Cherith Brook Advent 2012 Newspaper

Our Advent 2012 paper is now online.  Be sure to read it and let us know what you think.

Advent 2012

God Made Flesh

Our nation loves war.  If you have been listening to any of the political speak lately, you will be hard-pressed not to find examples of violent language used to describe a whole variety of things.  We have declared war against Afganistan, Iraq, crime and drugs.  At the same time, we have also declared war on the poor, the prostituted, the undocumented, the refugee, the felon and the panhandler.  We project ourselves as ones who are right and righteous while simultaneously dehumanizing those who aren’t like us - those who are deemed to be wicked and unworthy of camaraderie. 

The fruit of all this division is oppression and marginalization.  This separation allows us the space to reduce whole races, ethnic groups, genders and classes to a subhuman status.  That’s how a society can dismiss an entire country “because they are all terrorists” or a homeless person “because they are all lazy drunks who are unworthy of compassion.”

Jesus was also the victim of this kind of labeling.  He was mocked by Nathaneal because of the town He came from: “‘Nazareth!  Can anything good come from Nazareth?” (John 1:46).  This encounter demonstrates the prejudice and labeling present in Jesus’ day, but it also reveals something more; something beautiful about the heart of God.

Speaking about Jesus’ birth, Henri Nouwen stated, “Jesus is God-with-us, Emmanuel.  The great mystery of God becoming human is God’s desire to be loved by us.  By becoming a vulnerable child, completely dependent on human care, God wants to take away all distance between the human and the divine… We usually talk about God as the all-powerful, almighty God on whom we depend completely.  But God wanted to become the all-powerless, all-vulnerable God who completely depends on us.”  One might also recall the passage in Philippians that speaks of Jesus as one who made himself nothing, taking on the nature of a servant (Phil. 2:6-8).  All of these examples involve a path of downward mobility.  God’s own Son was met with criticism because He came from a neighborhood of low standing, not unlike the neighborhood in which Cherith Brook is situated.  Instead of building God’s kingdom by rubbing shoulders with the political elites of his day, Jesus made himself low; Jesus practiced solidarity.

This aspect of Jesus’ ministry is timely as we enter into the season of Advent.  As we collectively look ahead to the day God became flesh and bone, it is important for us to remember that Jesus was not born into privilege or wealth.  Jesus was homeless.  Jesus’ family were political refugees.  Jesus was undocumented.  Jesus begged for hospitality from others.  Jesus spent time in jail.  Jesus was even sold for 20 pieces of silver.  On a different level, God chose to practice downward mobility by sending Jesus—God made flesh—into the world as a baby who was fully dependent on Mary and Joseph for survival.  God became human, lived our suffering, and through the sacrificial nature of solidarity gave birth to a new, reconciled community. 

 

The act of God becoming flesh, depending on us, and then redeeming us provides a new framework for us from which to operate.  It reminds us of the significance of caring for others in sacrificial and sometimes inconvenient ways.  Instead of letting our taxes be the only way the poor are cared for, we are reminded to directly help our neighbors in need. Instead of spending all our efforts trying to attain power and prestige, we are reminded of the Christian’s call to the margins and to the practice of the kind of downward mobility Jesus modeled for us.  In doing so, we avoid the popular criticism of the Christian as one who will pray for someone but will “pass the buck” when it comes to raising up the lowly by living in solidarity.

God practiced solidarity by becoming flesh and bone.  Jesus practiced solidarity by living on the margins and dining with sinners.  When we practice solidarity, we find there is no longer rich or poor, slave or free, Jew or Gentile, man or woman.  By stepping down, we break the divisions that separate us and create a more lasting peace.  We invite the felon to dine with us.  We invite the homeless into our homes.  We welcome the foreigner into our communities.  Instead of declaring war on the panhandler, the prostituted, the felon, the undocumented and the refugee, we call them brother, sister and friend.  In doing so, we embody the way of the kingdom of God—the eternal, reconciled community.

As we draw closer to the day God was made flesh, let us rejoice in God’s beautiful expression of solidarity.  May it draw us closer to those on the margins - to those deemed unclean and unworthy.  By removing all distance between us, we know that the hymn, “Peace on Earth,” will not only be sung at church but will become a reality in our homes.

Cherith Brook Ordinary Time 2012 Newspaper

Our Ordinary Time 2012 paper is now online. Be sure to read it and let us know what you think.

