In a quiet sweep across the United States, small community groups are tackling loneliness one neighborhood at a time.
Social Isolation in America
By many measures, Americans are socially disconnected at historic levels. They join civic groups, clubs and unions at lower rates than in previous generations. Recent polling shows that membership rates in religious congregations are around the lowest in nearly a century. Americans have fewer close friends, trust each other less, and spend less time in shared public places like coffee shops and parks. About one in six adults feels lonely all or most of the time, and the same is true for about one in four young adults.
Former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy told The Associated Press that “We need to build a movement centered around connection.” He added, “The good news is that that movement is already starting to build. … What we have to do now is accelerate that movement.” In 2023 he issued a report on an “epidemic of loneliness and isolation,” noting that social isolation and loneliness are independent risk factors for cardiovascular disease, dementia, depression and premature mortality.
Building Connections in Akron
Murthy recently met with groups working toward community repair in Akron, Ohio, as part of his new Together Project, supported by the Knight Foundation. Leaders of the Well Community Development Corp. described fostering affordable housing and small businesses in a marginalized neighborhood while cultivating social gatherings at the local elementary school or a coffee shop launched in the former church that houses its offices. Families have resumed trick-or-treating after years of largely dormant Halloweens.
Zac Kohl, executive director of The Well, said, “Those types of things make a big difference.” He added, “It’s not just a safe, dry roof over your head. It’s the personal connections.” Across town, Erin Myers, director of real estate development for the Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority, explained that the Summit Lake nature center draws joggers, fishers, boaters and grillers. The lakefront adjoins a public housing development and a recreational trail, and “It’s strategically located to try to get people in the space to talk and interact with one another,” she said. Murthy praised the effort, saying, “I love that you’ve worked on creating spaces where people can gather and connecting them with nature.”
Baltimore’s Backyard Economy
On an October afternoon on Baltimore’s outskirts, neighbors set out trays of vegan jambalaya, beet salad, fresh-roasted goat meat and more. A rooster crowed from a nearby backyard. Before the neighborhood feast, dozens of visitors gathered for a walking tour. Ulysses Archie described how this short block of Collins Avenue became a hub of backyard farming, environmental cleanup and neighborly connection. Visitors saw hens and rabbits raised by neighbors and explored a “Peace Park” created from an abandoned lot, which now hosts food distributions and summer camps for neighborhood kids.
“The core of what we do is building relationships, and building relationships with nature,” Archie said. Neighbors described helping to clear overgrowth and create footpaths in an adjacent urban forest. They described their “intentional” community- not a formal program, but a commitment to caring for each other and the wider community, sharing anything from potlucks to rides to child care.
Michael Sarbanes and his late wife, Jill Wrigley, moved to the neighborhood three decades ago and spent long hours of youth mentoring and other services. “We were burning out,” Sarbanes recalled. They recognized, “We need to be doing this in community.” They reached out to other families involved in social justice work. Some belong to a local Catholic Worker group, others are Protestants, Muslims, or have no religion, “but believing we are responsible for each other,” said resident Suzanne Fontanesi.
Participants include Ulysses and Chrysalinn Archie, who founded the Baltimore Gift Economy, a small nonprofit. Years earlier, Ulysses Archie suffered an injury that left him struggling financially and in spirit. “I put my hands in the soil, and my life was kind of normal again,” he said, explaining how the healing work inspired the backyard farming. With the Baltimore Gift Economy, they’re seeking a more personal approach. A couple times a week, for example, they place food donated by nearby organic stores at the Peace Park. Participants take what suits their diet and needs. The food isn’t labeled “free.” “Free is really transactional,” Archie said. “When we present it as a gift, it’s really relational.” The group encourages recipients “to realize that they have something to give.”
Myk Lewis, 56, who returned to Baltimore after years in California, tends chickens and rabbits in his backyard. Neighbors support him as he cares for his aging mother. “I probably wouldn’t have been able to move back and start my life over if it wasn’t for them,” he said.
