cross-gender friendships

hey all, if you haven't read Kathy Escobar's interview with her friend Dan regarding cross gender friendships, then get ye to her blog!

interview with emily

(photo by hannah)

Hey all!
I did another interview of an EmDes'er on my blog!
It's Emily!
Check it out here.

Photo Shoot with Fun Family this Saturday AM

Hey all,

In case anybody is looking for something to do this Saturday morning (December 4th) around 10am, you can come hang out with us as we take family photos of our friends, Carletta & her 9 children.

Tara and I have been wanting to do this for them as kind of a parting gift from us (Ha - well, Tara will be providing the photography... I'm moral supporter + kid coordinator:-).
We'll be picking them up around 9:30AM and driving over to Folley Park which is less than a mile from their house. [MAP] We'll just be hanging out, getting a few family shots, individual shots, and candids of course. We'll also have brunch-type food & drinks (pastries, bagels, juice, etc).

The final goal will be to present the family with at least one big print/storyboard (maybe 20"x30") for Christmas. If anybody else would like to contribute some $$ to the printing, then we'll be able to do more...

Looking forward to seeing many of you at the Schroeder party that night as well!

Connecting and Wholeness

Saw this incredible TEDx talk this morning, and I thought it would fit in well with our recent conversation about community and connecting.

PHOTO SHOOT POSTPONED...

Hey all,

Just a quick post to let everybody know that the photo shoot/picnic we were planning to do this Saturday with the Towns family has been pushed back. The mother's schedule got rearranged a bit, so we'll try again to do this probably in 2-3 weeks... I'll keep everybody in the loop.

Have a great Halloween!

- Adam

What Are the Ingredients of Community?

As another installment in our series on "community," I wanted to get these thoughts bouncing around on the blog...

Months ago, Jacob and I spent a decent amount of time working on some ideas regarding "intentional community." How is it created? How is it sustained? How is it contextualized in different living & cultural environments, e.g., rural vs. suburban vs. urban? To keep things simple, our thoughts were confined to the context of the U.S., but I'm thinking most of the conclusions can be applied across most borders and cultures...

A singular question has been running through my mind for a few years now, and I think we've talked about it here & there at EmDes:

What are the ingredients of Community?

And when I say "Community" I'm referring to the sort of experience that David recounted about his grandmother and what Joy termed as an "innate part of our humanity." The sort of connection with other people that fulfills something at our personal core.

After scribbling at the whiteboard in my garage for a while, this is the condensed version of what Jacob & I concluded:

There isn't really any order intended in this list except for the two items above the line: Proximity & Commitment. Those two seemed foundational to achieving the depth of connection that we're talking about. There's a lot that could be said about each aspect of this "recipe", but I don't want this post to get too long.

What do you think about these ingredients?

COMMUNITY: Our Collective Thoughts

Hey everybody,

Upon reading Donald Miller's recent blogpost, What “we” are missing in our lives…, I was reminded of the various talks we've had over the months about doing a blog series here centered on the concept of "community." Let's do it!

The structure will be pretty loose [as with all things EmDes:-].

The idea will be to simply offer your reflections on "community."

Where does your mind go when you hear that word? What are great examples of community both in past times and in our modern context? How is community created/achieved? Why is it important? What are the aspects of it that you just don't understand or make you frustrated? etc.

I'm trying to get everybody who's involved with the cohort author-invitations if they aren't already contributors (please let me know if I've overlooked somebody or if you have questions on how to post your thoughts). This is open to everyone, and I'm excited to see where this goes...

- Adam

reconciliation

Here's a link to a thoughtful post about reconciliation by Rachel Held Evans. In it, she shares several stories of others who share what they consider living a story of reconciliation looks like. Please take a few moments to read it-it's refreshing.

certainty and doubt

Yesterday, we talked a bit about those who hold certain beliefs true and those who are holding doubts. Is there room for both people in our group? Are there people who could come to our gathering and feel unwelcome because of issues in their life?

It was an interesting discussion, and I think it really challenged many of us. I certainly was engaged, and I learned so much from people who have actually faced certain situations in their lives. It's one thing to pose a hypothetical situation, but to hear answers from real situations is humbling.

I thank everyone who shared stories.

It's true that context and relationship can change us. It's one thing to have an opinion or belief, but it up-ends us when someone we love comes to us in their pain.

Thoughts?

Chili Dinner This Sunday!

Hey folks,

If you're able to make it this Sunday, you get to look forward to Debbie & Sheri's world famous White Chicken Chili!

Let's all bring something to round out the rest of the meal, if we can. Here are some ideas of what will be needed:

- chili toppings
- cornbread
- biscuits, etc
- desserts

Leave a comment here with what you plan to bring so we don't end up with 52 biscuits and no cheese (we NEED cheese:)

*Photo credit - "PotteryBarn Part Deux (Terri)"

Progression of Community

Hey everybody,

I was reflecting on Sunday's conversation regarding the first installment of Rob Bell's Jesus Is Difficult series on Gossip, and I had some thoughts/questions I'd like to throw out to the group...


We've touched on these ideas before, but I want open up the discussion again on our [Emerging Desert's] progression of community. One thing that struck me about the conversation on Sunday (or the portion I was able to observe) was that a number of people identified the assumption of closeness in Rob's main points. That is to say, his teaching about how to deal with conflict and thus gossip hinged on an assumption of relational maturity or closeness. I think we have/are/will continue to witness a beautiful evolution of community within EmDes, but I still sense that there is plenty of ground to cover in deepening our relationships. Or to frame it another way, Rob's talk about conflict resolution, etc. made me wonder if we, as a community, are deep enough into each other's lives to even merit that depth of conflict resolution if one should arise (which really hasn't yet to my knowledge). Does that even make sense?

To offer an answer to my own silly question: I think we're getting there. Like I said, a number of us have committed to doing this journey together, and much progress has been made. But we still have a way to go, I think. So I guess the wrap-up questions are these:

- Is our ongoing progression of community something that simply takes time (so we should just keep doing what we're doing), OR is there some increased level of intentionality that would be good for us to collectively put into action?

- If we lean towards "doing more," what would that look like for us as a group? Of course there's a individual aspect to all of this, but should we add an element to our weekly gatherings in which we some how make ourselves more known to each other (whatever that might mean), or would that feel too forced?

Any and all thoughts are greatly welcome!