Jean Vanier is a Canadian Christian who founded the L’Arche movement. (L’Arche is French for “The Ark.”) This movement is made up of communities of mentally and physically challenged persons and “normal” people (Who among us is really normal?) who seek to live in the spirit of the Beatitudes from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Vanier is very familiar with community life and has written with compassionate wisdom on living within community. In his book Community and Growth: Our Pilgrimage Together he offers an insight which I have found especially helpful as I live with myself and others.
Vanier points out that many people who try community life are looking for the ideal community—a utopia where all is joy and there are no struggles. Of course, there is no such place. That, by the way, is the literal meaning of the word “utopia.” It is Greek in background and means “no place” as in “nowhere.” We shall never find any ideal place this side of eternity. Not a one of us is ideal, so it stands to reason that a community of such imperfect persons will itself be imperfect. There are those who spend their lives looking for utopia—the ideal family, the ideal church, the ideal home, the ideal partner/spouse, the ideal children. All of these are forms of utopia. They do not exist. They are “nowhere” to be found in this dimension of time and space.
But that does not mean that we should not strive to grow and be better people. The question is this: Do we grow from where we are, or do we grow from where we want to be or where others want us to be? In other words, do we accept ourselves as unique creations of a loving God and grow from who we are, or do we seek to grow into something we think we should be or others think we should be?
Too much of my life and ministry has been spent assuming we should grow from where we want to be or from where others want us to be. There is an ideal—a utopia out there toward which we are to grow and that should shape our characters and lives. The older I become and the more I deal with pastoral situations, the more I realize that this is a destructive way of approaching our pilgrimages with Christ. This “utopia” approach ignores who we are now and assumes that God would have us all fit some predetermined pattern so that the end result is a succession of spiritual clones with no individuality, no freedom, and no authentic responsibility. I would suggest that when we grow from where we are (which I really believe is the only way we do grow), we are helping God create the unique “building materials” only we can offer as God moves us toward God’s ultimate goal. We know that goal is a beloved community of peace, joy, sharing, forgiveness, reconciliation, compassion, and creative freedom. What I am suggesting is that we each in our own way contribute to that splendid unity in diversity which will finally be manifested when God’s will is done “on earth as it is in heaven.” But that contribution starts with accepting and loving ourselves and then growing from where we are.
I can’t believe that God has gone to all the effort to create such a beautiful, intricate, and “wonder-full” world with such splendid variety and uniqueness with the goal of turning us all into a bunch of “ticky-tacky all in a row.” A more healthy and sensible approach is to ask people to grow from where they are now. Such an approach will allow them to accept themselves, to preserve their individuality, to offer their uniqueness to the experience of community, and to honor the God who has made them so special in the first place.
The church is a type of community, and I don’t have to tell you that it is not ideal. We have not found utopia, and we never will in this life. Perhaps we could benefit the most and violate people less if we asked ourselves and others to grow from where we are instead of from where we think we should be or from where others think we should be. Such would allow us to accept and love ourselves, which is fundamental for any growth and change. Such would make for an interesting and redemptive community. And such would ground us squarely in reality and creation instead of trying to put ourselves “nowhere.”
