What Is Community?

We had a barbecue last night – paid for by a contribution from Alpha Hospital, our grateful thanks to them. This occasion was of benefit to the 35 or so young people, plus volunteers, both of The Vyne and Outside Light. We had hoped that it would also have been an opportunity for building bridges within the community, between residents around the park and the young people who use it - but sadly the residents didn't take up our invitation. We were also joined by Gabby (Council Officer), Councillor Whitehand, Nick the Vicar and two of our local bobbies all of whom saw a well-behaved, engaging group of young people just having a good time.

I’m really not sure why some, at least, of the 150+ invited households didn’t join us – the barbecue was free :o). Their reluctance might have arisen from uncertainty about our stated aims, or maybe because society is increasingly insular, passive and inward-looking. We get home from work, change our clothes, eat our dinner, make a cup of something or open a bottle and settle down in front of the telly. Of course, those with young children have a different routine. I’m talking now of the majority of those who don’t.

But imagine instead a society that’s dynamic, active and outward-looking. What kind of picture does this create in your mind? Is it a positive one? Would the world - our community - be a better place if we were prepared to miss an episode of Coronation Street and – dare I say it – speak to people outside of our normal domain? Isn’t ‘relationship’ the cement that binds a society together – and aren't the virtual relationships you see on our TV soaps just a poor facsimile for real life, a voyeuristic opportunity to cast judgement on someone's virtual actions whilst forgetting that, actually, they're just the product of some writer's imagination?

Is it, perhaps the case, that some of us would rather exist outside of Society within some kind of people-free wasteland where real-life engagement only takes place on our own terms, if we want and with whom we want? I remember a time when that was certainly the case for me. Was I selfish or shy, or was it simply that bad habits had developed and it was hard to give them up? To this day, if I'm honest, I can't be sure. I really hope it was either of the latter. And I really, really hope that it's one of those two reasons that the residents didn't turn up last night - because then we'd still have hope that one day attitudes might more easily change and a real commumity might develop right here in Knaphill.

Although I’m a creationist, (in other words I can’t accept that the Universe, our Sun, our world, its diversity of animals, plants and people, my eyes, my thoughts are all the result of an accident; that somehow supreme order has arisen from explosive chaos [I’m carefully watching my garage to see whether a micro-community forms from any 'new life' developing out of the chaos there]), I also see evolution all around me. Behaviour patterns are evolving all the time and what I once saw in my own behaviour and am seeing deepen in others right now fills me with utter disquiet. My perspective has changed (like a smoker’s might when they stop) and what I now see is a disengaged society, one where its populace take little interest in whatever doesn’t directly affect them - and then complains bitterly when whatever that was turns in their direction and bites them on their behind. I see a Society that would, on the whole, rather stay in and watch TV than engage with a neighbour, let alone a stranger.

Of course, there are exceptions. Football, for instance, encourages community of sorts. Church does the same. But in both cases there is often reluctance to regard the opposing team's supporter or alternative denomination or religion with high favour. Many of us exist within our own dark little world rather than the huge, bright and wonderful world that God created for us.

But this isn’t what God wanted for us. It’s certainly not what he wanted for his church. Jesus wants His Father’s Kingdom here on Earth – one in which God’s rules apply, not ours. He wants a world in which we care for one-another, not one where we would walk by on the other side of the road. He wants a church with no walls and its people living IN the community. But how do we begin to address that if we’re not even prepared to leave our TV sets and speak to someone we don’t yet know? Or if we stay within our own limited and limiting circle of friends – perhaps as a church that spends its life contemplating its navel rather than looking out at and embracing the glorious creation that's all around us?

And yet, increasingly, I’m seeing people who are stepping out; Eileen and her volunteers at The Vyne, Drop-In; Outside Light’s volunteers; the Councillor and Council Officer who turned up with the Police last night; the new Outside Light/Vyne volunteers, John and Barnaby - we’re all beginning to see what happens when we switch off the telly and step outside of our front doors to engage with other people whether they're young or old.

What, folks, do we have to do to be able to share the positive feeling that we’re doing something good when we’re out IN the community, so that others will want to be there too and so that we can become more accepting of one another? If a free barby won't get people out, what will? :o)

I know that Gordon Brown isn’t currently very popular, despite his extremely adept handling of several major crises when he first became Prime Minister. Whatever has happened since, I believe he has basically sound motives. And perhaps it was because of those that in a recent interview he was able to come up with this quote. “Community is basically, not buildings but thousands of acts of friendship and generosity and support for people” Gordon Brown August 2009.

Maybe there's a clue - not just for the wider community but for churches too. And it's a definition that I feel Jesus would have endorsed whole-heartedly.