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Really. Well. Thank You. Really.

Derek Webster — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 12:50:39 -0800

I love sarcasm. I'm practically a "Daily Show"-o-phile. That's the show where nearly every word that drips from John Stewarts mouth is laden with subtext. I used to watch SNL when David Spade was on there. The Hollywood Minute killed.

But a few years back, my friend was deeply convicted that his sarcasm was getting in the way. He asked me (as a show of solidarity) to kindly consider not using sarcasm when I was around him - it would be too tempting to join in. Over the last several years, I've come to see what my friends sees: sarcasm does more damage than you think. Here are 5 reasons why:

1. Sarcasm makes you look snarky.

I used to think it made others seem smart. Witty, even. A well-placed sarcastic comment can bring the house down, leaving someone else looking idiotic.

Which is why you actually look snarky and not smart.

Sarcasm is all about making you appear smart and someone else appear dumb. You wind up becoming a smart ass...which invariably leads you to a place where others drop the "smart" but keep the "ass" as they think of you.

2. Sarcasm ultimately undermines your credibility.

Peter and the Wolf was all about attention getting while undermining credibility. Sarcasm leaves the listener wondering if what they are telling you is actually sarcastic, but they aren't seeing it. Try being sarcastic and then offering someone (anyone really) a genuine complement. They'll look at you as if they aren't quite sure what you mean. Is that a sarcastic compliment (which is the opposite of complimentary) or a genuine compliment? If you're not consistently genuine, then people won't be able to tell.

3. Sarcasm saps naiivitee.

Sarcasm is the post-modern's answer to modernities optimism. We're cynical. We've seen it all. We've got it on YouTube to prove it. So a naiive answer or perspective turns jaded. Everything has subtext. Nothing is as it appears. Everyone is suspicious.

But let's face it, naiivitee is under-rated. There are many things I know now I wish I didn't.

4. Sarcasm undermines community.

A community is built on trust. Teasing someone else works when there's a knowledge between the two that there's actually a lot of love underneath it all. But sarcasm does undermine it. Think of sarcasm as a chemical acid, able to burn into anything it touches. Use it often enough, and people will run away.

5. Sarcasm undermines criticism.

That may sound strange. After all, isn't sarcasm itself a form of criticism? Yes it is. But it actually takes away from the genuine article by setting you up as the jokster. If your critique comes back to bite you in the...ahem, I've already mentioned it...then you get to have deniable plausibility. You were just employing a form of humor, right? Wrong. Sarcasm is a way of making no stand. It's not satire nor wit. It weakens your position.

Tenth Consideration: Turning off the Computer

Kristin Ritzau — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 19:09:04 -0800

This tenth one is one I thought long and hard about the last couple of days. What should I post so I can put up something prolific on Christmas?.... (A time when I am sure you're all checking email and Facebook)

Then is dawned on me in such a simple way - I don't want to be on my computer on Christmas. I love connecting with people online, but today is a day to be with my community; to be with my husband and our family, to be with the Trinity -- all of them in unique ways.

So in considering what turning off my computer means right now, well, it means being present to what's around me and right now, it's not technology.

Have a blessed and happy Christmas and I will be posting 11 and 12 in the coming week!

A Gaelic Christmas Blessing

God’s grace descend upon you,
Christ’s love descend upon you,
Spirit’s peace descend upon you,
Every day of your days on earth.

Nollaig shona duit
Happy Christmas

Why the Journey is still important

bo.white — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 12:55:23 -0800

Now, I must preface this with a notation. I sometimes cry at movies. This isn’t a confession, rather it’s a fact, kind of like saying that I have greenish eyes and am right handed. When the writing, acting, cinematography, story, and score all come together in the right way, at the right time, I cry. But, I can’t remember being emotionally moved at the beginning, middle, and end of a film, until recently.

Recently, I sat in a giant, stadium seat theatre and watched The Way. There was only me and one other couple at the screening on a Wednesday night, so right away you’ll note that it’s not a summer blockbuster type or Disney flick. The Way, though, struck me on several different emotional levels all at once and for that reason, it’s one of the more emotionally moving and satisfying films I have seen in a long time.

