An inner core of silence

And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone. (Matthew 14:23) 

Fr. Kevin, Rector of St. Clements, Seattle, sends out a form of the Daily Office each morning. Each includes a reflection. Here’s today’s.[i]

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I can only speak for myself, but I feel bombarded and weary - which are not to be confused with depressed or anxious.  These days, everything is new though it piggybacks on yesterday.  The change is constant, not a bad thing, but constant.  Sometimes, my head feels like a boomerang.  BOING!

These are times when I reluctantly feel called to silence, solitude, quiet: turn off the radio, the TV, the computer, even the phone, put in my earplugs and go about my business.  I light a candle at my home shrine reminding me to be intentional in acknowledging the Presence.  Acknowledging doesn't mean talking.  It means acknowledgment, affirming what is without words.  Then reluctance goes away.

Even Jesus felt overwhelmed at times by what was swirling around him and went off to pray, to acknowledge, to be in the silence and absorb the Presence of which he was even a part.  The silence seems to have cleared his mind, been a source of refreshment resulting in peace. 

I frequently talk about what we Christians are called to "do," vital things to which God calls us to transform our world.  But more importantly, we are called "to be," the place from which our action proceeds.  For me - and mind you, I'm only speaking of myself - the silence gives me a place before the Presence to reconnect with my own sense of self, my own integrity and authenticity which are rooted in God.  Once reconnected, I can return to the world of doing with a better sense of what I am doing.  

So, now, I will shut up, light the candle, acknowledge the Presence, bask in the solitude and reconnect.  

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The Order of the Ascension (OA) has taken on a small, but important, project to offer people a pathway into Fr. Kevin’s “silence, solitude, quiet.” And we recognize the reluctance he notes. It can be difficult to begin.

We believe that some will be helped by associating themselves with one of the church’s religious orders. Living in communion with one of these “Communities of love, prayer and service” has been a great help for many.

In 1988, after five years of communal formation, we gathered in the chapel at General Seminary to take the Promise, “To seek the presence of Jesus Christ in the people, things and circumstances of life through stability, obedience and conversion of life.” The week prior was spend with Fr. Ken Leech on retreat. In those days all the Professed Members were priests. He said this to us,

Any authentic priesthood must derive from an inner core of silence, a life hid with Christ in God ...Only those who are at home with silence and darkness will be able to survive in, and minister to, the perplexity and confusion of the modern world. Let us seek that dark silence out of which an authentic ministry and a renewed theology can grow and flourish.

Of course, the message applies to all the baptized. And yet, it remains true that priests, and the Professed of the church’s religious orders, have a special duty to find a home in silence and solitude.

Fr. Allchin wrote a short booklet some years ago on the religious life in the Anglican tradition.  He wrote that theirs was, “a life which overflowed into activity, not an activity supported by a life.”[ii] It was from the life of love and prayer in these communities that service flowed into the world and the church. They worked with the poor and desperate, those most impacted by plagues and hunger, with orphans and prostitutes. They partnered with the priests of the slum parishes. Their love and prayer overflowed into activity. And that life of sacrifice and compassion kindled a flame in much of the church.

Might becoming an associate of a religious order assist you in silence and solitude?

rag+

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[i] With permission. The Rev’d Kevin Corbin Smith

[ii] A. M. Allchin, “The Theology of the Religious Life: An Anglican Approach”, S.L.G. Press, 1971

Postings on the inner life and the virus

You know, and they know, that they are offering their lives    

Intercessions and the virus              Solitude.                                                                             

The mystery of the cross                 Solitude in Surrey                                                         

We'll meet again                            God's not indifferent to our pain            

Endures all things                          Becoming an Associate of a Religious Order

People Touch

Spiritual vitality and authenticity      The path of servanthood

Down into the mess                        Missing the Eucharist 

In you we live                                Faith to perceive

Faith to perceive: In your great compassion  

Turn everything that happens to account

We no longer know what to do        The cares and occupations

The Peace of God

Postings on Parish Development during the Virus

Power from the center pervades the whole           To everything there is a season

Faith to perceive: Remaining inseparable            Communities of love, prayer and service 

That blessed family

The Trinity is that blessed family into which we are adopted. Austin Farrer 

The poster said, “Nonviolent Commitment.” The boards said, “we are afraid.” There’s a “March for Black Lives” in West Seattle today.

