Deep longings and quiet whispers for a new way of life in which the fragments and fractals of life become integrated and whole are the undercurrents that have been ruminating in my soul and played a large part in moving me to San Francisco. My faith upbringing was anything but typical. I was at the convergence of a Catholic family heritage that birthed hippie parents turned Jesus followers. My education was an intermingling of conservative Christian primary school and Jesuit secondary school, combine that with growing up one of a handful of caucasians in an all Latin neighborhood, and you get a flavor for what it means to grow up in the diversity of the Bay Area. My earliest memories are full of idiosyncratic family behavoir, I remember sharing our dinner table with homeless herion addicts wrestling to get their life on track and move beyond their addictions into the life God dreamed for them. Every summer we would embark on multiple-week family camping trips where God was openly praised for the lakes we swam in, the mountains we hiked and the flora and fauna that surrounded us. We would go away to the snow on weekends with other families and, along with snowboarding, would end up having communion and discussions on the Christian scriptures. These experiences developed a palette and wet my appetite for a more holistic approach to living in harmony with God. We would attend traditional services on Sunday mornings but it was by no means the definition of our faith. Recognition of a tradition was important because it broadened perspective and tied us into a spiritual geneology but there was an understanding that our faith heritage informed, but didn't necessarily dictate the expression of our faith.
Our history is one of the raw materials used in creating a communal life with God. It's one of the threads we weave into our story, but it's up to us to take that thread into the next chapter. Only in the last 6 years have many of these realizations been translated from indistinguishable feelings into rational thought. There was a wrestling match inside my soul that plagued me as I tried to reconcile my family's understanding of faith with that of the institution. In my family experience God was relational and dynamically infused life, encouraging us to delight in Him and His creation. Food was a gift meant to be enjoyed, our bodies vehicles to engage our spiritual nature. I wrestled with how to weave my everyday life experience of a relational God with a uni-directional static church structure. As I longed for putting the pieces together I realized existing expressions and language would be insufficient. God has imparted to us an imagination and intellect in which we can dream a better future, and in turn I began to dream. It started for me in the community of high school leaders in Willow Glen and is now playing out in San Francisco. It originally began in the first century, where local tribes of people forged ways of following Jesus. It continues to this day where we must figure out what it means to follow the Master. We all live in a particular place, at a given moment in time, and within a given scientific and intellectual era. What practices, rituals, and behaviors do we need to exhibit and form in order to be the people of God in our time and place? For us this is reflected in our daily scripture reading, morning and evening prayer, hospitality, creation of cultural artifacts, and in our language. May we take the gift of imagination, creativity, and life and allow the spirit of God to infuse it with his purpose and goodness.
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