Dear Friends,

In 1958 the Teddy Bears released the song “To know him is to love him,” which might as well have been called, “To know know know him is to love love love him,” since that’s the way everybody remembers it. Either way, you get the idea: There’s this great guy out there, and the closer you get to him, the better you’re going to feel about him and, in all likelihood, the better he’s going to feel about spending time with you. After all, who doesn’t like being loved for who they really are?

Of course, there is no rule that says you can’t choose instead to get close to a lousy person, no matter how mean, lazy, stupid, violent, or unbelievably selfish he or she might be. On the contrary, there are plenty of rules saying we should do just that, in the name of Jesus. And there are plenty of stories and proverbs suggesting that when we do, wonderful things can happen. And so they do, especially early on in the relationship.

The problem is that to love love love a lousy person over a long period of time is…well, to find out just how lousy they are. It is to see for yourself, over and over again, why the rest of the world has left that person alone. In other words, in some cases, the closer you get to someone, the worse you are going to feel about them and, eventually, the worse they are going to feel about spending time with you. After all, who doesn’t hate being disdained for who they really are?

This isn’t an idle meditation on the Teddy Bears’ one and only hit. This is me trying to figure out why some folks who used to love being with me don’t want to be with me anymore, even though all I’ve done is care and help and give and forgive…and quietly lose respect for them even as they fall ever deeper into my debt. OK, so maybe I’ve already figured out why.

I know I always say this thing is more about loving people than trying to fix them, but it turns out I have been secretly hoping that if our little core group set a tone of mutual love, we would unleash the ‘inner good neighbor’ in everybody else, and a true fellowship of friends would emerge, wherein everybody genuinely cared about each other. It never occurred to me that if folks couldn’t – or just didn’t want to – start improving their lives or giving back to the group, the warmth they initially enjoyed might end up feeling like some kind of negative judgment. It never occurred to me that grace could backfire.

God, how do you keep loving people who can’t stand being known? If you pray, ask that for me.

Sincerely,

Bart Campolo

Dear Friends,

I’ve heard from many of you who liked last month’s letter, or were at least relieved by its more positive tone. It turns out a lot of folks have been thinking all this ghetto reality is bringing me down, and I suppose those folks are right in a way. It is hard to stay positive when you are so mixed up with so many brutal and broken lives, and I tend to write when I feel most frustrated. On the other hand, if I wrote when things went well, I could just as easily send out an entirely truthful, utterly upbeat letter every month, about the very same group of people. Well, maybe not every month, but you get the idea. When you are trying to give grace at close quarters, over time, almost everything becomes a matter of perspective.

For example, last week I went for a walk around the neighborhood. I didn’t even make it across the street, however, before Marlena (remember her?) called me over. As sad as she looked, I thought we were going to talk about her son’s ongoing recovery from his stabbing, or about her own job search (she got fired for missing too many days when he got stabbed), but this is what she told me: Victoria, her bright and beautiful 16-year old pride and joy, is three months pregnant. And this was my first thought: Maybe she’ll miscarry.

I know that is terrible, of course. But I know Victoria too. Smart as she is, she’s already dropped out of high school and she’s never held a job for more than a few weeks. She isn’t ready to take care of a pet hamster at this point, let alone a child. I don’t exactly know the father, but I know the sorry line-up he comes from, every member of which has already been the sperm donor for at least one fatherless child. I know this neighborhood, too. Barring a miracle, Victoria’s baby doesn’t stand a chance. And while I still pray for such miracles, especially when it comes to the fortunes of ghetto babies, I certainly don’t count on them anymore.

After I told Marlena I’d get back to her, I walked on. Halfway up the block I ran into Tanya (remember her?), now 14, who gleefully told me the doctor at the clinic said she’d lost twenty pounds. Why were you at the clinic, I asked her. For my Depo shot, she answered matter of factly, since it was me, after all, who convinced her mother to put her on that form of birth control last year. Like I said, when it comes to babies, I don’t count on miracles. Unfortunately, that doesn’t make me feel any better about this desperate little girl having sex with the much older boys whose casual affirmations mean so much to her.

Moving on, I turned the corner onto McMillan Street, one of the main drags in Walnut Hills. Up there, over the next five minutes, I passed half a dozen scantily clad young women pushing their babies in cheap strollers with toddlers trailing behind, most of them smoking and shouting profanities into their cell phones. Instinctively, I began extrapolating the kinds of apartments, diets, discipline styles, and educational opportunities those mothers will give those children. Suddenly I stopped. What is wrong with me, I wondered. Babies used to be beautiful little reminders of the promise of new life. Now, in this place, seeing them just depresses me. As much as I believe in loving and protecting each and every human being on God’s earth, no matter how much or little he or she can contribute, I grieve and I rage when people with no ability and no intention of nurturing a child conceive one anyway, regardless of the consequences.

