Intentional Community

An Epilogue to the Epilogue of Mystics and Misfits

Matthew and our daughter feeding the chickens on the farm

For eight years, my family and I lived in a Christian intentional community on a farm.

The first few years in community, we plowed through with happy idealism, growing and eating organic food, relishing the closeness to the land and our neighbors, raising our babies, eating together, worshipping in a different way, sharing our lives in close proximity.

If you’ve read Mystics and Misfits, you know that our last few years in community were increasingly full of challenge, strife, and pain. Before we left, we helped close the community down. And when we pulled out of the driveway for the last time with our U-haul, I was relieved to be leaving it behind.

That was five years ago.

This past weekend I had, what felt like, an Epilogue to the Epilogue of Mystics and Misfits.

Let me explain. My family and I spent the weekend at a gathering of intentional communities, many of whom had been in our network of communities for those eight years on the farm.¹ We reconnected with old friends and met new ones.

The gathering included communities from Mexico, from inner city Chicago, from Texas, New York State, Georgia, Illinois, and more. Our sessions were translated into Spanish and I enjoyed one particular panel in which two white women and two Hispanic men told stories of the challenges and joys of cross-cultural community. The women spoke in Spanish and the men translated for them in English. It was a joy to witness.

The theme of the weekend was “Revolutionary Peacemaking” and one of the men from Mexico pointed out that the word Revolutionary is usually associated with war. He said that Christians are to be Revolutionaries, but revolutionaries for Jesus’ peace.

Our kids learned more about ways of making peace through diverse stories from El Salvador and the Amish. We visited with people from the Bruderhof and people from a community in Portland. We had lunch at an Amish community and were served a meal made by a community from Mexico. We had a ridiculous and hilarious “lack of talent” show that included Dad jokes, rapping, singing, a humorous PSA about intentional community, and a silly reading of Thomas Merton’s journal.

On our last morning, we had an open-mic so that people could share what the weekend had meant to them. I don’t usually enjoy speaking off the cuff but I had realized some important things in that moment and wanted to share them.

I told them that I wouldn’t have wanted to come to a gathering like this a few years ago. Leaving community in such a painful way had left wounds and a few years ago, I wouldn’t have been ready for those emotions and memories to come flooding back to the surface. But these last five years had offered some healing and respite and I was glad we had come.

I told them that we were now in a more traditional church (a lovely group of people) and we were a lot more aware of the ways the church, at large, is struggling. I said that lot of people I know and love have left the church or faith altogether.

I told them that I understood why many people had left the church. There were some good and understandable reasons. The church has hurt and devastated too many people to count. But, even so, I’ve had a hard time dealing with the deep grief of it all.

I admitted that sometimes I have wondered why, when so many are leaving, I am still here. I’ve wondered why I am sticking it out in church and faith when many people aren’t.

While listening to other people speak about what the weekend had meant to them, what I realized was that one of the reasons I was still clinging to faith was because of my experience of intentional Christian community. For all of its flaws and conflicts, Christian community offered me a vision of a different way. It had showed me that another way was possible, a way of following Jesus apart from authoritarian structures and power-hungry charismatic leaders and the capitalist American dream. A way of following Jesus that cared for the needs of others, that invited you to face your weaknesses, that offered family for those who had none.

I had been given that vision for eight years, and, frankly, it has ruined me for the “normal” American dream.

After those years away from community, I was encouraged to return to this group of people and see how those healthy communities were still being faithful. There were still those wise older voices of people who were continuing to give their lives to one another. They weren’t doing it perfectly but they owned up to it. They were praying together, caring for the vulnerable and accompanying communities from other cultures. And most of them weren’t just “sticking it out.” They were leaning in to a life that they were committed to.

And do you know why they were still there? Do you know what was uniting them? It wasn’t politics or economics or language or culture. They didn’t agree on everything. It wasn’t even the idea of Revolutionary peace (although that is very important).

No. They were united in their desire to follow Jesus with their whole lives and to be open to Jesus taking them to uncomfortable places. They were united in their belief that Jesus is the only anchor that holds.

I have been in many different kinds of spaces. And the spaces that tend to talk a lot about Jesus don’t always talk about loving your neighbor and welcoming the stranger. And the places that tend to focus more on peace and justice, even in religious spaces, don’t always talk about Jesus.

And I can’t tell you how much of a relief that was to hear the name of Jesus prayed over and over. To hear the work and life and holiness of Jesus prayed and sung, over and over. And to see the fruit of lives lived in service to Jesus.

It was such a beautiful gift. I will be thinking about for a long time.

---

Wild and wooly stories (featuring the mystics):

• Mystics and Misfits: Meeting God Through St. Francis and Other Unlikely Saints

• Awakened By Death: Life-Giving Lessons from the Mystics

1. Yes, there are networks of intentional communities. A surprising number of communities and networks!