"Our Western tradition has given us an individualistic private salvation, without a support system for us to believe in it, or for us finally to see the resurrected power that comes from it."(R.Rohr "Radical Grace" p. 355)
There are times that I feel very torn between my need for community and my need to go it alone. Actually it is not all that complex. I happen to love being with people. I yearn to fit in. I'm not really very good at being alone. Yet at the same time I have had more than one experience of being in a crowded room and feeling like I was invisible.
I know the power of being in community. I've had definite experiences of it. Being part of the wrestling team in high school felt that way. Though High School was also a very lonely time interior for me. I felt it in college, yet some of what I needed could not be filled do to a choice I'd made. I've felt it at other times as well.
I know that scripture says I'm to work out my own salvation with fear and trembling, but that for me does not mean that I do it in isolation from others. How that salvation is worked out is unique, what makes it work is a community within which to test it.
I think this is true of most self-actualization. If the only person we have to reflect on who we are is ourselves, we will in fact be deceived. In true community where we are free to express our feelings and thoughts and be heard in love by others and have constructive criticism come our way, the true person hood and the real image of God emerges.
Blessings,
Ed
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