At the other end of McMillan I ran into my old friend Bobbie (remember her?) who angrily reported that her son had just called to tell her his on-again-off-again 20 year-old girlfriend was pregnant. For years Bobbie bragged to me about teaching her son to use condoms when he was in junior high school, so that he might avoid the burdens of child-support (marriage and parenthood being out the question) later on. Now, having made it to 26, he had let both her and himself down in a big way, and she was furious. All she could hope, she told me, was that a paternity test might get her son off the hook. And right onto Jerry Springer, I thought to myself.

By the time I circled home, I was ready to tell Marty that I couldn’t take it any more, that it was time to pack our things and get out of here. Fortunately, she was already across the street, preparing the food for our big Monday night dinner party. So then, instead of cashing in my chips, I went over there myself, to set up the tables and chairs. Pretty soon the rest of the gang rolled in and we sat down together to eat.

Donna and Jeff showed up a few minutes late that night. As usual, their one-year-old adopted son Quinn practically stopped the whole show with his cuteness. Quinn has just started walking, but he’s been smiling and laughing and flirting with the rest of us since a few months after he was born, and our entire fellowship is madly in love with him. On this particular night, our friends Nina and JJ had brought their one-year-old, Cortez, and the rest of us watched the two of them playing together like so many grandparents of all ages. By the time we got around to taking prayer requests at the end of the night, I no longer wanted to move. I just wanted to hold Quinn and Cortez.

Given that Donna and Jeff are among the most gifted and thoughtful parents I know, and that both their families are solid, supportive, and nearby, I daresay there isn’t a child on this planet better loved and cared for than baby Quinn. Cortez has far fewer advantages, but his mother and father are still together, and increasingly they are looking to our fellowship to guide their parenting. There are no guarantees with kids, of course, but with these two at least, there is plenty of hope.

As we were cleaning up afterwards, another pregnant 16-year-old, Summer, sought me out. We’ve just begun getting to know Summer and her family, who moved onto our street last fall but only recently started responding to our invitations. “I was too afraid to ask everyone to pray for me,” she said, “but I’m really scared about delivering this baby.” I called Donna over, and then Karen, Bobbie, Marlena and every other mother I could find, and asked them to gather around this poor, frightened child, to pray for her together. Fifteen minutes later they were all still there, laughing and talking together, offering Summer a kind of communal support that almost no expectant mother gets around here. There will be more of that for her, and hopefully for Victoria too, whether or not her mother and I are able to talk her into letting her baby be adopted.

If you find this letter depressing, I am genuinely sorry. There is plenty to be depressed about, to be sure, but there is also this strange little fellowship of people, committed to loving each other in the midst of the mess. And there is Quinn, too, and Cortez, and the outside chance that some of those miracles I no longer count on will come our way anyway. Remember, when you are trying to give grace at close quarters, over time, almost everything becomes a matter of perspective. Honestly, at the end of my walk, at the end of that day, I felt more tired than anything else. I wasn’t tired the next morning, though. As usual, it was good to wake up.

Sincerely,

Bart

For those of you who keep asking, you can indeed donate online to support our little fellowship, which is conveniently registered as a 501c3 non-profit organization. Will we be stunned, and happy, and disproportionately grateful? Absolutely! www.thewalnuthillsfellowship.org

Dear Friends,

The other day a bunch of people e-mailed me the same New York Times column, which cited a variety of scientific research suggesting that what we think of as intelligence is quite malleable in children and owes little or nothing to genetics. What stuck out to me was one study which found that a child of professionals (disproportionately white) has heard about 30 million words spoken by age 3, while a black child raised on welfare has heard only 10 million words. No wonder low-income children often show brain physiologies similar to adults who have suffered damage in the parts of the brain most critical for problem-solving and creativity. In too many cases, their young minds are literally starving for stimulation. Now here is the good news: According to the scientists, it doesn’t have to be that way. If we nurture kids the right way, we can actually make them smart.

What does that have to do with The Walnut Hills Fellowship? Well, since practically everything we do around here is about trying to nurture our kids – and our grown-ups – the right way, it has everything to do with us, especially during the summer, when this little group of intentional good neighbors shifts into high gear.

The action begins as soon as school lets out, when we start shuttling kids to the various summer camps we’ve signed them up for all over town. We might have started a camp of our own if we didn’t have jobs, but in many ways this is much better. The kids get exposed to lots of new places and people and perspectives, and somebody besides us gets to feed and teach and play with and – best of all – discipline them. What we get to do is actively process their experiences in the car on the way home, like a bunch of hyper-interested aunts and uncles. In other words, lots of words.

We still eat dinner together every Monday night, of course, but during the summer we stretch things out. We sit at the table longer, everyone talking about our weeks. We play more games. Nobody hurries home after we’ve done the dishes and put away the tables and chairs. Sometimes, when the weather is nice, we load up and go to the park for a picnic, like one big happy family. And through it all, especially for the little ones, there are lots of words.

