Another Table

Whether in schools, churches, or businesses, a throughline of my life is to create community.

Whether in the United States, Canada, or across the globe, I’m curious about connection.  I want to listen and gather insight on how to cultivate the nourishment of belonging.

Since 2015, the notion of the Table of Learning rolled around my being.

Now, I’m feeling the shift to explore a different table, the Table of Community.

Where are we creating spaces of connection, belonging, and trust?  How can we do that effectively and purposefully?  How do we weave the fabric of community?

A Powerful Moment

Early in the germinating days of Niteo, I had a simple yet profound experience.  The team and I were visiting Sanyu orphanage in Kampala, Uganda.  This was about 15 years ago and I wasn’t even traveling with a smartphone yet.  I was still stumbling all over myself trying to hold the chasm of my wine-and-cheese lifestyle with the poverty I was experiencing abroad.  Upon our arrival for 3 days of serving (a pittance, I know), the Director gathered all the caregivers and team from the orphanage.

Now, these employees were part of the $1/day crew who came each day to care for dozens of discarded, disabled, and deserted babies (ages 0-2).  They came to bathe, feed, and diaper.  I imagine it as thankless work.

As we gathered together, in a circle, we pulled out our sharpies from our aprons and some sticky nametags and offered each person a nametag for their uniform.

What happened next was completely unexpected…

Glee, literally childlike joy, spread throughout the room like a glow.  The team filled with excitement and anticipation because each person would be recognized and spoken to by name.  The response to “I see you” inherent in the small act of nametags blew me away.  We had no idea.

Caregivers who were almost as forgotten and discarded as the babies they served were acknowledged and named.

Belonging and happiness were infused in the moment.

While now, I will spend the rest of my life deconstructing the power and colonial structures illustrated in these moments, I also want to acknowledge the power of seeing each individual within the group as a first step.

Now, 15 years later, I’m more deeply considering this Table of Community.  We need it more than ever.  Leaders, we need safe places for acceptance, growth, and journeying together.

Elders and Saints

I am looking to the elders and saints to bring wisdom to our table.

Mother Teresa reminds us, “The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.”

And, Richard Wagamese, Indigenous author and elder, offers, “We are all one drum and we need each other.”

Is love the feast of our table?  Could we cultivate community when we include everyone?  Is every child a gift?

Leaders, teachers, and community-builders let’s meet here again soon, in this village, to explore the Table of Community.

For the sake of the children,

Karine