Josh Livingston, Housing Specialist at Englewood Community Development Corporation in Indianapolis shares his reflections on the roundtable discussion about affordable housing which took place on Friday, February 19th.
Intentional Christian Community has always been about housing. Mainly, how many souls can you stuff in a house? For those of us with the social and economic capital to make radical decisions like these, it may be more important for us to remember and consider folks who live like this by necessity.
That said, our community housing experiments, in our better moments, have been about demonstrating hospitality towards one another and the stranger in the same manner that God has been hospitable to us. This workshop was about exploring how we can both remember and extend that hospitality to our neighbors, demonstrating what Don Mosley has called a “faith beyond borders.
…our community housing experiments, in our better moments, have been about demonstrating hospitality towards one another and the stranger in the same manner that God has been hospitable to us.
What immediately struck me was the abundance of the gift of God’s Spirit that was among us and the ways that this gift was embodied in the real presence and experience of everyone on the call. I found myself in a posture of thankfulness to be conversing with sisters and brothers who not only care deeply about their neighbors in tangible ways, but some for decades on end.
What was also immediately apparent was the diversity of shape and expression that each community represented, with regard to care of their neighbors through housing. We heard from folks that practice housing development, like Reba Place. We heard from folks that were focusing on persons experiencing homelessness, like Jesus People, USA. We heard from folks that have been advocating for refugees like Don Mosely and the folks from Jubilee Partners. We heard from folks doing property management like Dave Carlton and Evan Sheppard. The depth of experience and demonstration of care was humbling and exciting to be a part of.
In true NCN fashion, we were an intergenerational collective of community representatives that continued to share stories, wisdom and experience with one another, particularly for the benefit of the next generation of housing practitioners. We were able to open the floor in order to field some questions from folks who are just now exploring practices of hospitality like Brian and JoLeah Gorman in Washington, D.C. and Roberto and Danea Solis in Saltillo, Mexico. The hope is that sufficient connections were made so that people who are desiring to learn more technical and specialized ways of practicing affordable housing for our neighbors can use this conversation as a springboard and find the time to continue dialogue and learning.
Love working itself out in deeds of compassion is what builds the community we all yearn for and seek in the Kingdom of God.
I think what was refreshing to hear was that hospitality in the Spirit does not require 501c3’s, multi-million dollar development capacity, or a property management team. Rather, what matters most is a community of folks who are willing to merge their lives with the Spirit of Jesus in practical acts of love. Love working itself out in deeds of compassion is what builds the community we all yearn for and seek in the Kingdom of God.
In the words of the Apostle Paul, I may develop hundreds of units of affordable rental housing, I may repair a thousand roofs for low-income and marginalized neighbors, and I may facilitate millions of dollars in grant funds for owner occupied home repairs, but if I have not love, I’m just banging a hammer.
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