Of course, after last year’s epic family vacation to Chicago, everybody has been hoping and praying (and asking and asking) about whether or not we’ll be able to do it again in July. The final answer was given last night, thanks to the generosity of many of you: We’re totally going back to Chicago! We all know what that means (besides a ridiculous amount of planning and preparation for Marty and Karen): Long van rides. Major sightseeing. An afternoon on the beach. A big-time African-American church service. Deep dish pizza. And all along the way, more words.

I haven’t yet mentioned the various housing projects our property guru, Mark, has lined up this summer, maybe because I am trying to pretend we haven’t bitten off more than we can chew in terms of time and money and sweat and (if my past experience in reconstruction is any indication) blood. One way or another, however, I know they’ll get done, if for no other reason than that none of us want to face the wrath of Miss Ella, who is eagerly waiting for us to move her into her new place, which just happens to be right across the street from mine. If you saw where she was coming from, you’d understand her impatience. Mark has a new place for his family, too, and we can’t wait for them to be here with us. After all, besides being our friends, both Mark and his wife Anne are big talkers, and our kids need all the words they can get.

You, on the other hand, must have had more than enough by now. Forgive me for being so newsy this month, but I figured you ought to know that everything in Walnut Hills isn’t dark and heavy all the time. On the contrary, we have plenty of happiness running around us here, in the form of the little people we adore and the big people we enjoy and the ceaseless Grace that holds us all together, even when things get tough. And we have you, to remind us that we are never alone, and never unloved. Whether or not such nurture makes us smarter, it surely makes us better. Month-in and month-out, thank you for that.

Keep the faith,

Bart Campolo

Dear Genuinely Responsive Friend,

First of all, thank you so much for your note. It feels great to know people care enough to not only read my letters, but also to reply to them. In this case, a lot of people, with a lot of very different ideas.

So then, instead of trying to answer each and every observation and word of advice, I thought it might be more interesting for everyone if I let some of those observations and words of advice answer each other. Taken together as a whole, I think they say something profound. For now, though, you and the others who responded are the only ones who will see them.

You may not have time to read each and every one, but you can be sure I did. I have been thinking about them too, and about you and the others who sent them to me. Troubled though I am sometimes, I don’t know anyone with the kind of backup I have, both near and far away. Thanks for being there.

Your friend,
Bart

You said that many of Marlena’s problems are the result of “amoral, ghetto decision-making we would never tolerate in a real friend.” This is what I’m saying - real friends don’t use their friends.

I wouldn’t have bought the tickets. Want to know what it really costs? Ask yourself how many Bibles could have been sent overseas to people who will really read them and take the Word to heart. $5/Bible is a good figure - so if you sent the ticket money for that purpose, what could have come from it?

jesus says, give to anyone who asks you. give, and do not hold back in luke. I don’t know what to do with that when i walk past the same homeless guy on the corner of michigan avenue on my way to work every day.

Your letter reminded me of the daily internal debate I have with myself about love and reciprocity.

Would Jesus have kept giving over and over to people who only saw him as the latest dispenser of things they had learned long ago to obtain by hook, crook or con? It is hard to tell for at least two reasons. First, Jesus clearly wanted to make disciples and at least part of the reason he made disciples was to have more people around to help people like Marlena. His help to people like Marlena was more than just object lesson to be sure, but certainly he wanted to “spread the joy” of this kind of giving to others. Therefore in his moving around to spread the Gospel he did not enter into long term relationships with those who were chronically dependent. The second reason is related to the first. Jesus died giving himself up, so there wasn’t much chance of creating perpetually co-dependent relationships.

Marlena is playing on your white guilt. She takes…but you give. My question to you is, “What do you get from this relationship?” “Why do you keep giving to her?” Is the answer, “Because that is what Jesus would do?” I think that is bullshit. I think to show love to Marlena, Jesus would understand he was being played and ask some tough questions and expect different behavior. I guess I would close by saying; We are called to LOVE one another, not be people’s friends necessarily. What if you weren’t in that neighborhood Bart? How would the people that are Marlena’s friends in that neighborhood help Marlena out? Would a bunch of neighbors all get together to pool their money to get her a plane ticket, would they sit with her and comfort her as she waits by the phone to hear how her son is doing. I wonder how you are actually upsetting the rhythm of that community by being the “White Guy” with the money. Hmmm…before guilty white people moved into poor black neighborhoods, if someone was “down on their luck” and needed rent money, they used to throw “rent parties” and everyone would bring what they had and have a party to help their friend and neighbor…but now they just go to that rich, white do-gooder and ask for help.

For us to try to base our actions literally on “what would Jesus do” mentality is a failure from the start. Jesus would know that person’s heart, their motivations, their chances, their pains. He wouldn’t look on the outer things at all. But all we can do is strive to be wise as serpents and gentle as doves and do the whole ‘pray for wisdom and not be upbraided’ thing (I’m sure hoping you understand my King James - it was once my primary language :-). I can only take care of my own heart, much as I’m pretty darn sure I could manage some other people’s hearts an awful lot better than they do! My own’s a full time job.

I understand the grace part on a theological level and in my world. I trust in God’s goodness and I’m overwhelmed with God’s “wonderful exchange”, taking on our shit and absorbing it. I don’t understand it and I certainly don’t know how you deal with it in your context.

