Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Spirituality and Consensus in Cohousing.

[Stuart Staniford-Chen (stanifor]

Dave Crawford wrote:

> When we start with spiritual pushiness and add group pressure, we may find 
> folks like Stuart (and me, if I'd been there) going along, unknowingly 
> putting group pressure on each other.  I believe it should stop now; I'll 
> stop going along now in my group.

> And we shouldn't be surprised.  Because most folks I'll call "spiritually 
> expressive" cohousers beleve "spirituality" (meaning for cohousing public 
> "ritual") is an unquestionable good.  Perhaps they forget that unquestioning 
> faith makes a "true believer."  In any event, objections to ritual make many 
> feel rejected or even wronged.  Any wonder Stuart, just for one, fears an 
> "unpleasant scene"?  

Ouch.  I had hoped not to say anything further on this topic, but I feel 
compelled to clarify my views which I think have been somewhat 
mischaracterized here.  I *enjoyed* the closing ceremony.  When I realized 
what it was going to be like, I made a conscious choice to open myself to 
it and be accepting of it and enjoy it as much as possible.  I was 
somewhat successful.  Definitely I felt closer to the other people at the 
conference as a result of the closing.

*At the same time* I was somewhat uncomfortable with taking part in what 
seemed to me to be religious rituals - albeit drawn from several 
traditions.  I rejected the religion I grew up with a long time ago 
because I didn't think there was any good evidence for its tenets; I 
haven't found others to be much more likely.  I don't go to religious 
rituals much as a result.  This one reminded me of the feelings I used to 
have in church.  That was both pleasant and painful.  I had forgotten how 
powerful and pleasurable that kind of shared experience can be.  It also 
invoked less pleasant feelings:  religious references come with a lot of 
baggage because religions are powerful social institutions that tend to be 
somewhat repressive if they have enough power.  They also do a great deal 
of good of course.

So my feelings were complex and contradictory - Dave chose to only pull 
one strand out of a message in which I was trying to be balanced.  My 
impression from conversations afterwards was that there were people at the 
closing who were *thoroughly* uncomfortable with it, but I was not one.

Also - I do not condemn RMCA for choosing to do this.  I think they 
were trying to do something that they thought would be really neat.  It 
didn't work out 100% the way they expected, but a lot of people enjoyed it 
and I think we can all learn quite a bit from the discussion that it has 
provoked.  I'm glad they did it.  I also like Velma, Zev, Kathryn a great 
deal as people - they're really cool and they have worked really hard for 
the cohousing movement.  I don't think for a moment that they were acting 
out of "religious intolerance" or "spiritual pushiness."

Finally, Dave suggests that whether to have religious/spiritual rituals 
should be a matter for consensus decision making.  This seems to me very 
appropriate for individual communities, but doesn't seem very practical 
for a national conference.

Stuart

(vigorously defending his right to have several feelings at the same time).