Kentucky’s Beef Bash
On another October day in the small Kentucky town of New Castle, a guitarist played folk-rock classics as patrons lined up beneath a tent pavilion. Area chefs served smoked brisket with salsa, beef Wellington bites, Thai beef salad and other specialties. But this “Beef Bash” was about much more than beef. Its sponsor, a cooperative of local farmers who raise grass-fed cattle, coordinates the processing and marketing of their beef to area restaurants and individuals. The program aims to provide a dependable income-helping small farmers stay on the farm and, in turn, strengthening rural communities.
“With just a little help, people and land can heal,” said Mary Berry, executive director of the Berry Center of New Castle, which launched the cooperative. The cooperative adapts methods from a former tobacco quota system that provided some stability for small farmers. After that program’s demise in 2004, “people lost what they held in common, which was an agricultural economy and calendar,” Berry said. “We also needed each other.” The surrounding community remains rural, but less tight-knit, she said, as many commute elsewhere or farm at a larger scale.
The center promotes the agrarian principles of her father, the novelist and essayist Wendell Berry. At the end of the Beef Bash, farmers cheerfully gathered for a group photo, trading stories of tractor mishaps and midnight calving. “If we keep our farms going, we’re all winning,” said one farmer, Ashley Pyles. Another, Kylen Douglas, underscored the effects of strained social bonds. “Everything’s so digital, and everything’s with the phone,” Douglas said. “We’re disconnected not only from where our food comes from, but just the center of life. Fewer people are going to church. Rural communities are having a hard time.” “Stronger farms can strengthen these communities,” he said. “Everybody should be able to have the opportunity to live here.”
Pittsburgh’s Neighborhood Resilience Project
On a recent weekday at the Neighborhood Resilience Project in Pittsburgh, some residents were upstairs training for a project to get more people qualified to perform CPR in marginalized neighborhoods. Downstairs, amid the fragrant incense of St. Moses the Black Orthodox Church, worshippers were concluding a prayer liturgy. Afterward, they set out folding tables for a light meal of soup, hummus and conversation. The parish is closely fused with the Neighborhood Resilience Project, an Orthodox social service agency. They share a modest brick building in Pittsburgh’s Hill District, a historically Black neighborhood just blocks from downtown but a world away-long suffering from crime, gun violence, racism and displacement.
The project’s mission is “trauma-informed community development.” It hosts a food pantry and free health clinic. It deploys community health deputies and provides emotional support at violent crime scenes. “In our work, community building is absolutely the core intervention,” said the Rev. Paul Abernathy, its founder and CEO. “Social isolation ‘is no longer simply the experience of marginalized communities,’ he observed. ‘Now it seems as though the infection of isolation has spread across society.'”
The center serves people regardless of faith. Not everyone on staff belongs to the church, though the church is attracting members. “It felt like real community, and people my age who want to actually do some things and not just talk about doing something,” said Cecelia Olson, a recent college graduate. Fidelia Gaba, a University of Pittsburgh medical student who grew up in another church tradition, recently was confirmed at St. Moses. One Sunday, she felt emotionally distanced and couldn’t even sing. “I remember being carried by the church,” she said. “What was broken in me was healed.”
Project workers are reaching the isolated. Kim Lowe, a community health deputy, helps residents get to a food bank, address a child’s conflict at school, “whatever the need is,” she said. One recent afternoon, Lowe visited Tricia Berger in the small apartment she shares with her daughter and grandson. Berger said she has multiple sclerosis and struggles with depression and anxiety. Lowe provides practical help, and the two enjoy conversing and watching comedy routines. “We connect well, with common interests, as well as her helping me get beyond my loneliness and conquering my fear,” Berger said.
“For Abernathy, such efforts exemplify community healing,” said the Rev. Paul Abernathy. “It has to be healed person by person, relationship by relationship, block by block,” he said. “Honestly, neighborhood by neighborhood, it can be healed.”
Key Takeaways
- Small groups across the U.S. are actively rebuilding social connection through local projects.
- Initiatives range from affordable housing and backyard farming to cooperative farming and trauma-informed community services.
- These efforts demonstrate that personal relationships and shared spaces can counter rising loneliness and improve community resilience.
The story, contributed by AP videojournalist Jessie Wardarski, highlights how grassroots collaboration can address the nation’s growing isolation. Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
