperatively. Importantly, coalitions allow organizations to pool volunteers, skills, resources, infrastructure, communication, meeting space, institutional knowledge, and community relationships instead of every group trying to independently build and maintain everything alone.

Coalitions are also about sustainability. Community organizing can become exhausting very quickly when people are expected to attend endless meetings, follow disconnected communication channels, and juggle multiple separate organizations with overlapping goals. Civic exhaustion and burnout are real and we're living through some truly challenging times. Shared infrastructure helps make long-term participation more manageable and humane.

Why Do We Share Meetings?

Honestly? Because nobody wants to attend ten different meetings every month. Many of the people involved in these groups already volunteer across multiple organizations and projects simultaneously, and our goals overlap heavily enough that separate meetings would often duplicate the same conversations repeatedly. By sharing meetings, we reduce volunteer fatigue, scheduling overload, communication fragmentation, organizational duplication, civic burnout, and create a stronger collaborative environment where information, resources, and relationships can flow naturally between groups.

Why Do We Have Shared Social Media?

Because people shouldn't have to follow a dozen separate pages just to know what’s happening in their own community. Our collaborative communication structure allows people to find civic engagement opportunities, educational programming, mutual aid efforts, community events, advocacy work

volunteer opportunities, and local organizing information in one shared ecosystem instead of scattered across disconnected platforms. This also helps smaller organizations with limited reach still connect to the broader community.

Why Aren't These All Just One Organization?

Because the work itself is not all the same kind of work. Different organizations have different legal limitations and governance structures, neverminding disparate missions, responsibilities, funding requirements, and organizational cultures. Trying to force all community work into one single organization would actually make many kinds of work harder or, in some instances, legally inappropriate. The overlap between these groups is intentional—but the distinctions matter too.

What Is The Coven of Leaves?

The Coven of Leaves is a federally recognized 501(c)(3) religious nonprofit founded in Rutherford County in 2015. Its work includes:

• Clergy services such as Rites of passage, particularly serving underserved communities

• Religious education, seminary, and ordination

• Free Pastoral Counseling for the community

• Mutual aid, Community care, Community resource programs, and Resilience-building

When it was founded, the organization intentionally stayed away from direct partisan political activity, though civic engagement and community advocacy naturally intersected with its work. The organization is governed by a board, while its day-to-day religious and organizational leadership is led by its clergy— in this case, High Priestex Mortellus. Would you like more information? Visit here!

What Is Indivisible Rutherford NC?

Indivisible Rutherford NC is a local chapter of the national Indivisible movement, which is itself a 501(c)(3) civic organization with its own mission, structure, goals, and organizational rules, and local chapters generally operate within that broader framework while remaining locally organized and community-driven. The Indivisible Rutherford NC chapter focuses on grassroots civic engagement, public accountability, voter participation, advocacy and education, local government involvement, democratic participation, and community organizing. The local chapter was founded by Mortellus, but it operates as a decentralized grassroots organization rather than a top-down hierarchy. Leadership, labor, organizing, and decision-making are shared among participating volunteers and members in accordance with requirements set by Indivisible on the state and national level. Would you like to join? Sign up here!

What Is The Interfaith Caucus of Rutherford County?

The Interfaith Caucus of Rutherford County is a county-level interfaith collaboration organization connected to a broader state caucus structure that is formally recognized by The North Carolina Democratic Party. The caucus was formed because many people recognized that certain groups—especially religious minorities, marginalized identities, queer people, Pagans, and people outside dominant cultural norm—were often excluded or overlooked within local civic and political spaces. The caucus exists to encourage religious pluralism, build interfaith relationships, reduce fear and misinformation, promote inclusion, advocate for marginalized communities, and ensure broader representation in civic spaces. The caucus helped create a formal avenue for advocacy within local political structures and has also supported efforts involving precinct organization, civic participation, and community outreach. The organization is governed by an executive board that participates in shared leadership and collaborative decision-making. Would you like to join? Sign up here!

What Is a Precinct?

A precinct is the most local level of political organization and they connect neighborhoods directly to civic and political infrastructure. Strong precinct organization helps increase local participation and build neighborhood relationships, while at the same time improving voter outreach, strengthening civic communication, and creating local leadership pathways. We've also recently begun collaborative work with Precinct 34 (Union), which shares a geographic footprint with The Coven of Leaves and benefits from shared meeting space, infrastructure, and community resources. If you're in the Union precinct and would like more information, visit here!

Are These The Only Groups Involved?

Nope! While not every organization is a formal coalition partner, we regularly collaborate, share volunteers, exchange knowledge, and support overlapping work with many other local organizations and initiatives. That includes organizations and projects like: Rutherford Connect, NAMI, the Rutherford Long Term Recovery Group, and many others depending on community needs and ongoing projects. In a rural county especially, community work often functions less like isolated silos and more like overlapping networks of people helping where they can.

Who’s “In Charge” Of These Groups?

Each organization has a different structure. The Coven of Leaves has a governing board and clergy leadership, The Interfaith Caucus of Rutherford County has an executive board and shared governance, Indivisible Rutherford NC operates as a decentralized grassroots organization centered on volunteer participation and democratic collaboration, and Precinct 34? They're a structure of the Democratic Party and have their own executive board and shared governance.

You will often see High Priestex Mortellus involved across many of these spaces, and part of why their name appears frequently across different spaces is simply because many local grassroots efforts rely on a relatively small number of highly active volunteers wearing multiple hats simultaneously. You might additionally encounter Mortellus through other local community and media work, as in addition to their organizational involvement with the Indivisible RuCo Coalition, they're the founder and editor of the local satire zine It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way, participate in investigative journalism and public commentary, occasionally contribute writing to the coalition blog, and regularly engage in public speaking and educational work.

Why Is The Coalition Called “Indivisible RuCo”?

Admittedly, that part is a little confusing! The name originally emerged from the early organizing work surrounding Indivisible Rutherford NC, and over time became the shorthand people used for the broader collaborative ecosystem that developed around it. By the time the coalition had evolved into a larger interconnected network of organizations and volunteers, the name was already attached to websites, printed materials, flyers, social media, event branding, and community recognition. At some point, names stop being perfectly precise organizational labels and simply become what people recognize.

That does create occasional confusion—especially since the URL for Indivisible Rutherford NC is "IndivisibleRuCo" while “Indivisible RuCo” is also commonly used to refer to the broader coalition ecosystem itself. At this point though? The overlap is largely historical and practical, and changing it would create even more confusion, rather than less.

Grassroots organizing in real life is often messy, incremental, and organic rather than perfectly engineered from the beginning.

Final Thought

At the end of the day, community itself is a form of resistance. In a time when people are increasingly isolated, exhausted, divided, and pushed away from one another, choosing to build relationships, share resources, support neighbors, and work together across different backgrounds and organizations matters. We aren't stronger because we're identical—we're stronger because we refuse to stand alone.

And ultimately? That’s what this coalition is about.