pat loughery

I’m reading “Community and Growth” (Jean Vanier), which I’m convinced should be required reading for all of us who think and talk about Christian community (alongside “Life Together” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)).

Vanier’s book is written from his experience with L’Arche communities, residential homes with people who have developmental disabilities. His book is a sledgehammer: it is a collection of thoughts that don’t live in the clouds, but that are born out of the hard work of actual, real, experience.

I have a deep respect for intentional communities, and as much as I would love to live in community, I don’t know that it’s in my path. However, I think that the wisdom of those who live in community is among the best-grown wisdom about how people are formed and shaped.

Vanier writes specifically about residential communities.

When I use the word ‘community’ in this book, I am talking essentially of groupings of people who have left their own milieu to live with others under the same roof, and work from a new vision of human beings and their relationships with each other and with God. So my definition is a restricted one. others would see ‘community’ as something wider. (p. 10)

However, he recognizes that community can be broader than his definition.

This book is above all for those who live, orwant to live, in community. But many of its points apply equally to family life. The two essential elements in life in commnity are also part of life in a family: inter-personal relationship, a sense of belonging and an orientation of life to a common goal and common witness. In the same way, much of the book applies to people who, although they do not live together, are deeply bound to each otehr and meet regularly in small communities to share about themselves and their ideal, to pray and to find mutual support and encouragment, and to be witnesses of love and hope in this world. (p. 10)

Communities in Vanier’s opinion exist for the purpose of becoming fully human in relationship with others. They are bound by a common purpose, a common identity, and a zeal for the work of God in the community and in the individuals.

The zeal felt by community members is good, and it also must be led well.

Communities must be led with wisdom. Young people need help in order to integrate the vision into their own hearts and minds and to develop their own inner freedom and choices, learning little by little to be led inwardly by love, rather than from the outside, by rigid laws. They must be led to true community where they can become men and women of prayer and compassion, open to others and to the world, particularly to the poor, the oppressed, the lost, and the vulnerable, and thus become artisans of peace. (p.5)