The storyline is rather straight forward—a father and son, who are estranged and don’t understand each other that well, are heading in different directions, until the father learns of his son’s death. The death, though, happens while the son is on pilgrimage, hiking the El Camino de Santiago from France in to Spain. The father, played by Martin Sheen, takes the pilgrimage himself and the film takes us with him. But, there are other film reviews to read online, this isn’t meant to be a review. So, let me focus on two points that kept me emotionally invested in the film and now, a while after seeing it, these thoughts still invite me to new conversations.

First, the film is the story of a journey and it’s done in such a way that the audience also goes on the journey, and that’s no small point. We’re all on a journey and we’re pilgrims with a destination. Vincent Van Gogh once said that we are strangers on the earth as he preached from Psalm 119 in the 19^th century. The most popular story, next to the Bible, in English, is Pilgrim’s Progress. Perhaps, we miss the point that the journey we’re on is not only not an accident or anecdotal, but it’s truly a pilgrimage toward something new. The Bible says that we are new creations and that one day, there will be a new heaven and a new earth. Until then, the pilgrimage we’re on, if we truly embrace it, allows us to explore things and experience things with purpose, pleasure, and passion. We fall down, mess up, get lost, or turned around, but we still walk, press on, and take in the one life we’ve been given. The journey doesn’t just point us in a certain direction, but the journey actually shapes our life in various ways as well. We shape the journey and the journey also shapes us.

This leads me to a second point. We don’t take our respective journeys alone. Other people are on the path and they too intersect with us and they too are being shaped and they too are shaping us. And soon their smiles cause us to smile, their eyes help us see, their pain hurts us, and their tears also run down our own face.

And pushing these points further in to my own day, I have been reading Jean Vanier recently and he writes on one occasion that “Our humanity is so beautiful, but it needs to be transformed”. And once again, I am invited to a new place where beauty can still be transformed into something even more stunning. A kiss can be transformed into being truly present. A hug becomes a retreat. And on goes this journey, with others, where beauty can both move us deeply, but also leave us in a place of contented anticipation. We’re stirred to the core, but anticipate something great is coming. And this is the invitation of the film, The Way. Dostoyevsky was right, when he wrote, ‘Beauty will save the world.’ In fact, I think it just may be our only hope.

-bo

What is work?

Kristin Ritzau — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 14:27:49 -0700

I declared these past 10 days Take Your Wife To Work Week. My husband works for an international humanitarian organization and travels quite a bit. Due to my old job responsibilities it was never an option for me go with him.

As I made the transition to my new role in the university, we quickly realized there was a window of time for me to travel to Costa Rica with him.

It didn't hurt that we tacked on a couple days to the front end to relax at the beach. However, we soon found ourselves at Nate's boss' home ready to begin our work week. I figured if you have to lesson plan, what's the difference between my home office or working in a different country with my husband?

My other companions on this trip were textbooks - leadership, spiritual formation, writing - along with other "fun" reads like Wendell Berry and John O'Donohue. As Nate sat for long planning meetings, only breaking for meals. I found myself diving into outlining, reading and lecture writing. Ten hours later I had finalized a syllabus and planned two lectures. I had learned new presentation software and done mental gymnastics in order to translate ideas to a new generation of students.

I was spent.

The same pattern repeated itself the following day as I poured over notes and made another presentation. Then I hit a wall. I knew I needed to continue, but I just couldn't muster the brain power.

We are sequestered in a way here in Costa Rica - away from the city in a modest home that houses a family of nine, vagabond travelers, an eager intern, a few souls who needed a sustainable living situation, and a handful of people, like us, who are here to have meetings and work.

Since I'm not here for the meetings, I spent time with John O'Donohue - the Celtic spiritual sage and writer. And what he had to say to me was profound: "If you only awaken your will and intellect, then your work can become your identity." Our souls shrink and end up hidden, he writes, under our work identities and we become absent from our heart's longings. "You look for a person, but you never meet him," even though he is right in front of you.

He had me in his graceful grip. I began to see how I could lose myself in the world of teaching -- of anything really. Just because I'm starting a new job doesn't mean my issues are resolved or that I have "arrived" anywhere. If anything I need to slow down even more.

