Sunday
The reign of God is the eternal state of things, how things finally and fully and freely are. To live in the reign of God is to live with that kind of big perspective.
—Richard Rohr
Monday
For many people today, kingdom language evokes patriarchy, chauvinism, imperialism, domination, and a regime without freedom—the very opposite of the liberating, barrier-breaking, domination-shattering, reconciling movement the kingdom of God was intended to be!
—Brian McLaren
Tuesday
Remember this: There are always two worlds. The world as it operates is power; the world as it should be is love. The secret of kingdom life is how we can live in both—simultaneously.
—Richard Rohr
Wednesday
Jesus expected the reversal of all social oppositions through God’s intervention. All those who were outsiders according to the norms of society and held to be “impure” according to the law—the poor, the landless, public sinners, tax collectors, and women—were accepted here.
—Dorothee Sölle
Thursday
God’s reign is about union and communion, which means that it’s also about mercy, forgiveness, nonviolence, letting go, solidarity, service, and lives of love, patience, and simplicity. Who can doubt that this is the sum and substance of Jesus’ teaching?
—Richard Rohr
Friday
The kingdom remains a mystery just beyond our grasp. All we have are almosts and not quites and wayside shrines. All we have are imperfect people in an imperfect world doing their best to produce outward signs of inward grace and stumbling all along the way.
—Rachel Held Evans
Week Thirty-One Practice
Intentional Community
We never know how our small activities will affect others through the invisible fabric of our connectedness…. In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of “critical mass.” It’s always about critical connections.
—Margaret J. Wheatley, Leadership and the New Science
Buddhist Quaker Valerie Brown encourages an intentional and loving approach to community:
As a teacher at Pendle Hill outside Philadelphia, I continue to grow in my understanding of community. A safe, brave space, Pendle Hill is where, on my better days I bring my most compassionate self forward. This compassion spirals outward as an invitation—an invitation that inclines others to do the same. In this community, I learn about connection and about sharing my vulnerability in ways that grow me, that grow others….
It’s easy to have idyllic beliefs about community—that it is a place where everyone is friendly, agreeable, and polite; a place where there is no conflict, connection is easy, there are no difficult people. What I’ve discovered, however, is that more often than not, community is about conflict and about how we together navigate it. Conflict often reveals something important, allowing me to yield to something bigger and more important than protecting my ideas around right or wrong. Community calls me toward recognizing the shadow side of myself: the ways in which I am hard, distant, rigid, and unforgiving. Community shows me when I am placing my needs before others, showing up distracted or late, and taking others for granted. The opportunity I am then given is to ask essential questions: Can I be transparent and undefended without collapsing when this feedback comes my way? Can I notice, name, and investigate with open curiosity what I am feeling? Can I offer myself and others kind attention without judgment or blame? The gift of community is the mirror that reflects back to me, that offers me a chance to live into a better part of myself.
Reference:
Valerie Brown, Hope Leans Forward: Braving Your Way toward Simplicity, Awakening, and Peace (Minneapolis, MN: Broadleaf Books, 2022), 167–168, 170.
Image credit and inspiration: Harli Marten, untitled (detail), 2016, photo. Unsplash. Click here to enlarge image. The reign of God is peace, even today, between two people and a tree at sunset.