Marlena has become a Narcissistic Personality Disorder for survival. People like her are all around us. This usually begins when you are very young and your family is unreliable and abusive. Working with people like this, I have to be sure to keep doing what makes sense to me and what I want to do and feel I should do to function for the wellbeing of the other person and also myself. I can never let the NPD take charge of the process.

This is all I know….I sure hope that the God of the universe keeps on treating me like you are treating Marlena, with unconditional love, b/c you know what, if he ever decides to start giving me what I deserve, I’m in BIG trouble. I am sure that Marlena is thinking what I think sometimes….wow, thank you God (Bart and Marty) for helping me when I really shd have helped myself and thank you for loving me when not everybody cd. and thank you for helping me get thru things that I wdn’t have gotten thru w/out you and thank you God that even though I can’t even comprehend why you love me so much, you just do. And so, “now what” is like….the rest of the story might be that Marlena starts to love God more or it might just be this continually amazing story about how God loves us when we’re really, really stupid and how people like Bart and Marty and Roman and Miranda can display this unconditional love thru the mighty power of God to those around them and just maybe someone as dumb as me will get it!

Now, what you do in regards to her is up to you and those who finance your efforts, but here’s my two cents: 1.) It wasn’t for nothing that Jesus said not to cast pearls to swine, and Paul declared that those who will not work will not eat. There are limited resources available to help people, and those should be directed to those most worthy of support. For example, let’s consider the funds spent to buy her the tickets (disregarding the cost of the gas to drive her to Louisville): I read an article in Time Magazine a while back about people in India who survive by catching rats for farmers. On a good day they maybe catch 5 or 6. They make a nickel a rat, plus they get to keep the dead ones to feed their families. They bust their asses, working 12-16 hours a day, and usually die young from lack of health care. They can’t get a better job due to the caste system. What could someone like that do with the $170.00 spent for those tickets? 2.) Despite her chronological age and grown up body, Marlena is a child and should be treated like one. Children shouldn’t be given everything they ask for, lest they turn into spoiled brats 3.)Frankly, you are not helping Marlena by covering for her when her irresponsibility gets her into trouble. Rather, you are shielding her from the one thing that might make her realize just how selfish and irresponsible she is: consequences. Friends don’t aid friends in their self-destruction, and that is what you are doing in this case.

So, I will type in a few paragraphs from Bonhoeffer’s section on “Costly Grace”. It seems germane to the issues with which your newsletter article wrestles. I don’t share it as a criticism of your actions with Marlena but only as food for thought, since I think that the lines between extending hospitality, getting played, and enabling often blur. What else can we do but step out on faith and act. Here they are:

Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our church. We are fighting today for costly grace. Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like a cheapjack’s wares. The sacraments, the forgiveness of sin, and the consolations of religion are thrown away at cut prices. Grace is represented as the church’s inexhaustible treasure, from which she showers blessings with generous hands, without asking questions or fixing limits. Grace without price, grace without cost! … In such a church the world finds a cheap covering for its sins; no contrition is required, still less any real desire to be delivered from sin. Cheap grace therefore amounts to a denial of the living Word of God, in fact, a denial of the Incarnation of the Word of God….

That is what we mean by cheap grace, the grace which amounts to the justification of sin without the justification of the repentant sinner who departs from sin and from whom sin departs. Cheap grace is not the kind of forgiveness which frees us from the toils of sin. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves.

Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.

Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life.

I don’t mean to be patronizing, but I think you are realizing a few things I learned the hard way in the Dominican Republic. I applaud you for taking a similar approach in your dealings with people, I had to learn also, which is, to focus your efforts on individuals, rather than disperse your energy on masses. Those individuals begging for your focus and attention are still inevitably far too numerous for you to deal with effectively; more than you have time, energy, or resources to achieve anything meaningful, so you inevitably pick and choose. You are faced with that choice anew, every day, and you never know for years whether you did any good! 30 years later, I only know three people who for a fact I made a lasting contribution to…

You said you don’t have programs, just relationships. When you have a relationship, it’s between two or more people, it’s not one sided. I used my family for years and did whatever I wanted without much concern for them. As long as they were giving me money or helping me out, they were fine by me. I never really called them unless I needed something. My brother and sister-in-law have helped me so many times, just like you are doing. Eventually, it brought me home. I was a biker chick living with 1%ers and doing just about the same crap these people you deal with are doing, probably worse. It took until I was 36 years old, but they’re gentle coaxing brought me here and here is pretty damn good! If it were me in your shoes right now, I’d ask Marlene for help once in awhile too, make her feel like she is contributing something. She has no money, so, let her serve in other ways. If some elderly person needs a meal cooked, let Marlene do it. If someone needs help with house cleaning or whatever, ask Marlene to help. Get her involved if you can with helping others, cause she’s selfish, just like I was. Let her see that a friendship and a relationship works two ways. She’s going to disappoint you a lot, but maybe one day she won’t.