This morning I was walking along California Avenue. It’s my usual route. More stores were boarded up then yesterday. A week ago, none had boards over the windows. I took a few pictures.

I have seen violence and strife in the city (Ps. 55)

There was a woman out watering the hanging plants. She asked me, “What do you make of it?” I said, “They’re afraid." She thought that was correct. She added, “I wish they had put signs in the windows that we’re welcoming and supportive.”  Fair enough!

There were such signs in some windows with messages of support and love. There were also a few signs that tried to identify with the protesters in one way or another, they cried, “Please don’t hurt me, I’m one of you” There was one that said, “You’re on camera. No cash here, only dresses, call if you want one.”

The march organizers were working hard to ensure that it would be non-violent. The poster said, “Please join us in this peaceful march as violence will not be tolerated.” and "To be very clear: the organizers of this event do not support any destruction or violence towards people or businesses.” My Anglican heart was enlarged to see the poster had a quote from Bishop Tutu, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

I bind unto myself today
The power of God to hold and lead

We are told that “perfect love casts out fear.”[i] And we know that such love is in the life of the Blessed Trinity. The life of mutual love, which is the Trinity, is expressed in microcosm in the life of each parish church, and even more deeply in the life of the church’s religious orders. We are baptized into that life and love.

Today I will hold on my heart before God those marching for justice and truth. I will also include others—the woman watering the plants, the police officers who are worn out and on edge, the store owners who have already lost so much. There is fear in the city. There is also much hope and love. Today I will strive to align myself more fully with the life of the Holy Trinity.

rag+

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[i] There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. (1 John 4:18)

Later in the day - pictures of the protest

Faith in the Darkness

You are a source of strength for those who have lost hope. You are a voice of calm in the midst of chaos. You are a steady light in days of darkness. The time has come to be what you believe. Steven Charleston

 and

Any authentic priesthood must derive from an inner core of silence, a life hid with Christ in God ...Only those who are at home with silence and darkness will be able to survive in, and minister to, the perplexity and confusion of the modern world. Let us seek that dark silence out of which an authentic ministry and a renewed theology can grow and flourish. Kenneth Leech during the 1988 OA retreat

The first part of this is Mother Erika's reflection in the weekly update from the Church of the Atonement, Chicago. She's given her permission to offer it here.

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I am drowning in words.

Every day I scroll through my news feeds and see words of lament and anger, of frustration and grief. They are words that increasingly reflect the chasmic divisions in our land. The cracks in our society are so deep and so wide that they have caused millions of other, smaller fractures, a spiderweb of brokenness that spreads over everyone and everything. These smaller divisions are what’s showing up on my feed this week as a constant, cocky barrage of criticism. Someone makes a statement about systemic racism, or the actions of our government, or the actions of the Church, or about their feelings, and there is a whole crowd of people waiting in the wings to tear apart whatever they’ve said. Someone expresses outrage, and someone else yells at them for being outraged about the wrong thing. Someone makes a statement of support, and someone else screams that their statement didn’t go far enough, or wasn’t written quickly enough. Someone offers a prayer or a symbol of support, and someone else scoffs that we’re long past the time for prayers and symbols.

I feel like I’m choking on the words.

Now I understand that the kind of criticism I’m talking about is not the same as violence at the hands of racists and racist systems. I understand that my discomfort at watching my friends and colleagues tear each other apart is only that – discomfort. But it is still disheartening, at a time when the unity of the Church and indeed of all faithful people is critical to effect positive change in this nation, to watch the speed at which people are jumping to judge, criticize, and ridicule others from the relative safety of their living rooms as they type ferociously into their phones. Of course, I understand, too, that many of these words are pure reaction, born of fear. It’s hard to be thoughtful and compassionate when your body is pumping with adrenaline and most of your higher-order thinking has been shut down for the night. But that doesn’t diminish the fact that many of the words that are being spoken in our public forums are cloaking the world in more and more darkness.

