Cohousing-L Mailing List: Cohousing development among red, blue, and purple people

[CHRISTINE COE (CHRISTINECOE1]

Dear Cohousing List--

Wow!  It's amazing how quickly this list can go from the mundane to the 
stratospheric!  Saoirse and Ann are both 
to be commended for paradigm-busting charity, and Rob for the realism that most 
of the country is purple (actually, 
red and blue mixed with white comes out something more like lavender).  I, for 
example, am an evangelical with 
conservative theology, but find much to be troubled with regarding the current 
Administration (and especially 
the neocon extremists).  An "Empire of Democratic Regimes" is a contradiction 
in terms.  

For too many, conservative theology lazily translates into a conservative 
politics.  There's a "fortress mentality" 
which too easily dominates both.  The irony is that science is closer to 
agreeing with "conservative theology" than 
ever before (see the "Anthropic Principle" debate along with the "Intelligent 
Design" movement)!

The Jim Wallis book and the Utne Reader article signal the start of a national 
dialogue about how the political 
parties have used the rhetoric of polarization to further their own political 
ends, and focus us on supposedly 
irresolvable problems rather than work towards national consensus, while 
diverting our attention from more 
pressing issues.  Our own forming "Christian cohousing" community has "paid the 
price" for not being predictably 
blue or red; we're reaching out in just the spirit of respectful dialogue that 
both Saoirse and Ann describe.

The Intentional Communities movement has been of great service, and I'm glad 
they have accepted this "new" form 
called "cohousing" with open arms.  Having studied various forms of community 
for many years, I see cohousing 
as constructively addressing many dynamics which too easily become unproductive 
in some extreme forms of 
communalism.  

Of course, it's always the character of the people in a community which 
determine its ethos, a factor which is only 
discovered over time with people whom you come to know well enough to evaluate 
and appreciate.  And so I see 
the entire Intentional Communities movement as a faith-enterprise which has had 
inestimable impact and value in an 
increasingly disconnected (and even alienated) society.  The culture wars have 
taken their toll, but they have not 
permanently debilitated us.

Thanks to all the cultural pioneers, this "new" movement has great potential.  
I do not see it as waning or 
cresting, but going through that slow phase of persuading those in society of a 
less idealistic bent of the real and 
practical benefits of this model.  It is an interdisciplinary, synergistic 
solution to a number of social and environmental 
ills.  As a means of restoring the broken sense of "polis" by using consensus 
self-management, it is a new form of 
stewardship and political training for its members, especially its children.

Embodying principles which go beyond mere tolerance, cohousing embraces 
diversity to a degree not often seen in 
voluntary associations, outside of the more noble community service 
organizations.  I think that there's much more 
to come from the cohousing model.  I also think that the surprising discovery 
has yet to be made that we are not 
as polarized a nation as the news headlines would suggest, but that the 
"entertainment culture" being promoted 
and reported in the national media tends towards a distortion of truth.

I would like to see a more concerted effort at discerning how cohousing could 
be a major solution to the nation's 
housing affordability crisis.  We need to marshal the resources available on 
all fronts --assistive organizations (Habitat 
for Humanity, for example, is launching a nation-wide initiative to build "New 
Hope" communities of 18-25 units in 
cohousing-like patterns; they lack a common house, but include community 
commons areas for gardens, playgrounds 
etc. with parking to the outside and the prospect of building a common house 
later with sweat equity); inexpensive 
"green" expandable small house models --see 
http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/houses.htm<http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/houses.htm>
 for example; other 
forms of retrofit cohousing which take advantage of current zoning rather than 
asking for variances --see 
http://www.konzak.com/prohousing/index.html<http://www.konzak.com/prohousing/index.html>;
 lending institutions which specialize in low-income funding 
(any help out there on this one?), and so on.  

Instead of just "bigger and better" cohousing, let's also facilitate smaller 
and more affordable.  That would give today's 
young people more entrée into a movement which, in every other way, is 
compatible with the spirit of the postmodern 
age.  Today's young workers and older low-income workforce are interested in 
"deconstructing deconstructionism" 
because they've come too close to anarchy for comfort.  The American appetite 
needs to be brought into line; insatiable 
is not sustainable.  Let's give them a model which works for them, rather than 
just "let them eat cake" (okay, that's a 
little dramatic, but you know what I mean!).  Perhaps we'll find in the process 
that our own appetites can be toned down.  

It is in America's neglect of the poor that our biggest source of national and 
personal culpability resides.  Despite a 
decades-long "war on poverty" we've made precious little progress.  The "war on 
terror" is a perilous outgrowth of this 
neglect.  The Wallis book is especially salient on this point.  May I also 
recommend a good look at the www.ijm.org<http://www.ijm.org/> 
website, an alternative model for risky action that comes closer to the point 
of disarming terrorism.  

--Guy Coe
christinecoe1 [at] msn.com<mailto:christinecoe1 [at] msn.com>
Bartimaeus Community, L.L.C., building
"Meadow Wood" Cohousing
Bremerton, WA 98311
www.bartcommunity.org<http://www.bartcommunity.org/>