Tuesday, April 15, 2008

What is community?

Living in the Bay Area, you can't stand in line to order a latte without hearing talk of community. It's the steamed-milk community. If you go shopping, you're part of the Berkeley Bowl community. (And if you shop at Safeway, you're nothing.)

Last night, I attended a meditation class and heard lots of talk of community, or sangha. This led me to wonder: What is a community? Are we a community because we have come to sit together? What is the quality of a community made up of strangers? Is there such a thing?

I have a much more intimate definition of community. It's made up of those closest to me. My inner circle. There are lots of other ways of addressing external community, but then again, I wouldn't use the word community. Group, maybe, a gathering of like-minded strangers. But community? How can you be a community when you don't even know each others' names?

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