And then, this morning, I was graced with this sliver of light, written by the Rt. Reverend Steven Charleston, former Bishop of Alaska and former Dean of the Episcopal Divinity School. I pray that when you read this, you, too, will feel the same rush of breath deep into your lungs that I did, that you will feel your heart lift in your chest and the ground suddenly firm under your feet.

Now is the moment for which a lifetime of faith has prepared you. All of those years of prayer and study, all of the worship services, all of the time devoted to a community of faith: it all comes down to this, this sorrowful moment when life seems chaotic and the anarchy of fear haunts the thin borders of reason. Your faith has prepared you for this. It has given you the tools you need to respond: to proclaim justice while standing for peace. Long ago the Spirit called you to commit your life to faith. Now you know why. You are a source of strength for those who have lost hope. You are a voice of calm in the midst of chaos. You are a steady light in days of darkness. The time has come to be what you believe.

My friends, we are not children of the darkness, but children of light. The time has come to be what you believe.

What, beloved, will you be?

Yours in Christ,

The Rev’d Erika L. Takacs, Rector

Further refection  

Any authentic priesthood must derive from an inner core of silence, a life hid with Christ in God ...Only those who are at home with silence and darkness will be able to survive in, and minister to, the perplexity and confusion of the modern world. Let us seek that dark silence out of which an authentic ministry and a renewed theology can grow and flourish. Kenneth Leech during the 1988 OA retreat

Early this morning the Order of the Ascension (OA) met in Chapter (on Zoom of course). We were reviewing an internal survey our Presiding Sister, Michelle Heyne, OA, had sent out.

Later, when I read Erika’s reflection, I was hit with a flood of feelings and connections. It was one of those moments when you can find yourself thinking “we are having the same thoughts.”

Our OA discussion was about the parishioners in our parishes. At one-point Brother Scott send us all a PDF from ERD, “Emotional Lifecycle of a Disaster.” That set off several responses.

Illusion to Prayer

The Order has been exploring offering an on-line class on the spiritual life model in Henri Nouwen’s book Reaching Out.

 

We talked about how the energy of most parishes has been on “gathering.” Both when we first responded to the virus and now whether is talk of “opening up.” And on the sense of sadness, even depression, people have felt in the absence of normal gathering. Someone mentioned how unprepared we were for this. So, we’ve spent a lot of time trying to have a shadow life. Necessary but not really satisfying. Then we noted the connection with Nouwen’s thinking—our parishes had not prepared people for solitude.

Then we looked at what Scott had sent us. In that life cycle people went from Heroic to Honeymoon to Disillusionment.  Then we connected that with Nouwen—as we were not prepared to live this time as one of solitude, once the positive energy of the Honeymoon period ended, would we experience an upswing in Hostility?  Mother Erika’s message seems to point in the same direction, “But it is still disheartening, at a time when the unity of the Church and indeed of all faithful people is critical to effect positive change in this nation, to watch the speed at which people are jumping to judge, criticize, and ridicule others from the relative safety of their living rooms as they type ferociously into their phones.” Hostility rising out of our lack of ability for solitude? 

Conversatio

For stability means that I must not run away from where my battles are being fought, that I have to stand still where the real issues have to be faced. Obedience compels me to re- enact in my own life that submission of Christ himself, even though it may lead to suffering and death, and conversatio, openness, means that I must be ready to pick myself up, and start all over again in a pattern of growth which will not end until the day of my final dying. And all the time the journey is based on that Gospel paradox of losing life and finding it. ..my goal is Christ. Esther deWaal

Someone in the “room” spoke to our Benedictine Promise. We understand conversion of life to include the truth that God is with us in our new life. To what extent during the pandemic, have we said the theologically correct things about God’s presence while acting as though God had left us, and now with re-opening, God was returning? God will return when we open up again. 

And as we experience the continuing limitations on gathering, and the possibility of a virus resurgence, will we engage the new life?  A new life that may call us to find God in the solitude. In the grief. In the sense of absence. Find God in the life we have instead of the life we wish we had. 

