in s.angelo

i'm at my parents' house in san angelo for the majority of the week. that means i have access to a computer. by the time i woke up today at 7:30, almost everyone had already left the house for school, work, etc. in bed, i was in an unsteady state of sleep and could hear the conversations that were going on in the house. they were incorporated into my dreams. i felt as though it was the first day of school, and i was going to be late.

i don't really know what to blog about today. i could write about moving, but that would just make me sad. i could write about the excitement i feel for what i'll be doing, but most everyone's heard that already.

when i tell people about what i'm doing, most ask me how i became interested in the subject. it all started with this book -

i first read excerpts from yoder's book three years ago when i wrote a paper on the political nature of the kingdom of God. then, a year and a half ago, i read the entire book for a class i was taking. i was intrigued by the issues that yoder spoke about, but wasn't convinced by all the things he said. i had issues with his thoughts on subjugation and believed that his refusal to participate in secular politics was an easy way out of dealing with the real problems of society. at the time, i was convinced that if the church was to have any significant influence on society, it would need to be active in changing policy.

i read the book again. this time for a class on social justice. the class read yoder after reading walter rauschenbusch, reinhold niebuhr, gustavo gutierrez, marvin olasky, and karen lebacqz's six theories of justice, which included philosophical and theological perspectives on social ethics. when i read yoder alongside all these others, my views on his stance began to change. everyone's solutions seemed truncated, or compromised, but yoder wasn't necessarily trying to offer any solutions. his challenge is for the church to be faithful to the politics of the kingdom it represents, whether or not they are effective. i felt i must be a pacifist, whether or not i believed war was necessary to overthrow evil dictators, because it was the way of Christ. many of my ideas began to change. but it was difficult to act the way i wanted to. i felt the only way i could enact the ideals i was challenged to embrace was if i could find a community of people who thought the same way and who were practicing things in the same way. it was during this time that i became interested in church communities that were very intentional about living together, sharing things together, visible enough to be different in the society they were living.

i began researching intentional communities and found there were so many in existance. for those interested, this page is an online directory of many intentional communities. it has a place where you can search according to different preferences. it was through this research, and much prayer, that i ended with the three different communities in mind to visit. and we all know how the story ends. i fell in love with reba place, and that's where i'll be heading on friday.


while i was in india, i read this book by shane claiborne. so much of what he writes resounds with my own dreams and passions. i felt so unoriginal knowing that someone else had been led down the same path, through simliar thought experiences. at the same time, it was extremely helpful to read. i have asked everyone in my family to read the book in order to better understand my decision to move to reba place. i hope they will.

then, there's this book that i picked up and read during my stay at reba place. it's the one that i think may cause some to squirm a little. wendell berry is very frank and speaks against practices by those on both sides of the line. but i his thoughts are valuable and have helped me better communicate the reasons for my convictions.

so, if you're interested in the things that have pushed me toward this move to chicago. these are three books i recommend.