Ordinary Time 2012

Being Placed: More On Stability 

Jodi and I moved five times in the first ten years of our life together—Fort Collins, Des Moines, Bratislava, Durham, Kansas City. Add to that almost two years in Atlanta, and back to Kansas City and we have experienced more than our share of mobility. I’m reminded of the main character in Wendell Berry’s book, Jayber Crow, who, after dropping out of school says, “It made me happy to have all my belongings in a box that I could carry with one hand and walk wherever I wanted to go.” Indeed there is something exhilarating about this freedom of movement.

At the time we thought little of our transience. It mostly felt logical (education), necessary (a job) good (a call to ministry), loving (to be near family) and, at times, a little adventurous. Our middle class culture expects this of us, to be sure. Yet looking back, it feels very different. It’s as if we have lived in the middle of everywhere but aren’t from anywhere. No roots. What one of Berry’s characters calls being a “theoretical person”.

This year we have been reflecting on stability in our community. In our last paper I shared some of what I’ve been learning about stability as a commitment to love: learning to love those particular persons around me; being willing to speak into their lives out of love and commitment to them; being willing to face that within myself that is unable to love.

Another question stirring in me is the relationship between stability and staying put. I don’t want to pit my experiences in Eastern Europe or the Deep South against the virtues of stability. They were filled with moments of clarity about our call to ministry and personal self-discovery. Besides, permanence comes with its own baggage like parochialism, close-mindedness or fear of strangers . Awareness must also be given to things like acedia, a vice recognized by monks whereby one can be present in body, but emotionally unconcerned about community happenings, withdrawn from central moments of communal life, or present only in a melancholy demeanor. So Benedictine Michael Casey wisely suggests we should not assume stability means never moving. “Stability is not a matter of immobility or resistance to change but of maintaining one’s momentum.”

But sometimes I wonder how being a “citizen of the world” (and I doubt such a thing is possible) has handicapped me from making commitments to a place? It seems inevitable that stability will require of me learning to be present to a concrete community, struggling to know it intimately, and accepting the limitations of its history and mine.

This value of committing to a place is one of the greatest lessons I have learned working with street friends in our neighborhood. Contrary to what we might think, homelessness is not instability, but the battle for greater stability amidst the volatility of life.

Ironically, for many of the homeless we know, Northeast Kansas City was and is their home. Their roots go deep into the happenings of the neighborhood. They attended Scarritt middle school, graduated from Northeast High school, went to VBS at Bales Baptist, or worked in the JC Penney’s distribution center.

For some, our chickens bring back childhood memories of gathering eggs in their own yard. Our garden reminds them of a family garden and steamy home-style vegetables at dinner.

Our own buildings are part of this memory stream as they recall shopping at Bob Mead’s hardware store, getting their hair cut from Freidley’s barber shop or watching a movie across the street at what is now a church.

And so they refuse to stay at the shelters or relocate. They find a corner in a friends house, tuck themselves in the shadows of abandoned buildings or bed down in the overgrowth rather than be forced out. I am often surprised at what great pains folks released from incarceration will take to make their way back to the area. Whatever challenges homelessness has brought to their lives and identity, this place is still an important part of their story. It’s home and they are staying. And when we stay, we become part of their story and they of ours.

What is the lesson in committing to a place? Perhaps it is that we moderns are the truly homeless, and the mainstream church shares in this displacement. We lack a real sense of commitment to community for the long haul. When we struggle with deep issue like generational poverty or our personal idiosyncrasies, wholeness can begin in the place where we stand. Stability requires us to abandon easy solutions or quick fixes.

In many of his writings, Wendell Berry calls the virtue of being rooted in a place “membership.” His character, Jayber Crow, reflects back on years of commitment to his place on earth called Port William,

“What I saw now was the community imperfect and irresolute but held together by the frayed and always fraying, incomplete and yet ever-holding bonds of the various sorts of affection. There had maybe never been anybody who had not been loved by somebody, who had not been loved by somebody else and so on…It was a community always disappointed in itself, disappointing its members, always trying to contain its divisions and gentle its meanness, always failing and yet always persevering a sort of will toward goodwill. I knew that, in the midst of all the ignorance and error, this was a membership; it was a membership of Port William and of no other place on earth. My vision gathered the community as it never has been and never will be gathered in this world of time, for the community must always be marred by members who are indifferent to it or against it, who are nonetheless its members and maybe nonetheless essential to it. And yet I saw them all as somehow perfected, beyond time, by one another’s love, compassion, and forgiveness, as it is said we may be perfected by grace.”