Everyone and the apostolic

Then there was brief mention of the need to address this in a two-fold manner. Everyone in the parish needed to hear about these spiritual dynamics. It was a way of understanding and providing perspective on what they where experiencing.  And, we need to provide ways of going deeper with those of apostolic faith and practice. That center of the parish, it’s heartbeat, needed to be strengthened for the sake of the whole Body. Steven Charleston's wisdom for the clergy was also wisdom for the apostolic center in every parish church. 

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Chaos the eventual hope

Dimly he knew at what end the attack aimed; some disintegrating force was being loosed at the vessel—not conquest, but destruction, was the purpose, and chaos the eventual hope.

The looters, the brick throwers, a few members of City Council, and Donald Trump—a disintegrating force, chaos the eventual hope.

I’ve watched Jenny Durkan, the Mayor of Seattle, and Carmen Best, the police chief, doing their best to make clear the difference between those protesting the crime against George Floyd and those who would tear the city apart. Trying to explain the difference between a police officer who would kneel on a handcuffed man’s neck for almost nine minutes and officers struggling to stay calm and disciplined in the face of threats and their own fears.

Those protesting for justice, the officers protecting their right to assemble and speak, the mayor and the police chief, the citizens who came to clean up downtown, the city’s clergy—are all on the same side.

Those looting and destroying stores, fighting with the police; and those in positions of authority enabling the violence; cops engaged in acts of brutality,and a president dispersing peaceful demonstrators so he could hold a Bible while standing in front of an Episcopal Church—are all on the same side.

Moral discernment can be tricky. Some confuse being able to “understand” the forces that drive destructive behavior with rationalizing, and thereby legitimating, the behavior. Some use slogans instead of considered thinking, e.g., "we don't condone the violence but we also don't condemn it," and "people over property"(thereby washing away the loss of jobs, access to needed supplies, and the sense of fear that has been engendered), and there's attempts on the right and the left to appropriate Martin Luther Kings comments on riots (here's the actual speech). That doesn’t make them evil, just wrong and morally confused. Others seem to revel in the chaos. They aren’t simply confused. They set out to hurt and damage. They have allied themselves with the destruction. It’s a bit harder to see the divine image in them. Even then, for the sake of truth, our nation, and our own souls, we must try.

In response to yesterday’s post, a friend wrote, “You help me persist, though I’m not always sure at what. It is at least persisting in a refusal to despair.” Maybe Charles Williams can help.  

Charles Williams has been a help in my journey. In War in Heaven, there’s a scene in which malign forces are attacking the Graal. There’s an Archdeacon, Duke and Kenneth in the room. Here’s some of what happens—

Archdeacon: “It may be that God is dissolving it but I think there is devilry. Make yourselves paths for the Will of God. …Pray …”

Duke: “Against what shall we pray?”

Archdeacon: “Against nothing. Pray that He who made the universe may sustain the universe.”

A profound silence followed, out of the heart of which there arose presently a common consciousness of effort.  … They existed knit together, as it were, in a living tower built up around the sacred vessel, and through all the stones of the tower it’s common life flowed. Yet to all their apprehensions, and especially to the priest’s, which was the most vivid and least distracted, this life received and resisted an impact from without. The tower was indeed a tower of defense, though it offered no aggression, and resisted whatever there was to be resisted merely by its own immovable calm. 

In the priest: Dimly he knew at what end the attack aimed; some disintegrating force was being loosed at the vessel—not conquest, but destruction, was the purpose, and chaos the eventual hope. … Silence and knowledge were communicated to him as if from an invisible celebrant; he held the Cup no longer as a priest, but as if he set his hands on that which was itself at once the Mystery and the Master of the Mystery.

May the priestly people of God pray—That He who made the universe may sustain the universe.

This morning Bishop Peter Eaton issued a pastoral message in response to the President’s sacrilege. In it he wrote this,

Yet, however our history has been shaped and by whom, all of us bear responsibility for taking our part in righting the wrongs of centuries, and it does rest with the President and the Administration to respond to the present crisis in ways that actually advance the American dream, and that do not perpetuate the nightmare from which we never seem to be able fully to awaken.  There are many rights at stake here, well beyond the Second Amendment - rights that are rarely mentioned, and even more rarely upheld.