If you ever get this figured out, let me know what the formula or standards are. After 10 years, $20,000, a lot of favors, and a bunch of sleepless nights helping “friends” with issues, I am so convinced that giving it away doesn’t change anything, but if not that, what? Where is the middle ground between “go away” and “here, take my car.” If we keep feeding the beast, it just gets stronger, but if we don’t, then we are just more people who don’t give a damn. I am so tired and frustrated right now over this that I am ready to cut my losses and move to the country. Sorry to vent, but I am with you brother. I want so much to make a difference, and I am so tired of sucking at it.

It is so hard to know what to do, when. I believe God say NO to us often—but He know when that is the best thing for us. We do not know when giving grace is appropriate or harmful or when a person is drawing closer to God or when they are using us. It is so hard!

I guess I should be thanking God for letting me read this particular newsletter at this particular moment in my life. But since you wrote and sent it – I’ll thank you more than I do God just this once. I’m a lot like Marlena…

Amen.

Dear Friends,

I really like Marlena, but that doesn’t mean she is a good person. She is smart and easy to talk to, but only if you are talking about her stuff. She is attractive and has her hair done every week, but every month she asks to borrow rent money. She loves her kids, but she lies a lot and has taught them to do the same. She’s been through more houses, jobs, men and resolutions than anyone I know, always looking for a better deal. So then, even though she clearly understands and openly embraces what out little fellowship is about, it is easy to wonder how long she’d stay with us if our friendship wasn’t such a bargain.

Lately I find myself wondering about that bargain, about whether the ‘grace’ my friends and I give our neighbors here is anything like the real thing. I mean, on one level offering our love without condition to broken people in a hard place sounds like a righteous thing to do. Moving into this neighborhood to establish genuine friendships across seemingly insurmountable barriers of race, class, and culture sounds more authentic than just dropping in to establish food, clothing, medical care, education, or housing programs.

For someone like Marlena, however, I wonder if our unconditional friendship isn’t just another program after all. When she comes over for a loan or asks Marty or I for a ride to the doctor, we generally treat her the same way we would Ric or Karen next door, who are our ‘real’ friends. It doesn’t feel the same, though, partly because Marlena is in no position to return our favors, and partly because so many of her immediate needs are caused by amoral, ghetto decision-making we would never tolerate in a real friend.

On Monday, for example, she called me sobbing just as I was preparing the game and a little five-minute talk about the value of community for that night’s fellowship dinner. “I just got a call from my son’s baby-mama. The girl he’s living with now stabbed him three times last night! He’s in the hospital there and he might die…oh Bart, I told him to quit that girl! I’m going crazy here!” I began to comfort her like a pastor, but she cut me off. “Can you use your computer to help me and Shonda get plane tickets to Newark tonight? I’ve been calling my family to borrow the money, but nobody seems to care enough to help…but if I come up with it, will you buy them for me?”

Remember, we don’t have a program here, just relationships. Marlena and I are supposed to be friends. So, before I headed to her house, I called my travel agent and put on hold a pair of $170 tickets, leaving three hours later out of Louisville, 100 miles away. On my way over, I called Marty to see what she thought I should do.

“What choice do you have?” she said. “Marlena knows we have that kind of money, and she knows we’d buy those tickets if it was our kid having open heart surgery tonight. If she’s really our friend, we have to help her.” She paused. “Now remind me again why we do this?”

You see the problem, don’t you? I mean, it is no big deal to help a friend when she finds herself in trouble after doing everything right. It’s a whole different thing, however, when your friend has no money because she quit her job after the boss disrespected her, bought a big purebred dog she can’t afford to feed, and drinks more beer in a week than you drink in a year. Or when her own family won’t help her because, well, they’ve all burned each other too many times. Or when the son she’s crying over has two kids by two different women and is freeloading off a third, who probably didn’t stab him for no reason. Or when the daughter she’s taking with her has already told you she doesn’t want or need a man to help raise her own babies when she has them. In other words, when this kind of ghetto drama is bound to just keep on coming.

And yet, help her I did. I bought the tickets with the fellowship’s credit card, not knowing if or when we (meaning you too, if you’re a supporter) will ever get paid back, and I got one of our young single guys to drive Marlena and Sonya down to Louisville, and I knelt on their front steps to pray with them before they left. Now, a few days later, Marlena’s son is just hanging on, and so is my confidence that I really know what I am doing here.

Giving grace? Maybe. But if it is grace at all, it certainly isn’t the same kind that God gives. God, after all, is no sucker. He may make all the goodness in the world available to anyone who wants it, but as far as I can tell, you have to actually want that goodness in order to actualize it. God makes the first move, over and over until you respond, but it takes two to tango. The gift is being shown the way, and being allowed to learn how to dance in good company, so you show up in shape for the party.

I like Marlena, but that doesn’t mean she is a good person. I gave her my friendship, but she hasn’t earned it. Now what?

