In the 1980’s, Robert Bellah and a team of sociologists set out to study American society. They compiled their findings in the book, Habits of the Heart. At one point they write this,

We believe that much of the thinking about the self of educated Americans … is based on inadequate social science, impoverished philosophy and vacuous theology. There are truths we do not see when we adopt the language of radical individualism. We find ourselves not independently of other people and institutions but through them. We never get to the bottom of ourselves on our own. We discover who we are face to face and side by side with others in work, love and learning. All of our activity goes on in relationships, groups, associations, and communities ordered by institutional structures and interpreted by cultural patterns of meaning. Our individualism is itself one such pattern. And the positive side of our individualism, our sense of the dignity, worth, and moral autonomy of the individual, is dependent in a thousand ways on a social, cultural, and institutional context that keeps us afloat even when we cannot very well describe it. There is much in our life that we do not control, that we are not even “responsible” for, that we receive either as grace or face as tragedy; things Americans habitually prefer not to think about. Finally, we are not simply ends in ourselves, either as individuals or as a society. We are parts of a larger whole that we can neither forget nor imagine in our own image without paying a high price. If we are not to have a self that hangs in a void, slowly twisting in the wind, these are issues we cannot ignore.
To be Christian means to be called to the community of discipleship and this is, by its very nature, a rejection of radical individualism. We live in relationship one with another and each of us with the living Christ and we realize who we are only in and through these relationships. “I urge you,” writes Paul in First Corinthians, “… that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and in the same purpose.” Stay united, “… so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its meaning.” Christian community is not just a nice by-product of the revelation of Christ, it is of the very essence of this revelation. Something very fundamental is at work when we gather and live as brothers and sisters in Christ.

Our society is fragmented – painfully fragmented – and there are forces that seek to encourage this fragmentation. (It is easier to manipulate people when they are isolated and not talking one to another.) Community and dialogue are the great fears of the forces of fragmentation. Today, one of the greatest witnesses we can give as Christians is to live community. Community, in a land which extols individualism, is radically countercultural and in community we are healed, we discover ourselves through our encounter with the other in Christ.

Here at the Catholic Center I will point to myself as an example. People sometimes ask me when did I know that I wanted to become a priest? In many ways my vocation began here. When I was a young boy I had thought about being a priest – elementary and high school. But the “idea” never went anywhere, it never grew because beginning around 6th grade through my second year in college I was not involved in church. I had an “idea” in the back of my mind but that was all that it remained – an “idea”. It was only when I came back to the church here at the Catholic Center, when I began to live in the context of community that the “idea” grew – it became no longer just an idea but a hope and ultimately a joy. We realize ourselves in Christian community.

In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus calls Peter and Andrew, he calls James and John together. They form community. It is interesting to read each of the gospels from the first to the last chapter and notice how much the disciples changed and are transformed (not into someone different but into truly who they are). They are changed primarily through their encounter with Christ but also (and there is sufficient proof for this in Scripture and not the most flattering proof either) through their encounters with one another in Christ.

“I urge you … remain united.” writes Paul. There is something truly fundamental and formative that occurs only in the context of Christian community.

I have had the opportunity to visit the catacombs in Rome. The tunnels (literally the local cemeteries) where the early Christians gathered in secret to worship during times of persecution. Here the Christians proclaimed Scripture and shared Eucharist. Rome’s catacombs go deep into the earth. I share this image because every time I walk down the stairs to the basement chapel of the Catholic Center at ETSU I think of my experience of entering the catacombs. Our little basement chapel is a catacomb church. We are getting back to our roots and we are about something subversive – just as subversive today as it was two thousand years ago. Like those first Christians as we break open Scripture and Eucharist we are being formed by something different than what the world offers.

There will always be a subversive component to the Christian faith because our faith is about that which is more than the world. An example: our world promotes upward mobility which, in and of itself, has nothing inherently wrong with it – we want to achieve and use the gifts God has given us, we want to be successful at what we do and provide for those we love and care for. What the gospels proclaim throughout their message though is not upward but rather downward mobility. The Son emptied himself and became human, “born in the likeness of a slave”. Isaiah prophesied the one who would bring justice but not by a show of power and might but by “not crying out, not shouting … a bruised reed he shall not break.” Jesus comes to John (not John to Jesus) and by so doing joins himself to all the disenfranchised people – the ones of no worth – who were looking for something more. Jesus humbles himself and is baptized by John. Downward mobility.

This is what is put before us. If, in the area of church life, upward mobility is gauged by mega-churches, donations flowing in, larger and larger crowds then how is downward mobility gauged in the life of a faith community? Not quantifiable but qualitatively. Walls are torn down, hearts are opened, reconciliation is sought rather than competition, there is a willingness to serve and seek and to find in the one being served not just another “client” or a means to my own sanctification but Christ himself.

It is not a numbers game – it is about so much more. Today’s feast calls us back to our roots, it calls us to be subversive and to make Jesus proud! But, before we jump into the fray, we need to be wise. We cannot do this on our own – there is hardship, struggle and just plain evil that we will face. The baptism of Jesus is connected to our own individual baptisms not because Jesus needed the cleansing from sin that we do but because we need to hear the words of the Father which he heard. We need this grace because only by it can we continue in the subversive life of the Kingdom – living downward mobility. Through Jesus and our baptism into his very life and death, the Father says to us, “You are my beloved son, You are my beloved daughter – with whom I am well pleased.” This is the grace which saves.