Nor can the Church simply criticise.  The Church must be ready to take our place with the Government and all others in any and all endeavours of good will and sound principle that seek to make this country the nation we were brought to birth to become.

It must further be said that we are not meant to stand in front of churches and other houses of faith; we are meant to enter them, pray in them, be formed by the community of faith that worships in them, and be changed. And Bibles are not meant to be held up; they are meant to be read, marked, learnt, and inwardly digested.

If we really mean the words of this majestic prayer in our Prayer Book, it will have consequences:

Almighty God, who hast given us this good land for our heritage: We humbly beseech thee that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of thy favor and glad to do thy will. Bless our land with honorable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogance, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindreds and tongues. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in thy Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to thy law, we may show forth thy praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in thee to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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The Peace of God

Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” (John 20: 19b-21)

 There are two images I now carry from yesterday’s protests in Bellevue and Seattle.

I send you

The first was when Bellevue Police Chief Steve Mylett asked a protester to help him kneel. She gently held him as they knelt together. A few minutes later he asked if she could help him up, she does saying, “We got you.” Chief Mylett started by saying, ”What happened to George Floyd was wrong! It was a crime.” A young man addressed the crowd “My father was the first black chief of police in Tacoma.” Mylett reaches over and touches his shoulder.

Here’s a video of the encounter

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. (John 14:27)

To receive the Peace of God is to be created anew. Something unexpected is to happen. We’ll only get to experience it for a moment at a time. It will be there and then gone.

To our wounds only God’s wounds can speak[i]

The second, was late last night. I was watching a live stream of the Seattle protest. The demonstrators had ended up in Westlake Park, in the center of downtown. There were two scenes that touched me. One was when a senior police officer went to the rear of the speaker’s platform. A few police officers and the leaders from the stage came close and talked. The police asked, “What’s your game plan.” They were clearly all listening to one another. It was calm and respectful.

The other, was later. The crowd had thinned. Maybe 150 protesters remained in the area. The police were in a line blocking access to an intersection. They had a plan to move the demonstrators out of the downtown back toward Capitol Hill where they had originally come from. An officer had made four announcements over the past hour saying that there was a curfew in effect (5:00 pm – 5:00 am). It was now about 10:00 pm. Five hours into the curfew. At the intersection the police, support by National Guard troops, put on gas masks. About ten yards away demonstrators knelt and stood. In between were a few people trying to influence the crowd. There were those asking people to remain peaceful and to go home and return on Monday at 3:00 pm. There were a couple of others, more agitated, I don’t know if there is any meaning in it. But those asking people to go home were black and those asking them to stay (and fight) were white. One yelling, “This isn’t a protest, this is a revolution.” The police eventually began moving people away and there was little resistance. I went to bed.

I then lay in my bed remembering. I thought of 57 years ago. Marching in the streets of Chester with deputized white trash collectors with clubs threatening. I thought of all the demonstrations as part of CORE, all the later anti-racism attempts to educate, and of standing in cassock between white and black teens ready to fight. And I found myself at Peace with the young protesters in Westlake Park. My inner grumbling about their lack of skill in negotiating, their lack of training in non-violence, their sometime over the top outrage, they yell and don't sing—faded away. They wanted justice. They would sacrifice for justice. They were courageous and persistent. And I thought about police officers I’d known. An uncle, a parishioner, the one who wouldn’t allow us to play in the intersection and took our football. Doing a hard job. Wanting to come home to their families each night. Serving and protecting. And like the protesters, flawed and in pain.

The heavens frighten us; they are too calm

   In all the universe we have no place to be.

Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?

  Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars, we claim Thy grace.[ii]

I can’t breathe

There’s a political cartoon in yesterday’s Philadelphia Inquire—"The Statue of Liberty can’t breathe.”  An African American Statue of Liberty is sitting holding two African American bodies in her lap. One is labeled “police killing” the other “Covid.” The two experiences of our nation are joined.  The suffering of the virus and the oppression. The need for the Peace of God—it’s mercy and justice, calmness and harmony—a peace that lies within, a peace that flows into action.

