Third Monday in Advent

Numbers 24:2-7,15-17a; Psalm 25:3-8 (4-9 in NRSV); Matthew 21:23-27

"By what authority do you do these things?"  This is one of those questions that tells us more about the questioner than the respondent.  It's a question we've been asked a lot as Companions.

From the beginning of our journey people asked us three things about our community: "What's your Rule?" "What's your habit?" And, "What do you have to do to establish a community?"  By that third question they meant, whose permission do you need?  Whose acknowledgment?

We answered, "We don't know about our Rule yet." (We have since written one, after reading many old and new.)  "We don't know about a habit yet." (Now we wear black on Sundays and feast days, with shawls in chapel.  We don't know how long we will do this.) 

But the last question was easy to answer.  We said, "Move in together and start praying."

But of course that wasn't what our questioners were asking.  They wondered about authority, as though being a community required the blessing of a hierarchical gatekeeper.  As though without credentials we don't exist.

After two and a half years, two of us made life vows in this community that is recognized by no authority other than God and those around us.  Our vows are not legally binding or enforceable in court.  They are vows.  They are covenant.  We made these vows in the presence of others who acknowledge them by their participation.  There is nothing to keep us faithful other than our word and our trust in one another and in God.

In their recent book, An Other Kingdom, Peter Block, Walter Brueggemann, and John McKnight explore the power of vows and covenant as a way to turn from the consumer culture and legal empire and return to community.  Community is built on trust rather than threat.  

"By whose authority?" is a question for the legal culture, the alienated culture, to debate.  It's usually a trap, aimed to rein in something or someone.  It is not an empowering question.

It's a question Jesus refuses to answer.  He knows a trap when he sees it.  

I don't mean that there's never a place for authority.  But authority questions are not creative, or meant to be.  Knowing when that question matters and when it doesn't is a part of discernment, calling for prayer.

Is there someplace where you are trapped by the need for authorization?  Are you feeling called to do something or be something, and needing community acknowledgment?  If so, let me suggest a clearness committee or its equivalent, a circle of friends.  They won't authorize, they will companion you.  That's the creative community we all need.

Go!  And tell us what you find!