John continued to gently massage the ideas into me: "Rapidity is another force causing massive stress in the workplace...Where things are moving too quickly, nothing can stabilize, gather, or grow." He goes on to tell a tale of a man visiting Africa. He ran through the jungle with four local guides, trying to get somewhere quickly. After three days of traveling the guides "sat down and would not move." After days of begging them to keep going with no avail, they finally said why they wouldn't get up. "We have moved too quickly to reach here; now we need to wait to give our spirits a chance to catch up with us."

It is tempting to plan all of my classes even though I have no clue who I am teaching yet. It is enticing to map out our fall garden even though I am about as far away from home as possible. It is appealing to start dreaming about our next vacation even though I'm still in another country. I need to remember my soul in all of my work and planning. But more importantly just remember I have soul. To stop and breathe. Not plan. Not work. Not do. Just be.

Take-your-wife-to-work-week hasn't been about work as much as tying community and vocation into family life.

Living, working, bathing, sleeping, eating, and breathing with all of these individuals this week has introduced me to beautiful stories being written in all corners of the world -- but if we only go to work we will miss our part in the story of life.

Quotes from John O'Donohue. Anam Cara. HarperCollins. New York, 2004. Pages 149-151

(Sorry there are no pics this week as we're still away)

Where in the World is Samaria?

Carrie Nye — Fri, 27 May 2011 19:26:20 -0700

Recently I heard Brenda Salter McNeil say that Samaria is the place where you do not want to go. It’s the place where the people who you despise live. Samarians are hostile. Samaria is the place we build freeways around so we don’t have to drive through.

There are two significant passages of red letter scripture where Jesus is clear as newly washed glass windows regarding a place called Samaria and a people group called Samarians.

The first is the all too famous story of Jesus` encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4. Jesus is fully present with the woman at the well. He goes straight to her heart and penetrates her deepest well of her soul. The Samaritan woman is then quick to determine Jesus is who he says he is. Jesus is a credible witness to her in her life.

Luke, the disciple of Jesus and the author of the book of Luke and Acts records words spoken by Jesus shortly before his resurrected body ascended to Heaven. “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” –Acts 1:8.

Brenda summed up Acts 1:8 as Jesus basically asking, “Can I get a witness?” I love that. When you get right down to it, being a witness is a movement outward and one that might be uncomfortable.

Jerusalem is where we feel culturally at home. Jesus pretty much tells us his witnesses can’t stay in Jerusalem.

Judea is close to home but it’s the place of sub cultures. Things may look the same in Judea, but when taken a closer look, there you’ll find subtle differences that divide people. For example, I might look the same as people in my Judea, but when it comes to politics, world views and church denominations, there exists a great chasm.

During the time when Jesus walked the Earth, no self-respecting Jew would ever go to Samaria. In fact, they purposely took the long way around to avoid Samaria all together. Samaria is the place that’s just not safe.

Jesus says his witnesses will go from safe to hostile; from the known to the unknown, from the comfortable to the uncomfortable and from a Disney movie to an action movie. I heard Gary Haugen say the same thing a couple months ago.

We absolutely must move from what we know to what we do not know.

Jesus revealed his credibility to the Samaritan woman and it radically changed her life. Credibility is given to us; it is not something we can give ourselves. This is what Jesus was talking about when he told his followers in Acts that when the Holy Spirit came on them, then they will be his witnesses.

In order to earn credibility, we must be in the right place at the right time for the right duration of time. Credibility takes time and patience to develop with people.

Take Chicago based social activist and Catholic Priest Michael Pfleger for example. No matter what your views are on many of the decisions he has made and continues to make, one thing’s certain; Chicago is his Samaria. In the early 1990’s Pfleger began protesting billboards going up in the neighborhood and very close to a school advertising drugs and alcohol. When his protests got him no where, Pfleger and company climbed the billboards and defaced them by painting right over them. Pfleger was of course arrested and what was his defense? Simply put, he was compelled.

Jesus said we will receive power when we show up in Samaria. We seek the face of God and we follow his banner. That is what we must do.

The church was always supposed to be cross-cultural, multi-lingual, ethically diverse, economically diverse, etc. We are transformed people by the journey from Jerusalem to Samaria. As we participate in the move, we transform to credible witnesses into Samaria. Our ‘withness’ becomes our witness.

Jesus gives life giving water to all who thirst. As John brings the writings of his vision of Heaven in Revelation to a close, he speaks of a mighty river of life that flows from the throne of God, through the city. This river is lined with trees and the leaves of these trees are for the healing of nations.

