The Hub: Koinonia

By Elliot Cavale:

“The communities that are thriving are ones who are disciplined about being in the world”

– Tim Otto (Church of the Sojourners, San Francisco)

“If you love the vision you have for community, you will destroy community. If you love the people around you, you will create community”

– Dietrich Bonheoffer (from his book Life Together)

Community has played an immensely significant role in my life and faith in the last four years or so. I have had opportunities to experience community in different forms: to live it, to see it, to love it, to fail at it, and to learn from it. Now it is something I have grown to rely on. It is an essential aspect of my faith.

            As one reads scripture it can be seen throughout that it is about God forming a people.  There are numerous examples starting in Genesis through the New Testament that illustrate this. In the Gospel of John, for example, Jesus’ last prayer on earth is for all believers: “that all of them may be one” and “that they may be brought to complete unity” (John 17:20-26). Jesus’ final adjuration before being crucified was for community: oneness and unity among believers. I say all that to provide a glimpse of the immeasurable importance of community in our lives as Christ’s disciples. What can/should community look like in our own lives? And how can it be played out? There are several answers to those each unique to one’s own circumstances. In our experience in the Hub, community has emerged in a number of ways.

            Mother Teresa was once quoted as saying, “if you judge people you have no time to love them”. I believe this is a good foundation for what community should look like and how community has grown for us in the Hub. We have found that the basis for the growth of community begins with replacing judgments, preconceptions, and differences with love. Perceiving someone with love is seeing them as made in God’s image; loved and valued equally by Him. It is not seeing them as their race, socio-economic status, or differences. We have to move beyond those barriers we put between us and them. This can and should be applied to your neighbor down the hall as well as next-door.

            My roommate Raul and I, for example, come from completely different backgrounds. He is Hispanic and I am white. His Mexican culture has influenced who he is, contrasting with my upper middle class white suburban upbringing. These differences come out in a number of ways: in our interests, how we interact with others, deal with conflict, handle finances and even how we approach modesty. Based on our respective backgrounds, society tells us that our relationship as roommates/friends can only achieve so much and go so far. But what if I view Raul as a brother in Christ, God’s child, an additional perspective that strengthens the whole instead of a contrasting one that diminishes it? How far could our friendship go then? When you view another person this way everything changes. It is then that one can move toward reconciliation.

            In the Hub, we try to cultivate community growth through sharing our lives together. We eat together, pray together, worship together and minister together. Sharing and embracing our differences instead of hiding or ignoring them allows us to go much deeper. If there are differences, instead of letting them irritate us or make us uncomfortable to a point of conflict (which is sometimes very necessary to most past differences) we address them, discuss why we are like we are through sharing our stories. When you get to know the person behind the differences and understand what influences their dissimilarities, true community begins to form.

The other night, one of our normal group meetings moved from a discussion about the church and its influences in our lives to a time of sharing of how we can be a better/deeper/more meaningful “church” or “community” within ourselves and eventually ended with an unintentional time of affirmation and vulnerable truthfulness that turned out to be so intentional. It took us first being ok with vulnerability and candid honesty to be able to open up share with each other how we can be better loved.

            This reconciliation can also be achieved with those outside of our apartments, those living right next-door. That same night right in the middle of our time of sharing there was a knock on the door. Our neighbor Diane was standing there out of breath and in pain. She was trying to move out of her apartment to another apartment down the way and had no help and her knees were giving out. Out of the relationships some of us had formed with her and her children and grandchildren she was led to our door to ask for help. Without hesitation we all stood and offered whatever assistance she needed of us. We were able to help her moved a significant portion of her apartment in less than an hour. This led to an open invitation from both sides to come by whenever and for whatever reason. We made ourselves available to her and she to us. That is community. That is reconciliation. Our group, which is made up of three white guys, two Filipino guys, a Mexican guy and one multiethnic guy was able to be approached by and share our time with an African American family.