When people are very detached, very devoid of purpose and a coherent worldview, Christians must be very suspicious of talk about community. In a world like ours, people will be attracted to communities that promise them as easy way out of loneliness, togetherness based on common tastes, racial or ethnic traits, or mutual self-interest. There is then little check on the community becoming as tyrannical as the individual ego. Community becomes totalitarian when its only purpose is to foster a sense of belonging in order to overcome the fragility of the lone individual. Christian community, life in the colony, is not primarily about togetherness. It is about the way of Jesus Christ with those whom he calls to himself. It is about disciplining our wants and needs in congruence with a story, which gives us the resources to lead truthful lives. In living out the story together, togetherness happens, but only as a by-product of the main project of trying to be faithful to Jesus.
Thursday, February 23, 2006
quote - Hauerwas and Willimon on community
Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon have this to say about community:
Hauerwas, S. and Willimon, W. H., Resident Aliens (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1989), 78
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As someone who has great interest in the emergent conversation and the emphasis it places on community I found this quite an enjoyable read.
I can see what the passage is getting at, but I can't help but feel that the writer is coming from a very individualistic view of Christianity. (Your previous post highlights this). Thsi view is strengthened by the authors referal to Christian community as "life in the colony" which I find to be a somewhat distasteful description.
Especially in saying, "It is about the way of Jesus Christ with those whom he calls to himself. It is about disciplining our wants and needs in congruence with a story, which gives us the resources to lead truthful lives."
So out of THIS come community?
Well I would say it is the other way round.
What I mean is, how can we progress any great distance in our journey with God without a community of faith in which to turn the theology into practice?
The author claims community happens "only as a by-product of the main project of trying to be faithful to Jesus". But how can we be truly faithful to Jesus and his teachings if we have no community in which to practice them? No brothers and sisters in faith to devote ourselves to in the first place?
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