What is a Community? This has become one of the more carelessly tossed about words in today’s digitally saturated world, yet I suspect that very little thought has been given to what the term actually means. Like concentric circles there are various types or degrees of community radiating out from one another ~ family being at the center, then expanding into neighborhood, parish, school, town or city. When I was young the neighborhood was a beehive of activity. It was the 1960s and several large families lived on our block, everyone being well acquainted with every other family on the block. Very few mothers worked outside the home and the street itself served as a kind of communal living room, overseen by adults sitting on their front porches (weather permitting) as youngsters played in each other’s front yards. Occasionally we even had impromptu parades and band concerts.

I lived in a moderately sized city where, joined by a friend or siblings, we might get on a bus and go downtown unsupervised, so long as we returned home before dinner time. Small drugstores featuring soda fountains and local grocers (AG Markets they were called) dotted the landscape, always one within easy walking distance. A large Montgomery Wards department store was only a few blocks from our home. The church stood at the end of the block; we walked daily to school as did the majority of students. There were tough kids, to be sure, but also nice kids who balanced the equation, with plenty of adult eyes overlooking the scene so that things never got wildly out of hand. The one thing we all enjoyed growing up was a gratifying sense of freedom which that neighborhood community provided. It was like living in a small town with big city amenities.

That is not to say that people didn’t struggle or that families, including my own, didn’t have their problems. There were fights and rivalries to be sure, but we also had a sense of belonging to a vibrant community where life could flourish and potentialities could be freely explored. From growing up in that environment I observed that there are four things necessary for a true, successful community to exist. 1: the physical proximity of people. 2: connectivity, meaning real person to person interactions – unlike a group of kids sitting at a table texting one another. 3: a set of shared principles, i.e., mutually accepted rules of behavior. 4: competent trusted leaders, whether parents, pastors, teachers, or political representatives who understand that authority derives from responsibility.