It also seems to me that commitment to a place nurtures stability because of a thousand daily acts and local life patterns that give us a sense of belonging. In this short time we have worked hard at establishing local patterns. Buying from our neighborhood grocery store or investing in a local business that employs our neighbors is not simply convenient, but it helps our lives overlap. One of the cashiers is a former homeless friend and behind each encounter and warm greeting is a celebration of her success.

Sending Diana and Henri to the local school brings us in relationship with families that live just a few streets up. Our evening walks take us in the direction of their homes. When we ride our bikes to church we see street friends in their fuller rhythms and appreciate them in new ways. Old patterns seem to merge into new ones, until ultimately there is a web of connectedness that is the gift of time.

Planting perennials can be seen as a spiritual discipline of this sort. Three years ago we planted peach trees in hope and anticipation. This year we awed as peaches emerged and giggled as they grew and ripened. Last year we planted pecan trees, an act of faith, for as saplings, they have no fruit yet to offer. Each year they survive I am more invested in their health, more devoted to their survival. And the desire within me grows to see their fruit.

This parable of the pecan tree begins with the assumption that I am tending the tree, that I chose to plant it and continue to care for it. In short, I am the cultivator of it. But those thousands of daily acts in one place have their effect on me, too. As the tree roots mine the earth, so my roots are winding their way through the darkness and we are being born anew from the same soil. As Jayber Crow reflects in his old age, “ I had laid my claim on the place, had made it answerable to my life. Of course, you can’t do that and get away free. You can’t choose, it seems, without being chosen. For the place, in return had laid its claim on me and had made my life answerable to it.”

Second Saturday Work Day

Hello Friends,

Our Second Saturday Work Day is coming up so we wanted to remind you all to
put it on your calendars.  It will be July 14th from 9am-12pm, followed by
lunch together.

We will be working on a variety of projects including (but not limited to):

Plumbing
Cleaning
Painting
Stump Removal
Preparing Lunch
Gardening
Construction
Organizing in the Clothing Closet

If you are interested in joining us on Saturday the 14th, please RSVP so we
can get an idea of how many people to expect.

Thanks you to all of you who have brought donations recently.  We are still
in need of shorts, underwear(esp. small sizes), white socks, men's
jeans(esp. small sizes) and men's shoes.

We will be closed from July 21 through August 5 for work projects but we'd
love to see you all before that if you can make it to showers to volunteer
sometime.  Thanks for all your love and support!

Peace

April Workday & Donation Requests

Our Second Saturday Work Day is coming up so we wanted to remind you all to
put it on your calendars.  It will be April 14th from 9am-12pm, followed by
lunch together.

We will be working on a variety of projects including (but not limited to):

Cleaning
Painting
Preparing Lunch
Gardening
Construction
Organizing in the Clothing Closet

If you are interested in joining us for the work day, please RSVP so we can get
an idea of how many people to expect.

Just a couple of donation requests... We're looking for a four person dometent for some friends and men's and women's shorts for our clothing closet.

Thank you all for the love and support you offer our community.  We look
forward to seeing you April 14th!

Cherith Brook Easter 2012 Newspaper

Our Easter 2012 paper is now online. Be sure to read it and let us know what you think.

Easter 2012

Seeds of Beauty

Beauty is often hidden, particularly in the places abandoned by Empire. It’s covered by crumbling bricks and swollen bruises, stained jeans and tall weeds, leaking roofs and rotting wood. Here, beauty has been marred by concrete and violence, graffiti and neglect. When people visit our neighborhood, the lack of beauty is one reason they feel less welcome or safe. When I tell people where I call home, they often respond, “You live there?”

As an intentional neighbor of Cherith Brook, I have watched over the last five years as beauty has slowly been revealed. Every day at showers, our neighbors are given the opportunity to re-claim a bit of the beauty hidden within them. This seems especially true during Women’s Day and Second Saturday haircuts, when the makeovers and shine are infused with deep trust and joy. Patient manicures and pedicures, trims and shaves uncover smiles and bright eyes.

















In addition to seeing people transform, I have watched places become more beautiful and hospitable. Saturday workdays usually show the most dramatic changes, but I’ve also noticed many little ways that everyday attentiveness and creativity have beautified spaces. Walking through the clothing closet or food pantry, the kitchen or shower room, hand-written labels and tailored modifications have created a warm kind of welcome that feels like home. The cafe space has been blessed with paintings, stained glass, and flowers. The front doorway to the main house, along with trim around the windows, has recently been renovated and re-painted, unveiling an old beauty.

