Dear All of Us,
Across the spread of
eighty-six years
I've lived in a whopping
twenty-nine homes.
No, I wasn't delinquent
with the rent and always
a step or two ahead
of the sheriff.
Dad's work had us
on the move
when I was a kid.
Then it was seminaries,
various religious communities,
clergy residences, parishes
and retirement relocations.
A lot of homes
for sure and
many were
just that,
home.
It's so good to have
a place and way to be
RIGHT AT HOME
It grounds us
to the heavens.
It stabilizes us
expansive.
It makes
all the difference
in our swirl of world.
Sadly, there are
increasingly
huge migrations
of souls without
a home base.
They are lost in
a pandemic of
loneliness.
As mentioned here
in a past positing,
it's like an orphan train
with nowhere to go.
And this is happening
in a world coming undone,
in a world increasingly
at a loss for even
basic community.
It is traumatizing.
In 2023 the
Surgeon General
issued a report that
said sad so and
clearly affirmed
the vital importance of
home,
community.
It was entitled:
Our Epidemic of
Loneliness and Isolation,
The Surgeon General's
Advisory on the
Healing Effect of
Social Connection
and Community
Steven Charleston (2)
frames things this way.
There has been a loss of a
WE
leaving us with only a
ME
That's
ME-ISM
That's
solitary confinement
even if in a crowd. (3)
That is unnatural.
That makes for
madness.
Indigenous peoples,
and people across
tribal lands and ways,
know a whole lot better.
Example:
A highly regarded
Australian scholar
was lecturing
at a tribal gathering
in Africa.
He shared that there was
rampant loneliness in Sidney.
His African interpreter
interrupted,
telling the speaker
that in these lands
and tribes
there was
no such word as
"loneliness". (4)
Would that it were so
for us all!
Well, it can be and
well that would be
in these severing times.
By God's gift
to be human
is to be
RIGHT AT HOME
an individual in community.
That balance is
under siege,
largely lost
in many lands.
The communal has been
devastated, eviscerated
by an exclusionary
individualism.
Beginning in
the Western World
with the so called
Enlightenment,
metastasizing in
The Industrial Revolution,
it has become
pervasively lethal in our
Technology Age,
the age of the
"Screen Caged."
It's Me-ism Madness.
Happily and hope filled
in the midst of this madness
is the gift of community.
Jesus invites us into
shared life,
lived in community:
"The time is fulfilled,
and the
kingdom of God
is
here.
Change your life
and believe the
Message." (5)
Jesus underscores
the dynamic of
community living in
the kingdom -
living his love together:
"Love one another
as I have loved you" (6)
and that's one heaven
of a lot of "lov'n"!
We care.
We share,
never stopping
to count, be it
tools, time,
talent shared.
We offer,
blend,
who we are,
share
what we have.
At The Last Supper
Jesus prayed
that all in
the community
" ...be brought to
complete unity..." (7)
We're invited to
tie in tight,
prosper,
one in diversity,
a mosaic
of unity,.
Paul reminds us that
together we are
The Body of Christ (8)
Cooperative unity in
complimenting uniqueness -
day laborers or CEO's,
Tex-Mex or Blue Zone dining,
Shakespear or Daniel Silva,
down home or uptown.
The Early Church was called
Ecclesia
"The Gathered" (9)
We can be too.
Gathered in
prayer, service.
hospitality, study,
The varied
Body of Christ
1Corinthians 12:12-27
In the early days
of the church
Tertullian recorded
the radical and
sacrificial love
the early Christians
had for each other:
"See how they love
one another." (10)
Was then.
Can be now.
Here in The States
and world-wide
things are really rough.
They are going
to get a lot rougher.
We need each other.
Jesus calls us
to be together,
to be community,
living Kingdom,
"kin"- dom life.
Thus, the oft
urging here,
and yet again now,
that we find or found
a true, a for-real
spiritual community.
It will correct and restore
the God given balance of
individual and communal.
"Wherever
two or three
are gathered
in my name
there I am
in their midst." (11)
What great company
and what a
Center!
That's what it takes
- close in community -
to be
really,
spiritually,
humanly
RIGHT AT HOME
******
For those who might have
time and interest,
A FEW NOTES ON THE
"HOW"
OF A
SMALL GROUP
COMMUNITY
are offered below
at the conclusion
of this posting
NO EXTRA CHARGE :)
******
(1) Gallop: Weekly Religious
Attendance/USA
1950's = 76% of the population
2025 = 20% of the population
(2) Member of the Choctaw Nation,
former Dean,
Episcopal Divinity School,
Cambridge, MA,
Episcopal Bishop of Alaska
(3) We the Lonely People,
Searching for Community,
Ralph Keyes, Harper and Row,
1973
(4) Sorry. I failed to note
where I read this recently.
(5) Mark 1:15, The Message
(6) John 13:36
(7) John 17:23
(8) 1 Corinthians 12: 27
(9) 1 Corinthians 16:19
one of numerous
uses in Paul of
"ecclesia" for church
(10) Tertullian (160-240 AD)
Apohogetus ch 39 sect 7
(11) Matthew 18:20
******
It's so
God Good
for us to be
"The Gathered"
here each week.
******
ONLINE POSTING
EARLY
WESNESDAY EVENINGS
East Coast USA time
******
Please continue to share
frankly speaking
with others.
Thanks!
******
PREVIOUS POSTINGS
AVAILABLE
by
scrolling well down
beneath
this posting
******
For those interested and
for consideration
over time
A FEW NOTES
ON THE
"HOW"
OF A
SMALL GROUP
COMMUNITY
We start where we are.
If there is an
established church
in our area that fosters
small groups,
we explore the possibility
of developing one
along the lines of
John Wesley's
Ecclesiola in Ecclesia,
Small Churches
in the
Larger Church
or
The Third Order (Lay)
Franciscans.
If that is not possible,
we reach out
to a few
like-minded,
like-hearted,
like-spirited
others.
We have dinner and
talk through the
posting above and
these notes here.
If it's a go,
we meet once a week:
to pray,
reflect together
on scripture and
our living of it,
share Agape or
Holy Communion,
have a meal together
(cum vino is just fine!!),
sharing how things are.
Monday to Friday,
if possible, we
Zoom Share
Morning Prayer
We care for each other,
help as needed
and possible.
We individually and
as a community
serve needs in
our area and beyond
We ask one
in our number
to serve as
convener and organizer
and
a discernably matured
spiritual guide
in our area to serve as
overseer
as per the early church
with a local servant leader
presbyter
and an area overseer
of small home churches
episkopos
As in the early church,
they have day jobs
for their support.
We ask the Spirit
to vivify us as
The Body of Christ.
1 Corinthians 12:12-31
Again and again
we revisit,
refocus on
our raison d'etre as
Jesus prays for us:
"The goal is
for all of them
to become
one heart and mind -
Just as you, Father, are
in me and I in you, ...
Then the world
might believe that
you sent me...
then they will mature
in this oneness
John 17: 21-23
The Message
"Abide in me,
and I in you."
John 15:4
All the best.
See you
next week.
Love to all
God Bless
John Frank
frankly speaking
spirituality for the street
johnfrankshares.blogspot.com
******