Sincerely,

Bart

Dear Friends,

I often tell people not to ask me for statistics, because in this work all the statistics are bad. Ask me for stories instead, I say, because even in the worst of times I always have a good story. Whether it is one of my own or comes from someone else doesn’t really matter to me anymore. What matters is that it rings true. Like this one I picked up on a visit to Philadelphia last week, which was first told to psychologist Jack Kornfield by the director of a nearby rehabilitation program for violent juvenile offenders:

One fourteen-year-old boy in the program had shot and killed an innocent teenager to prove himself to his gang. At the trial, the victim’s mother sat impassively silent until the end, when the youth was convicted of the killing. After the verdict was announced, she stood up slowly and stared directly at him and stated, “I’m going to kill you.” Then the youth was taken away to serve several years in the juvenile facility.

After the first half year the mother of the slain child went to visit his killer. He had been living on the streets before the killing, and she was the only visitor (in jail) he’d had. For a time they talked, and when she left she gave him some money for cigarettes. Then she started step-by-step to visit him more regularly, bringing food and small gifts. Near the end of his three-year sentence, she asked him what he would be doing when he got out. He was confused and very uncertain, so she offered to help set him up with a job at a friend’s company. Then she inquired about where he would live, and since he had no family to return to, she offered him temporary use of the spare room in her home. For eight months he lived there, ate her food, and worked at the job. Then one evening she called him into the living room to talk. She sat down opposite him and waited. Then she started, “Do you remember in the courtroom when I said I was going to kill you?” “I sure do,” he replied. “I’ll never forget that moment.” “Well, I did it,” she went on. “I did not want the boy who could kill my son for no reason to remain alive on this earth. I wanted him to die. That’s why I started to visit you and bring you things. That’s why I got you the job and let you live here in my house. That’s how I set about changing you. And that old boy, he’s gone. So now I want to ask you, since my son is gone, and that killer is gone, if you’ll stay here. I’ve got room and I’d like to adopt you if you let me.” And she became the mother he never had.

Honestly, for a man like me, in a place like this, a story like that is more precious than any amount of money or any amount of praise.

Lately I’ve been asked how long I can relate to such badly broken people in this particular way, and the truth is that I don’t know. However long it is, I think, will be determined less by the number of healed lives I see, and more by my ability to sense the depth of the compassion and forgiveness that is trying to heal them. Today, with that good story in my heart, it feels like I may last a while longer than it felt like before I heard it. I hope the same is true of you.

Your friend,

Bart

Dear Friends,

I stayed up way too late in a Buffalo hotel room the other night, eating string cheese and Oscar Mayer salami from the convenience store across the parking lot, watching the tail end of the Connecticut-Syracuse basketball game on television. Unfortunately for the folks I spoke for the next morning, that game went into six overtimes before Syracuse finally won around 1:30AM…and unfortunately for the guy sitting next to me on the plane ride home, I ate all the salami. Still, I have no regrets. That game had more drama than most Broadway plays.

I will spare the details for those of you who are not basketball fans, except for this one: At the end of every period but the last (when the game was finally out of reach), whichever player had the ball took a shot, no matter how off-balance or far away he was from the basket.

Basketball players always do that, of course, at every level all over the world, the same way football quarterbacks throw Hail Mary passes in the last seconds of their close games. Nobody really expects such desperate, unlikely attempts to succeed. Everyone knows that ninety-nine times out of a hundred, they don’t even come close. But everyone watches them anyway, holding their breath, because everyone also knows that every once in a while even the longest of long shots is good. And when it is, when that last-second basket or touchdown improbably – maybe even impossibly – wins the game, the crowd goes wild. The winning team goes wild, too, and together they mob their unlikely hero and joyously celebrate what is almost invariably called their ‘miracle shot’.

That is what we are doing here: Throwing up desperation shots, secure in the knowledge that most of them are bound to fall short. Tutoring high school kids who can barely read, let alone hope for college. Searching out jobs for the least-employable adults imaginable in the midst of the worst economy any of us has ever seen. Securing mortgages so we can rent houses to families that have never lived anywhere longer than a year or two. Trying to create genuine, long-term friendships where some friends have cars and credit cards and other friends are losing their food stamps, where some friends read to their pre-schoolers and other friends still smoke and drink while they’re pregnant, where some friends have everything and other friends nothing at all. Loving people who are broken beyond repair.

That is what God is doing here too, I think: Loving us with all his might, seeking our salvation in every moment, ceaselessly calling us to do his will in this world, so as to make it over into that glorious Kingdom that Jesus was always talking about. He doesn’t always get his way, of course, at least if my life is any indication. So often I thwart him. So often I don’t listen, or I disobey. We all do. One day God will have his way with us, but for now we more often use our free wills for other things. We are the problem, however, not God’s will. No matter how broken we are, God always does His best. God always takes His shot.

