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More recently, people of faith have turned their attention to community investing. In community investing, people can invest in nonprofits or small businesses that are working directly with the poor to provide affordable housing, health services and day-care centers.

"Community investing is the fastest-growing part of social investments as a whole," said Andy Loving, a Baptist minister in Louisville, Ky. who now serves as a financial advisor specializing in socially responsible investing.

Finding a way

Locally, Self Help is the most popular investment option, followed by the Latino Community Credit Union and Generations Community Credit Union, which serves the African-American community.

Nationally, there's ShoreBank and the Calvert Foundation -- financial institutions that use investor deposits to fund loans for disadvantaged communities, mostly in the United States. Internationally, Oikocredit does the same thing for communities in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

While some of these institutions, such as Durham's Self Help, offer market rate investment returns, others are slightly below comparable commercial banks.

Kristin Posson, a stay-at-home mother of two who attended last week's seminar on Sabbath Economics, said she has been speaking to her husband about how to take it further.

"Like many folks, I wasn't interested in economic things," said Posson, a Methodist who lives in Cary. "It opened my eyes to reading Scripture in the cultural context of being just and fair, as God is just and fair."

Although she hasn't acted yet, Posson said she has some ideas.

"If we get out of our greedy accumulative culture and get back to the important things -- human beings -- the vision of enough for everyone is really beautiful and right."

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