Yesterday, I said this: I am advocating for more shared sitting spaces–where we come together, greet each other in caring ways, adopt rituals that express love and have meaning, talk with one another and share ideas, eat and drink together, find sanity and ground ourselves together, acknowledging that the world outside is not normal. I want to build safe nests together, places where we are safe and comfortable and can sing together, dance together, and be generous with one another–and more often than just once a week! I want to learn how to invite strangers to cocreate with us, to grow our community from one small fractal into the larger community and to learn what it takes to become so resilient that we are a force that predatory powers cannot defeat.

I want us, in this time of authoritarianism that we are in, not to withdraw from the world by hiding, but to remember the world’s sacredness, and to create something beautiful and invite others to enjoy it, too.

So let this church community be a place of refuge and creativity, like a nest. It is holy work in these times. Let us come home to it, not just on Sunday mornings but throughout the week, to gather our resources together and find hope together. Let us not just make plans, but put them into action, practicing different ways of being together.

Then let us go into the world to build our flock, to help others to navigate these times, too. Let this place be our spiritual home, where resilience is gathered and embodied.

And today, I don’t feel like leaving my house. So, I get it. It’s hard to get to church more than once a week when you have to work all week long or drive a distance to get there. (Of course, there are other places we can meet! Let’s be creative!)

But today, I will have to leave the house because I’ve just been informed that there are families in Mulberry that need space heaters (tonight!) and food. And this is the work that must be done, no excuses.

It reminds me that I must choose the ways of resilience over my own comfort. The echoes of history surround us, teaching us that comfort now while the world breaks apart means discomfort (or worse) later. But engaging in joyful resistance together today, means a future of thriving for all.