Collaboration with our Samaria’s always begins with a posture of prayer. Praying for God to break our hearts for what breaks his is our foundation when on the move to Samaria. Justice lives will flow out of this discipline of prayer.

Samaria is the place where we feel God’s wrath if deserved and where we want to help God take people to hell.

So where’s your Samaria?

*The post here is a combination of what I heard Brenda speak on at a recent conference called The Mighty Waters: Preaching and Living God’s Passion for Justice as well as my own reflections and thoughts on what I took away from her talk. In the next few posts on CL, I’d like to share with you more of what I took away from the 2 ½ day conference from some of the other speakers. Cool? :)

With-ness: An Advent Reading

Kristin Ritzau — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 08:49:55 -0800

This past weekend, I was invited to partake in the advent activities at our church. Every week for the past month, someone has shared a reading while other participants light one of the advent candles. Our themes over the past few weeks have been time, openness, untamed and for this last week: with.

Here is the reading:

“I am waiting in a silent prayer. I am frightened by the load I bear. In a world cold as stone, must I walk this path alone? Be with me now. Be with me now. Breathe of Heaven.” Mary’s words sung by Amy Grant, are haunting in this advent season.

She didn’t ask to have this load taken off of her. She didn’t pray for God to change the plan – she told the messenger angel: “May it be as you have said.” In that instant the expectations of her life forever changed.

Though alone in many ways, God was with Mary. We like to sum up her journey in Protestant circles in less than 25 days, but her story even being “with child” was so much longer.

“With” defined in the dictionary means accompanying, possessing something, indicates responsibility, a relation to, or how something affects us. “With” is a bridge, a beacon, a companion. With means we’re not alone even though advent is about waiting expectantly. In a way the phrase the night is darkest right before the dawn never rang more true.

"With" by Megan and Daniel Lundgren

Kathleen Norris writes, “The incarnation is the place where hope contends with fear.” Hope with fear – Good with bad – black with white. It’s a movement into a tension filled gray area where a soldier didn’t come to save, a baby did. It’s Mary’s story; it’s Jesus’ story; it’s our story. It’s the great crescendo that no one heard because it happened in a stable with animals.

He was to be called Emmanuel “God with us” and he was with the ordinary from his birth. He welcomed shepherds as his first visitors, not royalty. He wanted us to be with him because he was now with us.

In a season where we’re encouraged to not be without, and to be with more – how can we embody this sentiment? Maybe now more than ever we need to experience “God with us” – God with you, God with me, because the beauty of being with others is that we know the reality of God with us.

A year ago, my husband and I left the church we called home for many years. I came face to face with a reason that may have forced the Grinch’s heart to shrink and move to the mountain outside of Whoville. That’s what happens when it appears no one is with you.

Matthew 1 tells us that the son born to Mary was to be called Emmanuel, God with us, an expectation, of not being alone, of a gift with a certain amount of with-ness.

Instead of shying away to our homestead, we tried out a little church in a basement and over the course of this year we have understood life “with” more than ever. Listening ears, open arms and doors as well as hospitable hearts greeted these neighbors, not to mention anyone who came. Welcoming the ordinary and inviting the extraordinary in them. They were our who-ville – the redemption in a dark season – that made our hearts expand with theirs. That doesn’t seem possible when you look at a baby, that he or she could do more amazing things than Emmanuel, but that is the promise he left us with on earth in Matthew 14. He was a gift and he left a gift for us: to be with him. And isn’t that what Advent is about? Eventually finding that Emmanuel is with us… it just might not be what we expected.

Anxiously Searching

Abbie Smith — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 15:04:16 -0800

"A Christian community is therefore a healing community not because wounds are cured and pains are alleviated, but because wounds and pains become openings or occasions for a new vision of Christ in the gospel! Mutual confession then becomes mutual deepening of hope, and sharing weakness becomes a reminder to one and all of the coming strength. Many people in this life suffer because they are anxiously searching for the man or woman, the event or encounter, which will take their loneliness away. But when they enter a house with real hospitality they soon see that their own wounds must be understood not as sources of despair and bitterness, but as signs that they have to travel on in obedience to the calling sounds of their own wounds…

From this we get the idea of the kind of help a believer may offer. A believer/minister is not a doctor whose primary task is to take away pain. Rather, he deepens the pain to a level where it can be shared. When someone comes with his loneliness to the minister, he can only expect that his loneliness will be understood and felt, so that he no longer has to run away from it but can accept it as an expression of his basic human condition.

