Unlikely Friendship: My Solidarity Story

Gracie engages one of our Nativity House infants - friendship

We were young and impressionable, wide-eyed and eager to serve.

During our on the ground training we were given an intense over view of Catholic Social Teaching. We were given a new worldview that was to prepare us for our work in the trenches.  We were to be working with the poor and marginalized: the mentally ill, the homeless, child-survivors of abuse, the addicted.

Edwin, Frankie, Mary, Pam, Brenda, Jim: just to name a few of those we worked alongside, those we served, those who served us.

We got to know them. We listened to their stories. They listened to ours. We learned each other’s likes and dislikes.  We exchanged knowledge, taught each other things. We celebrated each other’s joys and triumphs. We mourned each other’s losses.

Does this sound familiar?

It really is as simple as it sounds: friendship and relationship.

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Justin and I lived for a year as Jesuit Volunteers in California in 2000-2001. We were steeped in Catholic Social Teaching, service to the poor and intentional community living.  The friendships formed and lifestyle lived that year left a lasting impression.

After that formative year we committed to continue this lifestyle. Reality quickly set in.  We would talk about our goals of living with and serving the poor and intentional community and people who nod their heads in agreement and quickly change the subject.

It was a few years later, I was talking with my dad about our dreams of living out the Gospel: living intentional community and living with and serving the poor and how it was frustrating because largely our societal system made it completely unconducive. My dad sympathetically responded, “Venus, your intentions are good. But you are young and idealistic. You will see you have to make some ideological compromises.”

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Eighteen years later, we continue the quest. We live in a small intentional community rooted in Catholic Social Teaching, prayer, and hospitality to expectant mothers. We are steeped in issues facing abortion-minded single mothers on a daily basis. In the three years that we have been offering hospitality we have become friends with 5 expectant mothers that have struggled with unplanned pregnancies, homelessness, and lack of support. Through these relationships I have come to honestly understand the difficulty in making the bold and courageous choice to bring life into the world.

Without these relationships I would have no idea just how courageous these women are. This is the work of Nativity House. At Nativity House we are an intentional Catholic community and house of hospitality for expectant mothers. Our house is situated on a small farm with chickens, goats, dogs, cats and a large farm garden where 8 families  come weekly to work the land and nurture their families with organic produce and community. Nativity House is all about community, friendship, relationship. In the grand scheme of things it was easy to get this started - the Christian life. Doing things differently than the status quo: we strive to live out the Gospel as those early Christians did.

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Idealist? Yes.

Compromise my beliefs as a Catholic to fit into the societal norms? No, thank you.

In today’s American society it is pretty clear that I need to take a side – one of two. How unfortunate. What I have learned about the honest struggle to live the Gospel is that one of the two sides available to me is not adequate. I will never fit into the socio-political system. I will never identify as a Republican or Democrat; nor do I want to. Both are sorely lacking when it comes to representing anyone who is striving to live the Gospel.

We as Christians are called to transform society; or as Peter Maurin said “create a new society within the shell of the old.” The first step to doing this is friendship and relationship.This is why Nativity House exists. One way we can answer to the new within the shell of the old.

We do not have to choose one of two sides. We can stand firm in the Gospel. We are creating a new society within the shell of the old. And finally, there is a group of people who are standing firm - The American Solidarity Party. Finally out of this poor political system of two lackluster sides that are the main undercurrent of American Society we have an honorable third choice. 

We are a party that seeks the common good, on common ground, through common sense. We believe in the sanctity of human life, the necessity of social justice, our responsibility to care for the environment, and promotion of a more peaceful world....

 This sounds like a new society in the shell of the old to me. We just need more people join the work in unlikely friendship.  

Will you be the one? And will you bring your friends?