Hey Everyone,
I wanted to send you all an update on the New Friars Forum we hosted here at the WMF Omaha office last week.
As some of you may know, a few years ago, Scott Bessenecker (author of The New Friars) started to reflect on the imaging of what were being called then (and now) “new monastic” communities here in the US.
The so-called “new monastic” groups were primarily made up of young people who started moving into poorer neighborhoods in the US. They were marked by qualifiers such as relocation, community, hospitality, and prayer. Among the more notable “new monastic” communities were the Simple Way (Shane Claiborne) and the Rutba House (Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove). You may remember seeing the book, “School(s) for Conversion: 12 marks for a New Monasticism,” that identifies the common ties among the new monastic communities.
Looking at the impact of “new monasticism” and thinking through the implications of the imaging of young people forming communities of justice, Scott began learning about groups that echoed the “new monastic” communities but were missional in their focus. Spring-boarding off of the borrowed language of monasticism, Scott kept the imagining consistent and sought to find those that echoed the memory and spirit of traditional friars.
He came across InnerCHANGE, Servant Partners, Servants to Asia’s Urban Poor, Urban Neighbors of Hope, and Word Made Flesh. After contacting members in these groups he wrote an article for Prism magazine called “The New Friars: The Return of Francis and Clare,” which ultimately become his book, The New Friars.
Though groups like WMF are getting labeled as “new friar” or “monastic” communities, we want to be clear that historical Christian monastic orders, friars and nuns are still very relevant today. The vows and devotion that these men and women commit to are honorable and admirable. They are our teachers. The only thing that is new about “new monasticism” or “new friars” is that in the short history of the evangelical movement, we have not seen communities quite like this taking shape; so honoring a more monastic way of life among evangelicals seems to be “new.”
We don’t want to completely reject this imaging or this language, I can see how it might be helpful for people to “locate” us, but we really want to remember the historical continuity of the church and those who have made tremendous sacrifices. Living into the legacy of historical monastic and friar traditions is a challenge and a privilege that we don’t take lightly.
Anyway, it was almost exactly 3 years ago that Scott convened a meeting in Madison, Wisconsin with the leaders of these “new friar” groups. That first meeting was informational and marked by introductions.
Following that initial meeting, we all met up again at Urbana 06 in St. Louis. That touch-point fortified the friendships and moved the groups commitment to one another forward a little more.
Since then we’ve been in discussions about how to get these “new friars” together again. So WMF opened up our space and hearts and hosted a series of conversations on capacity, community, and communion.
Those who flew into Omaha to take part in these meetings included (by the way, hit these guys up on Facebook-they’ll love it and you’ll love them):
Scott Bessenecker: Scott’s the author of The New Friars and runs InTerVarsity’s Global Urban Trek. He’s thoughtful and innovative in how he sees the next wave of missional communities serving among the poor. He’s also the “godfather” of this group in that he was the original one who brought us together and holds us together.
Derek Engdahl: is the Director of Servant Partners. He’s solid. He’s got a great mind for structure and capacity building; in fact, he’s a great community organizer. He’s headed out on sabbatical soon, something that we’re all glad to see that he can make space for this in his busy life.
Craig Greenfield: is truly a contemplative mystic, understated in the best ways but really thoughtful and deep. He’s the author of The Urban Halo and the International Coordinator of Servants to Asia’s Urban Poor.
Tim Lockie: is the bridge for InnerCHANGE‘s leadership team and director of new projects. He’s got a quick mind and he’s fun-real fun. Tim is a good connection point for InnerCHANGE and could be a bridge to others w/in that community.
Mark Smith: is the new Executive Director for InnerCHANGE, fresh back from years in Cambodia. He is brilliant, very thoughtful-he’s a chaos theorists (awesome!). He’s the newest voice in this circle, but also saying some real fresh things.
Last Monday we started the meetings by having everyone join us for dinner at my place, Phileena whipped up a mean pot of soup and we busted out some great bottles of wine. The evening ended with everyone (the WMF Associate Directors too) in our library making reconnections.
