On Mourning the Possibility

Sorrow and grief spring forth naturally in any lasting relationship, whether individual or communal.  In the last three weeks, we have said good-bye to acquaintances, co-workers, friends, and family.  When you give yourself over to the work of the community and those within it over an extended period of time, grief in saying good-bye is normal.  But there exists many types of grief.  And, my parting ways from the East Nashville community pairs more with a mourning of what could have been, the possibility of deep friendships committed to the co-laboring of healthy relationships, rather than from what was.  As we take a few weeks to reflect on our time in Nashville and prepare for our work in Hawaii, it has become clear that my grief is one of potential unfulfilled.

One could infer all types of meaning to the kind of potential I speak.  It could be professional...I had plans for Emmaus Fellowship that I could not materialize.  Relationships between two disparate communities were slow to grow.  At East Nashville Cooperative Ministry, I wanted to engage churches in East Nashville to mobilize for communal change on individual, communal, and systemic levels in regards to food and poverty.  But many churches live an insular existence, keeping their heads attuned to the individual needs of those in their own buildings.  Rare was the day when a church community wanted to create with you rather than just serve in a mission project capacity.

The potential could also be relational.  In our five years, we felt we kept hitting a glass ceiling in the depth of our relationships.  As Joy and I grew closer together as a married couple, we longed for others to share life with us, to struggle with us, to challenge us, to encourage us, to laugh with us, to love us, and to join us (or for us to join them) in witnessing to the Kingdom of God among us.  We can name all of the couples/individuals who held potential to be that for us and us to them, but only a select few began to manifest in real ways.  Joy and I have talked about why having genuine friendships has been so hard for us: a different stage of life, geographical proximity, no common commitments, lack of shared goals, overlapping time, personal interests, etc.  It seemed that my contemplative activist friends met during times where church responsibilities held me from participation, and my time at Vanderbilt didn't lend itself well to joining friendships to our marriage.

In the last year, when we moved to East Nashville and joined the East Nashville Mom's Club we began to see many of our neighbors as joint friends.  And yet, we began having the conversation to move away, limiting our attachment to new relationships.  And we feel right now a loss revolving around those future relationships.

In many ways, Nashville has been for me a type of preparation.  We moved to Nashville for my education, to prepare further for the work God has for us.  School is naturally preparatory.  Yet, we could have made Nashville our permanent home.  We love the city of Nashville, but we have never felt so isolated.  In many ways, the work I was doing at the Church fits as an isolated venture delegated to an individual.  There was not a sense of shared community.  The support I needed was not necessarily monetary support (though it was necessary to continue the fellowship meal); I needed the common bond that occurs through shared experiences of those committed to a common goal.  For me, this community needed to be created- which was hard, lonely, and isolating work.  In many churches, we like to hire out professionals to do our outreach work.  We mostly know social justice is important, but we have no idea how to guide a community toward a way of life where justice happens.  When compassionate ministry or social justice or hospitality work is delegated to an individual, instead of becoming part of the social imagination of the whole community, we merely foster an illusion of restoration and communal healing.  And I'm tired of fitting in as an illusion.  The grief that I have in separating from Emmaus Fellowship is knowing and seeing some of this come to fruition.  In the last 6-9 months, a committed core group began to see and live differently in relation to our neighbors.  And I couldn't be more grateful.

But my sorrow also fits within the "idea" of community.  I often wonder whether I've been searching for some ideal community that I've placed over particular relationships.  Rather than giving myself to a place or person entirely and seeing what kind of community comes about, I've created what Bonhoeffer calls a "Wish Dream," which always destroys community.  My fear is that because we didn't see relationships blossom to our hope, that perhaps they never will wherever we go.  Or, perhaps, five years really isn't long enough to reach the depth of grace and love that we so desperately want to share with others.

My tears in leaving Nashville were genuine.  We left people and communities that we loved.  And, we will miss many of our friends and those we worked with.  But there's a small part of us that believes we missed something, a fleeting ingredient that kept hiding.