So what's been going on at the KPU Chaplaincy lately? Well, this summer we have begun weekly meetings with the on campus Christian Club, Kwantlen Christian Fellowship (KCF). We share a pot of soup and some bread, have a conversation, doing some dishes, and play games. It's been a fruitful time of getting to know one another and also exploring topics of Christian faith and practice.
The conversations have mostly been focussing on Christian practices: spiritual disciplines, prayer, and Christian community, especially. For two weeks we talked about the practice of living and working in community. The main theme that I took away from those conversations (also having learned this from Rowan Williams and the Desert Fathers) is that there simply is no such thing as life with God that excludes life with others. Though it is tempting to exclude such messy and uncomfortable matters as concrete people with disagreements, differences of opinion, and difficult personalities, there really is no other option: Christian life invites us to see our relationship with God and our relationship with our neighbours as mutually intertwined, not having one without the other.
That has been a helpful thing to keep in mind as we continue to work towards a fruitful and vibrant Christian community on campus. KPU has drawn together students from all different walks of life, and my hope is that KCF can be a place where we genuinely explore differences in personality, theology, and opinion while also remaining united in the common goal of following Jesus, understanding who he is, and how we can faithfully live a Christian calling on campus. It is not a simple or easy task. But these regular meetings with about 5 or 6 people have begun what I trust is a community in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Aside from these Christian club meetings, I have also continued to host a philosophy club which focusses broadly on philosophy of religion and cultural criticism. The discussions have been fruitful and sometimes very long. My main aim is to present a coherent critique of materialism and secularism. Since the rest of the participants in the club hold to those two positions with varying degrees of enthusiasm, the disagreements quickly arise! But they are generally quite hospitable and interesting disagreements, never degenerating into poor quality of conversation.
Finally, I have also been meeting with a Muslim student, fostering interreligious dialogue while reading through Miroslav Volf's book Allah: A Christian Response. This young man I'm meeting with is very knowledgeable about his own Muslim faith and heritage and so the discussions have been meaningful and interesting.
Pretty soon the summer semester will be winding to a close and the campus will empty out for a good chunk of August before classes resume in September. In August I'll be taking a three day spiritual retreat, which I am very much looking forward to. Working on establishing a Christian community is exciting but its important for the sake of that community that we take time in solitude. Heni Nouwen says that in solitude we come in contact with that which originally brought and sustains us in community at all. For community is not merely built on outward practices: "Solitude," he writes, "puts us in touch with a unity that precedes all unifying activities. In solitude we become aware that we were together before we came together and that life is not a creation of our will but rather an obedient response to the reality of our being united" (Clowning in Rome, 14).
