THE YEAR OF PAUL II: PAUL AND COMMUNITY
(This is the second of three articles on aspects of St. Paul’s life and influence.)

Frank DeSiano, CSP

Vince Donovan, who had spent most of his life as a missionary in Africa with the Massai tribes, wrote an important book called “Christianity Rediscovered.” Written over a generation ago, Donovan’s argument still has a lot of energy. He concluded, after years of missionary work, that the Church had gotten mission all wrong. He felt that we needed to be more like Paul – that is, we needed to follow Paul’s missionary policy which he put this way: Paul would found a Christian community, wait until it started to germinate some kind of stability, and then leave. He would let the community develop its own form of organization and take care of its own internal preoccupations. Instead of getting caught up in the nitty-gritty of organizing and maintaining faith communities, Paul would be off to another city, ready to start another community.

Donovan’s insight was attractive because it held a beguiling promise: missionaries could be, perhaps, exempt from all the messiness that invariably flows from organizing people into community and trying to keep that group together. Let others worry about the hiring, the salaries, the petty disputes, the clash of classes and languages, the upkeep of the facilities, and what kind of bread to use during the Eucharist. The missionary could be free of that! The missionary could concentrate on just founding the seeds of Christianity.

While Vince Donovan had important reasons to espouse his position – he saw how much energy could be wasted taking care of the folks at home – yet the letters of Paul himself would not be among those reasons. Paul, in his actual missionary work, does not lend support to the “found it and leave it” missionary strategy. For Paul expended as much energy on the communities he organized as he did on his mission work – letter after letter shows the array of issues that Paul had to deal with, perhaps none so clearly as his two letters to the Corinthians.

In Paul’s eyes, the unity of the community of those who follow Christ appeared to be as important as anything else. How could it be that people would profess to live as followers of Jesus (Paul’s phrase was “in Christ”) and yet not show each other the very same love that Christ showed in his life? How a community lives shows the extent to which it has heard the Good News of Jesus. Community, rather than getting in the way of mission, is an indispensable part of mission.

Perhaps no passage of Paul is as well known as the 13th Chapter of Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians. In the earlier sections of the letter, Paul had underlined the kinds of divisions that existed in Corinth: a) divisions about loyalty and b) divisions about class. The loyalty issue revolved around the missionary whom Corinthians saw as their evangelizer. Was it Cephas? (i..e., Peter, from Jerusalem) Was it Apollos, the more classically trained, elegant speaker of Greek? Or was it the rough-and-tumble Paul? Paul shuts up all the arguments with the question, “Who was crucified for you?” Certainly not Paul, Cephas or Apollos. Only Christ. So Christ Jesus should be their point of unity. About class, Paul exercised himself quite a bit on how the richer members of Corinth would come early for Eucharist, eat their own fancy meal, and then leave leftovers for the rest. The disunity shown in these attitudes hardly reflected well the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

So Paul’s “Hymn of Love,” as 1 Corinthians 13 is called, speaks powerfully and ironically to a community that was, in fact, impatient, unkind, puffed up, conceited, vicious and self-seeking. Paul probably is using an existing hymn, rubbing it in the face of his Corinthian malcontents, but his call to love within community remains an unending challenge to all generations of Christians.

Another place one can see Paul’s concern about unity is in his letter to the Philippians. Philippi was undoubtedly one of Paul’s most favorite communities; it’s easy to feel the affection he has for them in the opening chapter. In the second chapter, Paul once again reverts to a hymn, one that also pre-existed this letter, about the status and person of Jesus. This hymn exalts Christ in his humility; though having the “form of God,” Jesus emptied himself to “take on the form of humanity,” humbling himself “even to death on the Cross.” Notice how Paul introduces this hymn in the opening verses of chapter 2: “. . . [M]ake my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.”

Paul the missionary wanted to see mission carried through to its logical conclusion: you cannot preach Christ without seeing Christ embodied in those who hear him. As much as Paul was a missionary, he was also an organizer of communities. Pastoral work is part of mission work. The life of the community is part of the message that is being heard and lived.

Often one can hear today the same debate going on in Paulists – whether we should be in parishes or whether we are held back by involvement in communities like campus ministries or centers. While it would be foolish to ignore the tensions in missionary life, it would be even more foolish to think missionaries do not need a community base from which to reach out.

I’m not sure how Paul would have survived today as a pastoral associate on a parish or campus staff. But I am pretty sure that he would not have seen such pastoral work as a contradiction to the missionary vision which drove his life. He would rather ask the Paulist (and Paulist Associate) how mission is incorporated in their work, no matter what setting it might take.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION:

1. How essential do you feel community is to your understanding of your faith?

2. How do you think parishes-campuses-centers can better direct themselves so as to maintain their missionary spirit?

3. What aspects of Christian community do you find most helpful? What aspects of Christian community do you find most difficult?

FORMAT FOR THE MEETING:

1. Check-in
2. Paulist Prayer (See Christmas season in Paulist Prayer Book)
3. Reading: Philippians 2: 1-5, 14-18
4. Reactions to the readings and newsletter
5. Apostolic reports, “Paulist” opportunities
6. Prayer (Prayer of Gratitude, p. 408)
7. Announcements and Plans for next meeting
8. Refreshments

CHRONOLOGY

Dec. 4, 2007 Death of Fr. Vincent Sampietro in Portland, OR; oldest Paulist Father

Jan. 4-6: Retreat for beginning group in Tampa Florida

Jan. 27, 2008: Appointment of Postulators for the Canonization of Fr. Hecker, NYC, formal opening of Fr. Hecker’s Cause

Jan. 26-27: anniversary celebrations in Washington, Austin and New Yor

CONTACT:

The Paulist Associates
c/o Frank DeSiano, CSP
8611 Midland Parkway
Jamaica, NY 11432

718-291-5995