I spoke of a longing for a “Community of Hope” a couple days ago. And I always return to the Church that has made such an impression on me over the past 29 years (I remember the years becuase I was 20 when I first read the stories written of their journey (writings by Elizabeth O’Connor, a gifted writer). Their concept of Church and life together in that Church is a testimony to what is missing in nearly every other Church I have encountered. That is a commitment to each other in the quest for the discovery of gifts, the sensing of call that joins gift and need in the world, and the Church as “corporate body” that is the enabler of this; the incubator from which mission springs forth.

Alas, and sadly, this is FAR FAR from the typical Church experience, which is so dominated by “events”, and real life issues are afraid to be approached in such a heavily charged political environment, where people make associations that tned toward polarizing opinion; one is a “liberal” or one is a “conservative”. Various Biblical themes are associated with liberal movements, and “values” , as Jim Wallis bemoans (and rightly so), have become so narrowly defined. “MOney” has fallen off the radar of the Moral issues, as if that is none of the Church’s business, and yet it so rules so many lives, and drives many to abuse others in order to gain advantage in how much of it they have. And this happens with nations as well, and I find myself lacking a community where I know that Nations and Money and Justice and gifts and call are constantly on the table, for they all deal with the stuff of life: they influence choices, determine emphasis and priorities, and lead us down paths that pull us toward darkness or else awaken us to something more real.

Where is this community? Where is the Church today? I’m so detached, becasue I’m not ATTACHED to a community such that it becomes my resource and my birthing into new calls. I work for a Church-related agency, and that is a small comfort that I am a piece in something larger, and good things are being done. But I long for my specific sense of call to online community and its advancement in the Church to become something more center stage, and to have a leadership role in that; part developer, part dreamer, part strategizer. Those various roles would mean something very exciting for me. And if there’s a lot of people out there like me, with concerns and fears and passion about things and need a place to be heard and to meet with others who share some of this, we could all findsomethign very neeeded in this. And so the CHURCH MUST BE THERE. And sooner rather than later.

It may also help us dream together more effectively (by adding to the ways in which we can make contact and talk and listen) about the shape the Church should be taking, and how to determine to what we as a people are being called.