
Habitat
noun | hab·i·tat | \ˈha-bə-ˌtat\ | the place or environment where a plant or animal naturally or normally lives and grows
A lot of us are looking for a place, a habitat. Among our ranks are those unfamiliar with church (for whom the whole religious subculture seems foreign or spooky or weird) … alongside those who spent years faithfully toiling and attending church but have lost our appetite for it … alongside those who feel caught in-between and no longer know what to call ourselves (post-evangelical? emergent? progressive?).
We are spiritual. But we are not institutionalized.
We are not being rebellious. But we insist on relevance.
We reject the conformity and tribalism that pervades the holy huddles beneath so many steeples. But we long for community and connection.
We are spiritual. But we are also intellectual, and social, and political, and environmental, and most of all, evolving.
Is there a place for us? If not, perhaps it’s time for us to create our own space.
“Habitat” is defined (by Merriam-Webster, of course) as “the place or environment where a plant or animal naturally or normally lives and grows.” Let’s think of habitat as the environment most conducive to the thriving of a species. Each of us needs a habitat, a place where we thrive on all levels and in all aspects of life. Different species need different environments — a polar bear would not survive in the Sahara, an elm tree would not reach its full height in the peaks of the Rocky Mountains. The environment where I thrive may not appeal to you, and vice versa, and that’s fine, so long as we allow one another space in the habitat where we belong.
So, what kind of environment causes thriving?
If the traditional American church experience seems more like a suffocating greenhouse than a real-life garden bursting with life and growth and fruitfulness, then how can we discover or create a habitat conducive to the thriving of our particular species?
While wandering in search of a habitat, I stumbled across a story.
This story has been helpful to me in imagining (and hopefully, eventually, finding or creating) a habitat.
Two friends are traveling an ancient road in first-century Palestine during a time of personal crisis. They devoted the past three years of their lives to following an itinerant rabbi named Jesus but now are confused, bitterly disappointed, unsure how to cope as the ground collapses beneath them.
Yes, this is a Jesus story, taken from the last chapter of the Gospel According to Luke. Jesus, whom these two friends believed to be the long-awaited messiah to redeem their people, was instead executed by the political and religious authorities. They felt like they’d been left stranded … unable to return to a religious system that rejected them, and which they had outgrown. Trying to figure out what to do next. Feeling out-of-place, no longer belonging to the old, familiar places but uncertain if a new place could be found.
In that moment of crisis, they nevertheless found habitat.
Habitat is about a journey.
They were traveling along the road that led to the village of Emmaus. As they walked, they engaged in deep conversation about the tragedy that had just transpired. They recalled favorite memories of their time spent with Jesus, profound teachings etched on their hearts. They asked questions and wondered together what had become of him, and what would become of them. They unearthed deep doubts and confessed their fear and despair.
They were leaving one place, on a journey to another. They could no longer settle comfortably in Jerusalem, or Judaism. Jesus inspired a restlessness in their hearts that compelled them to seek out something more than their tradition could provide. Fr. Richard Rohr describes this as a “movement through unknowing,” which “is necessary in all encounters, relationships, or intellectual breakthroughs.”
As Fr. Richard has said:
You normally have to let go of the old and go through a stage of unknowing or confusion before you can move to another level of awareness or new capacity. This opening up and letting go is largely what we mean by faith, and it explains why doubt and faith are correlative terms. People of great faith often suffer bouts of great doubt because they continue to grow.
This journey is only possible when our disatisfaction with the status quo becomes more intolerable than our fear of change.
Many of us have gone through a time of spiritual deconstruction — reexamining the faith tradition we inherited, reevaluating our belief system, taking it apart (deconstructing) and examining the parts, keeping some and rejecting others. Deconstruction is not the same as rejection. Deconstruction is a necessary part of the process of reconstruction, just as demolition is often a necessary part of renovation or rebuilding. Jesus said he did not come to abolish the Jewish religious system, but to fulfill it … to bring it to full potential, to extend its meaning and purpose. Deconstruction is a necessary process, but it is not the end of the journey. We need to find our way through deconstruction to the other side … to a new level, or a deeper realm, of faith in relationship with God.
The very process of journeying — the hardships, the discoveries, the growth along the way — is needful. And it is always a blessing to share the road with others who are on the same journey.
Habitat is about a conversation.
At some point in their wandering, Jesus joined the pair on the road and entered their conversation.
They weren’t looking for Jesus. They didn’t even recognize him or realize when he showed up. (Luke says “their eyes were kept from recognizing him.”) I suspect that Jesus, unrecognized, is hanging around anywhere honest conversations are being held. That’s because conversation … really good conversation, not mere chitchat or polite pleasantries … requires community, transparency, humility, and an unselfish focus on another person.
Conversation is therefore a better avenue toward understanding than is sermonizing. The mutual sharing, the give-and-take of ideas, the questions-and-responses, reveals more truth than can be gleaned in a lecture. We can learn more from our community than from relying on the expertise of distant professionals.
If we’re engaged in the journey and transparent with others about our fears, and doubts, and questions, Jesus has a way of showing up. Whether we realize it or not.
Conversation implies a lot about how we relate to one another. Conversation is an egalitarian practice. Conversation privileges relationships and decentralized authority over top-down control. Commands and rules, which are one-way communication, stifle conversation. And so, conversation opens up space for us to live together without enforcing our doctrines on each other.
Brian McLaren explains splendidly in “The Great Spiritual Migration”:
What would it mean for Christians to rediscover their faith not as a problematic system of beliefs, but as a just and generous way of life, rooted in contemplation and expressed in compassion, that makes amends for its mistakes and is dedicated to beloved community for all? Could Christians migrate from defining their faith as a system of beliefs to expressing it as a loving way of life?
Most of organized religion has spent way too much energy enforcing a system of beliefs. We have valued intellectual assent more than relationship. We have valued unanimity over unity. But complete agreement makes for boring conversation when we merely echo what we’ve heard instead of contributing, sharing, appreciating, learning from one another.
Habitat is about sacrament.
Think of “sacrament” as a “sacred moment.” We need a sense of sacredness in our lives to imbue our existence with richer, deeper meaning.
The ancient mystics wrote about “thin spaces” where the dividing line between this world and the spiritual realm seemed, well, thinner. A space that seems to draw so near to the heavenly as to touch. That is what sacrament does.
In order to experience transcendence, we need to participate in sacrament and engage in spiritual practices that open us to the divine … habits, which help to create our habitat.
Although Jesus walked several miles on the road with these friends, it wasn’t until a sacred moment at the end of their journey that they fully experienced his presence. When the friends reached the village of Emmaus, they had dinner together. Jesus took the bread, and blessed and broke it, and as he gave it to them … does this sound familiar? … suddenly, their eyes were opened to see Jesus. “He was known to them in the breaking of the bread” is the climax of the story.
And in that sacred moment, which hearkens to our sacrament of the eucharist … Jesus vanished.
Not that he was really absent, nor was he forsaking his friends. Jesus is even more fully present in the eucharist, more fully known in the sacraments, more fully experienced as we practice spiritual habits. So what does this mean for the disciples of Jesus?
In the midst of their journey, through their soul-baring conversation, in a sacred moment …
They found their habitat.
Peace to you,
Don