The peace of God, which passes all understanding

We can do two things. Two things in response to our Lord’s gift of Peace.  We can nurture it in ourselves and we can learn to see it when it happens.

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:15)

Because we are of the Body we have access to the peace of God. And as we do that, we become instruments of God’s peace, in family and with friends, at work and as citizens.

Ours is to place ourselves in the pathways of grace. To engage the practices and disciplines of faith that feed inner peace—Eucharist and Office, silence and spiritual reading. Not the self-serving peace of passivity but the risking peace of Christ—"as the Father has sent me, so I send you.” It is the stuff that renews the earth.

For the blood of thy martyrs and saints shall enrich the earth, shall create holy places. From such ground springs that which forever renews the earth. Though it is forever denied. T.S. Eliot

Over the last few months I have returned again and again to the icon of the Martyrs of Memphis.  What was the peace they knew as they ministered to those with Yellow Fever, as they suffered and died? What was the peace known by Constance and the Mother Superior as they brought additional sisters into the danger? I have found myself pondering this, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

             Consider becoming an associate of a religious order.

rag+

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[i] “He showed them His Hands and His side.” From “Jesus of the Scars, and other Poems” by Edward Shillito. In Readings in St. John’s Gospel, William Temple. p 366.

[ii] As above. Shillito wrote the poem toward the end of World War One. Peter Wehner drew on the poem in “What It Means to Worship a Man Crucified as a Criminal”

 The first picture is a piece by Allan Rohan Crite.

The icon of Constance and her Companions was done by writer Suzanne Schleck. It is part of the icon series “The Anglo Catholics."

There was a third image. It's been posted many times. Some see a Seattle officer placing his knee on the neck of a man being arrested. There's outrage. Though some believe the knee is on the mans shoulder. I can't tell. Here's what I see--a chaotic scene in which police are interfering with people looting a store and fleeing when the police arrive. A man running who is taken down by two officers. One officer places his knee either on the man's neck (if so, did he learn nothing!) or on a shoulder. Someone is cursing and yelling "Take your knee off his neck." The second officer reaches across and moves the first officer's knee. The Peace of God is in the officer who moves his partner's knee. Enough in control of himself to hear the yelling and/or notice the knee. Courageous enough to risk offending the other officer. I think this is what we want in our officers. To be willing to correct an officer engaged in a morally problematic act and for the other officer to accept the correction.   What do you see? What do make of it?

The story of Bellevue's police chef was repeated in various ways across the country. In NY City Chief of Department Terry Monahan, the highest ranking uniformed officer, was leading a group of officers facing off with protesters who were hurling bottles and other debris. A protest organizer tried to hold the demonstrators back but was unsuccessful. “He tried -- we kept backing up, they kept advancing,” Monahan said. Monahan asked for a protester's megaphone so he could address the crowd. "This does not need to be riotous every single night." The protest leader then asked the chief to take a knee with him for peace, and when he complied the crowd cheered. "Have a good day, I love you," a protester said before hugging Monahan. Another NYC event. In Flint, MI and other places. In Camden, NJ. And in DC protesters turn over  to police a person destroying property (note it is mislabeled as being a black-white clash.) A hug in Louisville. A BBC report on the hug. 

Postings on the inner life and the virus

You know, and they know, that they are offering their lives    

Intercessions and the virus              Solitude.                                                                             

The mystery of the cross                 Solitude in Surrey                                                         

We'll meet again                            God's not indifferent to our pain            

Endures all things                          Becoming an Associate of a Religious Order

People Touch

Spiritual vitality and authenticity      The path of servanthood

Down into the mess                        Missing the Eucharist 

In you we live                                Faith to perceive

Faith to perceive: In your great compassion  

Turn everything that happens to account

We no longer know what to do        The cares and occupations

The Peace of God

Postings on Parish Development during the Virus

Power from the center pervades the whole           To everything there is a season

Faith to perceive: Remaining inseparable            Communities of love, prayer and service