Tuesday started off with conversations on the value of bringing the “new friar” communities together, including the benefit of establishing trust among the senior staff. We moved that into a discussion on some of the challenges of organizing the movements rather than institutionalizing the organizations. After lunch at M’s Pub we spent a good portion of the afternoon discussing the use of the StrengthFinder’s tool and other profile assessments for our communities.
We wrapped up the day with a conference call to Shane Claiborne where Scott suggested the “new monastic” and “new friar” communities consider how we might reflect on what St. Francis of Assisi called the “third order.” I really hope that Scott will work at developing this idea as a means of securing sustainable support for all of us engaged in missional community organizing. In the meantime, Phileena’s newest prayer letter introduces this possibility with hopeful imagination, she writes:
In the past ten years or so there has been a growing trend among radical western evangelicals toward some of the traditional Christian monastic ways of life. Traditional monasticism is characterized by cloistered life, keeping the hours of prayer, and a common way of living together.
The so-called new friars are becoming known as those evangelical communities who not only practice some of the traditional monastic devotions, but are also called to a specific ministry or service in the world; groups like Word Made Flesh, Servants to Asia’s Urban Poor, Servant Partners and InnerCHANGE.
The third order are those like you, who surround a called and set apart group (traditionally friars), ascribe to the same values and pray and support the ones who go into the world in a shared service of humanity.
Saint Francis of Assisi is well-known for having established three orders. The first order was for friars. He called it the Friars Minor meaning the “Little Brothers.” The second order was for nuns. He established it together with Saint Clare of Assisi. It is named for her, the Poor Clares and their order is marked by contemplation. The third order was established for laymen and women. It is known as the ‘Third Order of Saint Francis’ or, more formally, the Secular Franciscan Order.
We ended up at the Upstream for dinner and a late night of pipe smoking at my house (we finally got the smell out of our couch-sorry Phileena).
Wednesday started with breakfast at the Diner where Scott shared with us his concern that our communities are desperately under-supported in prayer. From there he led a meaningful and intimate time of prayer back at the office.
We spent the rest of the afternoon using the WMF Field Forum Papers as the starting points for conversations on everyone’s best practices as they relate to leadership, boards of directors, administration, advocacy, and community care. It was a stimulating time of sharing and learning-a time that I think will end up providing very practical examples of how the “new friar” communities can learn from one another and grow together in excellence and service.
Our last night together included a great meal in the Old Market and a bit more pipe smoking…
Thursday, we invited the group to join us for our Omaha community’s staff prayer where we prayed for the guys, their families, and their communities. Following the prayer meeting Craig Greenfield led us all in a communion service that formally concluded our forum.
Reflecting on our time together I think the 3 obvious outcomes of our gathering could be framed as:
• Capacity: sharing our best practices, making our infrastructures available to one another, and challenging one another into excellence is exciting. Together, I think all our imaginations were refreshed and inspired at how we can better organize and support the movements with the “new friars” community.
• Community: Tim Lockie of InnerCHANGE said it so well, that for all of our communities to see that “trust goes all the way to the top” will help our organizations better relate to one another. Specifically for WMF this could look like staff sharing from Servants to our WMF Bolivia community or WMF communities in Romania, Calcutta, and Bangkok relating to some of the other “new friar” communities located in those same countries/cities.
• Communion: of course, all of our collective activities and energies are ultimately spent through our theological praxis of serving Christ among the world’s poor. We continue to consider how we can all center our friends who suffer as a prophetic indictment against sinful structures that resist community. May our communion of community be a statement of hope that God IS active among the poor and may our collective vocational response to that hope embody a lament and a prayer for justice.
Since the “New Friars Forum,” Scott posted a nice thought re: hospitality and the poor on his blog, “The New Friars.”
Hopefully sharing this with you is a first step to seeing WMF embrace the larger circle of how we can relate to these groups.
Thanks for your prayers during our time together,
Chris