When we become aware that we do not have to escape our pains, but that we can mobilize them into a common search for life, those very pains are transformed from expressions of despair into signs of hope. Through this common search, hospitality becomes community. Hospitality becomes community as it creates a unity based on the shared confession of our basic brokenness and on a shared hope. This hope in turn leads us far beyond the boundaries of human togetherness to Him who calls people away from the land of slavery to the land of freedom. In Christ the one who was wounded for the wounded!"

-Henry Nouwen

A Theology of Hip Hop

Daniel Hodge — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 14:48:43 -0700

Daniel Hodge, author of the ground-breaking book, The Soul of Hip Hop (IVP Books), talks about his book with Bobby Duran. In this 12-minute interview (Part 2 of 3 parts), Daniel explains, "Hip Hop tells you how much of America lives. It becomes a canary in the mine because it shows you how America really is."

Daniel digs into the spiritual relevance of Hip Hop because it reveals "A Theology of the Hip Hop Jesuz" (one of five Hip Hop theologies in the book). Hodge explains: "Jesus was born multi-ethnic and multi-cultural. He had his own baby mama drama, he was hated by the police, and his boy did him in."

Hodge's goal is to help the church understand that Hip Hop can be a positive element in reaching the culture, and to show how to communicate Jesus through a theology of Hip Hop.

Daniel Hodge Part 2 - "A Theology of Hip Hop" from ConversantLife on Vimeo.

Crying in the Kitchen

Crissy Brooks — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 12:07:00 -0700

This summer I was especially taken with the verses in Philippians where Paul declares, “I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him.” My heart resonated. My soul cried, “Yes! Christ is all I need.” I made plans to simplify my life. I stopped buying clothes. I got more creative and made things I needed out of what I already had. My gaze was set on knowing "Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.”

Then a new roommate moved in. This move required me to share my room, to consolidate, to get rid of stuff- lots of stuff. It is one thing to stop acquiring. It is another to “consider everything a loss,” to actually get rid of things. Don’t get me wrong, the move was my idea. This was part of knowing Christ- of going to a deeper place of community and identifying with our neighbors who have their whole families living in one room. But it turns out I like my stuff. I have pretty things. I have useful things. I have things I may need later. I have things that may come in handy some day for another life I am scheming. I have lots of stuff.

So I moved the stuff from the closet to under the bed to another closet to a shelf. I boxed up the stuff. I took bits of it to the Goodwill. I sold pieces at a garage sale. I shuffled and sorted but I rarely let go. It feels like loss to let it go, even irresponsible. And yet this morning as I look around feeling cramped and needing to breathe, I wonder why I want this stuff. What is it about the stuff that makes me hang on? What is it about me that won’t consider it rubbish?

And it’s not just about the stuff. It’s about the space. My room is huge. The closet is big. There’s a lot of floor space and a sitting area and my queen bed. It is so big in fact that my new roommate moved her queen bed in the same room. Two queen beds. Two women. No more floor space. No more sitting area. There is simply no more space for all this stuff. There is no more space to store up for an imaginary life to come. There is no more space to throw things I don’t want to deal with. There is no more space to hide. Before the move, my roommates and I looked around the house, looked at each other and asked, “Where are we going to go to cry?” There is no more space to hide.

Together we recognize that the very thing we long for- to be known and loved in a caring community- means vulnerability and not hiding. It means hearing each other snore and crying in front of each other. So we are taking steps into this life together. We are stripping ourselves of stuff we have held onto. And as I give up my own stuff I realize that I haven’t really lost much at all. Now instead of one really cool antique chair, we have two. And I sit in both. This morning I was lamenting the loss of a pair of shoes and my new roommate broke out an amazing pair of boots for me to wear. I gave away my bowls and my roommate has the set I’ve looked at in magazines for years. Now I eat my breakfast out of them.

