What is a community? Simple question but complex answers. The basic definition is people sharing a common interest or within a geographic area. Thus an individual who enjoys jazz shares a common interest even if they do not know anyone else with the same interest. Individuals living on housing estates, or within the boundaries of a church or secular parish may be described as communities of geography.
An individual may be a member of several communities of interest: work, leisure activities, hobbies, race, sexuality, economic. A geographic community will not be homogenous but very diverse. Take for example an housing estate comprising properties formerly rented out by a local authority. There will be individuals who rent from an housing association, owner-occupiers and owners who rent on the private market. There will be old people, young people, those in employment, unemployed, sofa surfers, those with addictions, a multi-racial estate etc. All with different interests, hopes and concerns.
So, when people speak of community engagement what does that mean, particularly in a church context? Is it a 'one size fits all' approach or is the plan to target specific groups? Does a church attempt a go it alone approach or seek to collaborate with other faith organisations, secular charities, businesses or the statutory sector?
More importantly, what is the motivation or purpose behind churches becoming involved with community engagement? It is a long-held opinion of mine that the belief system as encapsulated in the Nicene Creed is far removed from the teaching of Jesus with its emphasis on loving your neighbour, kindness, helping, justice and sense of community.
Carl Krieg suggests the following:
“Change the message, returning it to what Jesus actually taught and did. That change is basic, and it conforms to what people need and want to hear because everyone understands love. The current images of what the church represents- sacrifice on a cross, walking on water, even hell- must be replaced by images of love and community, images that represent who God is and who we are. A non-dogmatic approach is mandatory and would open the doors to people who come from different backgrounds and are at differing stages of life and faith formation. There must be no room for a fundamentalist attitude of “here it is, take it or leave it”. It is that attitude, masquerading as faith, that made the pews empty in the first place. The purpose of the church is not to convert, not to get people to join. The purpose of the congregation is to continually grow in awareness and fellowship within itself, while also providing for society at large a welcoming place where spirituality, love, and justice are practiced. Should those efforts prove successful, growth will come naturally.”
Do you, or your church, engage in social action, action in the world outside your church as a means to an end, namely to evangelise? Or does it engage on the basis that it is the teaching attributed to Jesus in the synoptic gospels to get alongside and support the poor, the needy, the outcast, the marginalised in their hour of need and also to seek justice?
Going into communities is to leave the comfort zone of the church and enter a world that has a range of values, expectations, worries and concerns. How to relate? Certainly not by pushing a gospel message. Motivated by the core principle of love your neighbour it is essential to display care, concern, compassion, connection, consideration, but as equals, not by being patronising of paternalistic. The key is to get alongside individuals, to show by words and actions that you are there for them and an integral part of the community. No 'us' and 'them'. You are with them and they are with you. Seek to dismantle barriers. By a process of osmosis the particular community(ies) you are connected with will imperceptibly come to understand and share your message of love.
Unlike mixed ecology it is not about numerical increase in church attendance. It is about showing the love of Jesus to a disbelieving world, to show the church is not an inward looking private club but a body for, of and with those it serves.
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