The garden, though, is my favorite space to have watched take shape. Starting in the backyard and then stretching around to the front, raised beds and limestone-terraced hillsides now host all kinds of herbs, berries, squash, tomatoes, peppers and more. Not only has Cherith Brook claimed hundreds of square feet for food growing, but we have also made the entire space more beautiful. I recently stumbled across a Rumi quote: “Beauty surrounds us, but usually we need to be walking in a garden to know it.” Somehow, tending a garden -- watering it, weeding it, and watching things bloom and grow -- awakens me to beauty and hope. The garden demands careful persistent attention both to help it grow and keep it growing in good ways. Participating in Cherith Brook, whether working in the showers or in the dirt, is often like tending a garden. Every time I go, my eyes are opened to beauty that was hidden before.

Cherith Brook Advent 2011 Newspaper

Our Advent 2011 paper is now online. Be sure to read it and let us know what you think.

Advent 2011

Waiting...To Celebrate!

Occasionally we are asked, “How successful is your work at Cherith Brook? Are you able to get the homeless off the streets?

For one, we are rarely the reason folks get off the streets. We aren’t lawyers or social workers, we are unqualified to process them through housing programs. We aren’t employment programs, teaching new skills where needed or pointing the unemployed toward jobs. We really value those who have these skills and expertise. And we know it would be wrong to give ourselves much, if any credit for the legal, financial and programmatic resources it takes to secure housing when you have nothing.

Besides, success is a word we don’t use much. It sends the wrong message. For one thing, while some of our friends are able to get housing, few of them escape the precarity of poverty. Consider, for example, those who “live off the government”. The typical Social Security Disability check is somewhere around $650 a month. Food stamps aside, that’s for everything. And then there is the struggle to find affordable housing. There is no wiggle room for what life often throws at us. Give it a try sometime.

Also, we don’t want to contribute to the middle class myth of independence. Such a myth does not take into account that while some start at the bottom, a few start at the top and some of us started somewhere in the middle with family resources and support abounding. Success talk allows us to buy into the idol of autonomy. Not much credit is given to the reality that we all depend on others for something. If we are honest with ourselves, interdependence is more true to human experience and to our call as Christians.

Most important, the Gospels give more value to living truthful, faithful lives than being successful in our efforts. When it comes to being with those in poverty, the story is about companionship with those who live a daily struggle. Yes, we are somewhat hesitant to talk of success.

On the other hand we have had plenty to celebrate. And, it hits me on occasion that we don’t do enough celebrating.

We’ve had plenty partying going on here as of late. Mike Turner, who has lived with us on and off since 2008, was awarded Social Security Disability last month. It was surreal. He applied for disability in April 2010. And then he waited and waited, received an occasional phone call from lawyers, filled out forms, went to appointments, then waited some more. Hurry up and wait. When we went to court on a Friday morning I expected more waiting. But as he came out of the courtroom, I could tell by his smile that the waiting was over.

What did Jesus mean when he said “The poor will always be with you?"  I’ll get back to you on that one. But what I do know is that Mike Turner went from the streets to our community and is now living in a house with friends. He will have trying times ahead as he learns to make the $650 stretch over the month. But after three years Mike knows we are in it together.

One of our favorite practices is to visit the houses of these friends for a blessing. Faces glow and eyes water up as we move from living room to bedroom and kitchen (yes, even the bathroom) to bless each space and giving thanks to God in Jesus Christ, who did some time in a stable on the streets and under the stars after all.

Mike is just one of several stories we have celebrated this past year. I’m learning what will power, patience, persistence, humility and faith it takes to transition from homelessness to stability of some kind. We have learned much by traveling this difficult road with friends. And much more to learn and much more to celebrate!

Festival of Shelters Event

We will be celebrating the Festival of Shelters this year Sunday, October 16 and Monday, October 17. This is a time we as a community spend remembering all who have experienced need and reflecting on the ways in which God has provided. We will set up shelters to represent the various types of homelessness, share in stories with friends and spend time on the streets learning more fully what life is like for the homeless.

We will begin our time together by gathering on Sunday at 4pm to hear the stories of some of our friends and celebrate the ways in which God has provided for us. The program will last until about 5:15pm at which point a group will set out for night on the streets.

Join us for the gathering, and if you are interested in sharing in the experience of time on the streets, we invite you to join us from:
1. Sun 6pm- Mon 6am OR
2. Sun 6pm- Mon 6pm OR
3. Mon 6am-Mon 6pm.

At the end of our time on the streets, we will all gather together at 6pm on Monday to share in a meal and reflect on our time. If you are interested in joining us for time on the streets please let us know by October 10.