When I suggest that some people can’t be helped no matter how much you love them, friends of mine say I am limiting God’s power. But when those friends suggest that God can do whatever He wants, whenever He wants to, in the life of whoever He chooses, I wonder if they think God is a monster…or if they are only watching God’s highlights reels, where all His ‘miracle shots’ are collected and replayed over and over again. You know, cancer patients healed, junkies redeemed, families reunited, hurricanes averted, crippled planes landed safely.

Don’t get me wrong; Over the years, I’ve experienced a few of those ‘miracle shots’ myself. I’ve seen times when everything and everyone lined up just the way God wanted them to, in ways that only a good and loving God could have orchestrated, in what the hymn-writer called ‘a foretaste of glory divine’. Honestly, if I hadn’t, I think I would have given up ghetto long shots a long time ago. Still, I keep taking them because doing so feels like the best, most hopeful thing to do, not because I think they are actually going to succeed. In fact, I almost never think they are going to succeed, and most of the time I am right. Most of the time, at least here in Walnut Hills, broken people stay broken.

So what? Win or lose, loving people is a beautiful pastime. Loving people is a good job, too, and the people who do it are good company. Loving people is a wonderful life. And, every once in a while…the crowd goes wild! And when that happens, I believe God is right there in the midst of the mob, celebrating the miracles that must be miracles to Him as well. In the meantime, keep the faith.

Sincerely,

Bart

Dear Friends,

What does it mean to be an outgoing, white (that is, noticeable) so-called man of God in this neighborhood? Well, for starters it means hearing more than your share of trumped up religious nonsense. Honestly, if I didn’t swear too much and drink a little beer, I’d really be in trouble. In a place that combines so much bad behavior with so much bad religion, even my ever-so-faint appearance of holiness already invites the bizarre theological musings of a wide array of street people inexplicably looking for my spiritual stamp of approval.

A corner guy named Robert, for example, recently pulled me aside to assure me that despite all appearances to the contrary, he too lives by faith. By way of example he regaled me with the story of how just last week, all alone after drinking up his last dollar, he had been visited by a long lost female friend of his, who had been led by the Holy Spirit to appear on the fire escape outside his window, armed with a bottle of whiskey, a bag of marijuana, and an appetite easy love. “I told her I had no money and just a few hours before I had to be back on my job,” he said, “but she just laughed and told me that was plenty of time for what she had in mind.” He paused for a moment, thoughtful. “You see, Bart, these other fools don’t understand it, but God takes care of me. He knew just what I needed that night…and He brought it to me right on time!”

Ah yes, sweet Providence…I had no idea. Seriously, how do you even begin to respond to that sort of ‘testimony’? I remember saying something sarcastic about Jesus’ parable of the Good One Night Stand, but the rest is kind of fuzzy. With Robert, the conversation is often kind of fuzzy. That man knows just enough Bible to be dangerous, and he loves to talk.

My friend Freemont, on the other hand, wastes few words. Big and burly, he was deep in the drug game until a few years ago, when a car accident injured his head. Now he lives with his mother and watches television most of the time, too slowed by anti-seizure medication to handle the pace of his former criminal life. He’s been part of our fellowship for nearly two years, but only recently have I figured out how to get him to open up; I ask him to tell me stories about ‘The Game’ and explain how it works. Then, and only then, does his tongue loosen and his eyes light up.

Even as he waxes eloquent about his bar fights, armed robberies, and cocaine-fueled escapades with women, however, Freemont never forgets who I am. Frankly, sometimes I wish he would. Like the other day, when he and I were hanging out in his cousin’s apartment, and he was telling about the last time he shot somebody. My goal in asking was to get to the place where I could openly acknowledge that, no matter how beautiful or fulfilling it might become, the good life I’ve been trying to sell Freemont will never compete with his old life in terms of raw excitement. Freemont’s goal in answering was to entertain me, at least until the very end.

“So I got dropped behind this little apartment building and walked around it to where these two guys I was after were standing out front. I shot at the one guy, and then the other one started running, so I shot at him too. Somebody must have called the police right then, or maybe they heard the shots, because they were there so fast I couldn’t get back to the car. So I ran into that building, and ran upstairs, looking for someplace to hide. Some lady was looking out her door, so I broke in that apartment and told her to keep quiet. The police were looking around the building, and then I heard them coming inside, so I jumped out of that lady’s window and climbed into the dumpster. Nobody saw me. I couldn’t believe it. I hurt my leg, but it didn’t break. I waited in the dumpster for two hours, until I was sure they were all gone, and then I climbed out and called my friend to pick me up”.

“What happened then,” I asked. “Did you actually shoot those guys? Did they die? Did the police – or those guys’ people – ever find out it was you?”

“Nah,” he said dismissively, “nothing happened. Later on I found out I hit them both, but nobody died, and I never caught any charges on that one.” I thought he was finished, but he wasn’t. “God was really with me that day”.

What does it mean to be an outgoing, white so-called man of God in this (or any) neighborhood? Well, for starters it means learning not to laugh out loud.

Keep (and try not to twist) the faith,

Bart

Dear Friends,

I want to be hopeful these days, what with Barack Obama just being inaugurated as our nation’s 44th President, but Tanya and Terry are making it awfully hard. I know I shouldn’t let the problems of two little people here in Walnut Hills undermine my confidence in the potential for global change, but, well…there you have it.