A couple of Saturdays ago, after our “where do we cry” discussion, one roommate and I sat at the kitchen table catching up on the week. We chatted and drank coffee and the conversation slowly spiraled into deeper topics until we were both sharing from our heart and crying, even weeping as the pain of life boiled over. As we listened and comforted one another our earlier conversation came to mind and the answer was clear: now we cry in the kitchen. All I thought would be loss, I have gained- beautiful stuff, sweet intimacy, a grace to be me and to love others for who they are. With no extra stuff and no space to hide, now we cry in the kitchen.

Know Your Role or Being Known

Kristin Ritzau — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 10:29:39 -0700

“There's this saying: ‘They are the nicest people you’ll never know,” my girlfriend said in a somber tone. “I’m not sure how to meet people.”

She was reflecting on her recent move to a new town and I was her conduit of encouragement from two states away.

“Have you thought about a different church?” I replied in an upbeat, proactive voice, hoping that my revelation might help. It didn’t turn out to be much of a light bulb though because of course my wise friend had already ventured down that rabbit hole.

“We’ve thought about it, but all that’s here are glossy mega-churches or tiny congregations where people have been for years.” My translation of my gracious friend’s words: We don’t want to hang out with only senior citizens.

There was yearning in her voice, not of desperation, but of a need to belong. I’m not a scientist or a developmental psychologist, but I am an observer of (and participant in) human life. In that, I would say, at a basic level: we all want to belong – to be known.

Recently, I have wrestled with a semi-common phrase: “Know your role.” In different spheres of my life, my role as employee, daughter, little sister, wife, woman, etc. can feel very limiting. I don’t want to role-play my life. I want to dream outside of the box, but that’s hard when there is no room to be seen as just me— no room to grow, expand, or safety to belong. I want to bust out of the cardboard life, but then the box rips. It makes a scene and, not to play that card, (but I’m going to) as a man you’d be applauded, but as a woman the glaring begins.

Women can be each other’s worst enemies. In the same breath we can put someone on a pedestal and cut off her legs. It’s a craft – it’s also insane. When we are held to roles, we see people as falling in line and performing like everyone else. When someone breaks rank, the chaos begins. Does it always have to be like this?

I am no less guilty of this phenomenon. I want to belong, but when I see others “belonging” without me, I can get fierce… and sad. Forgive my blatant honesty for a second. However, more and more I find myself wanting to be proactive in these situations. I can sit around and wait to be included or I can see who I have left out. It’s important to reflect on the emotions stirred when I have been put out, but I also want to be a proactive participant in my life even when there is so much to react to.

Of course I’m not an island or a superhero, so there have been times when the best way to respond has been to leave a toxic situation, but then in removing myself, sometimes I have found the best places of belonging. In sinking down into myself and the communities around me, I have been able to find love, acceptance, and grace in my daily life. And isn’t that the journey of belonging?

This past weekend I went on a church retreat and somehow it shifted my paradigm even more. The retreat was not a typical hear-the-speaker-four-times-and-have-an-altar-call-on-Saturday night – kind of retreat. Those have their time and place and can be helpful, but this weekend there were no formal activities, no speaker, not even our pastor – just hanging out and actual retreating. At times I thought, “Well, is anyone feeling left out?” But as I looked around and even reflecting on it now, no one there would have said they felt anything but welcomed and embraced.

Instead of listening to a speaker, we listened to each other and spoke truth into the blank space. I know that there were a few conversations I had that literally may have changed my life and I don’t say that lightly. I say that because when you find a community of welcome –just as you are – one of belonging, you can’t help but be softened by it. Pretense vanishes and grace swoops in like a cool breeze on a hot day. You know you will be changed by it and changed in a life giving way. You know that you are safe, even if a season of your life is damn hard.

There will be others walking with you as fellow journeyers and not out of guilt or because it is their job, or because of an obligatory role, but because of the greatest commandment: Love God, love neighbor as self. It’s a paradigm built with no roles, but on being known in love.

It’s risky to let yourself be known authentically and it can take time. The voices of humiliation and judgment stir inside of us uncomfortably, but how else can we ask for help? How else can we move beyond petty stares and life sucking commentaries? How else can we realize that by helping each other beyond role-playing that there is enough love to go around? Those things might never disappear, but we no longer have to melt at the stare or deflate at the comments. We are our true selves and that is where we belong – with ourselves and in communities that will let us live that way.

(Picture - Megan Lundgren -do not use without permission - danielandmeganphotographyblog.com)