All
aspects of our life—emotional, spiritual, physical, etc.—call for deep
relationships in order to foster healthy living. We can merely skim the surface
of scripture to uncover the loaded truth that Man shouldn’t be alone in the
Book of Genesis. Even during Christ’s three years of public ministry he
surrounded himself with his disciples. He made sure to find a space for
solitude to pray to the Father, but many of his waking hours (when he wasn’t
preaching or healing) were spent in the company of twelve men—his friends. He
walked with them. He ate with them. He lived with them. He was God, yet they
aided and nourished his natural development, just like food, water, sleep and
other natural things did. God, in deigning to become a man, allowed himself to
be nourished by human relationships, by community.
True
community embodies the type of relationships that ask us to relinquish some of
our aloneness and autonomy. Community
invites us to delve into the messy life of human relationships that won’t
always make us feel good, shattering the ego-crafted miracle that we know all
too well when left to our own devices… We are – and never were – alone as God’s
sons and daughters.
--Chris
Hazell,
Why We So Desperately Need
Community,
Word on Fire
To read
Chris Hazell’s full article, click here.
Image
source: OLMC 2011 Parish Picnic
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