Maybe, if they had given me just a few hours to soak in the pageantry of Tuesday’s ceremony before calling me to intervene in their latest crisis, I could have held onto some of the inspiration I took from President Obama’s eloquent call to responsibility and sacrifice. Instead, those few good words were quickly overwhelmed in my consciousness by the many bad words of the worst mother and daughter combination I know.

On the surface, the situation is simple enough. Tanya is fourteen, looks much older, and desperately craves male attention. Lately she has been running away to stay with the worst kind of older boys. Terry is fifty-something, mentally handicapped and hardened by street life. Thanks to disability payments, she has always provided food and shelter for her daughter, but never much affection. When the girl was little, she kept her inside all day, but she knows that strategy won’t work anymore. Her two older sons are in prison, and she fully expects Tanya to end up the same way or worse. They lived in a horrible apartment until Tanya got raped there last year, after which we moved them into a trim little house. That’s where I found them on inauguration day, fighting after Tanya skipped school and stayed out all night again.

I can’t remember their order, but these are some of the things I heard: I hate you, you bald-headed bitch. I wish I aborted you when I had the chance. Yeah, I got raped again, but we didn’t report it because my Mama said she didn’t want no trouble with those boys. Shut the fuck up, liar. So what if my man tortures me? They gonna lock you up and those girls in there are gonna whip your ass. I didn’t get no love growing up, so why should she? You snuck out, so you deserve what they did to you. Where am I supposed to find nice friends in the ghetto? She don’t care about me. Nobody cares about me.

Did I finally manage to calm them down? Of course I did. Did we make up some new house rules, and arrange for some more counseling? You bet. Did they grudgingly apologize and hug one another before I left. Yes they did, believe it or not. They hugged me, too, after I somewhat indignantly reminded them that there were plenty of people who cared a whole lot about both of them, starting with me. It was a bitter, ugly fight, but it ended well.

So then, am I hopeful now? No. I don’t believe for a minute that Tanya will stay home from now on, or that Terry will touch her kindly again without my prompting, or that some cut-rate counselor provided by the state will be able to help either one of them unload the baggage of two lifetimes of abuse and neglect and ignorance. I don’t believe that the part-time love of our little faith community will ultimately transform them into reasonably good people, or that their transformation will be part of the global change that President Obama – not to mention Jesus – says is possible.

And yet, my hope is not entirely dead. All evidence to the contrary, I believe that somehow, in ways I don’t fully understand, Tanya is better off, and Terry is better off, and even sorry little me, despite the ongoing destruction of my optimism, is better off because I stepped into their conflict that day, and because my friends and I remain in their lives. It may not make the difference between triumph and tragedy, but clearly I believe our love makes a difference nevertheless. Otherwise, I’d be long gone by now.

So then, here is my message to President Obama and to Jesus and to anyone else with confidence in the future of humanity: Don’t give up on me. I am not convinced, but I am still here.

Sincerely,

Bart Campolo

Dear Friends,

For as long as I have been writing Christmas letters to our supporters, I have assumed you folks were better off and more stable than our neighbors here in Walnut Hills. This year, however, I am not so sure. Oh, I know the economic crisis hasn’t brought you down to worried-about-your-next-meal status, but I also know that most of us don’t measure our well-being in absolute terms. Instead, we compare how we are doing right now against our past experiences and expectations. By that standard, I think, it isn’t the permanently unemployed or the perpetually dependant who are hurting most these days, but rather those folks who are used to working hard, paying their own way, and even looking out for the less fortunate.

People keep asking me if this economic crisis is going to stop us from caring for our neighbors. Happily, the answer is no. We may have to do it differently, but the good news about having almost no programming is that there is almost no programming to cut when money gets tight. Our Monday dinners may be more potatoes and less meat, and our vacation next summer may be a day-trip to Indianapolis instead of a weekend in Chicago , but beyond that nothing much will change. Our relationships here are practically recession-proof.

For many other ministries I know, however, things are much worse. An old friend of mine neatly summarized the problem: “When budgets get tight,” he said, “goodness is almost always the first thing to go.” As ministry supporters ourselves, Marty and I know just what he is talking about. All of a sudden, as we are facing difficult choices about our kids’ educations, we realize we can’t give away as much money as we used to. Even so, we don’t have to look very far to see people in much worse shape, who can’t afford for us – for any of us - to stop caring.

So then, instead of another story, this month I am writing to you with a simple request: As we settle into what may be a long hard time, don’t let your goodness to others be the first, or the second, or even the hundredth thing to go. Like our little fellowship here in Walnut Hills, you may need to care for your people in different ways than you are used to, and you may not be able to send as much money to ministries like ours, but for God’s sake, and for the sake of his neediest children, keep doing what you can. And as you do, know that we are praying for you, with both concern and thanksgiving.

Merry Christmas,

Bart Campolo