Little movements of communities of ordinary radicals are committed to doing small things with great love.

That is the power of the Eucharist. At the communion table you have rich and poor together in the early church and they were being challenged.

I just have a more holistic sense of what it means to be for life, knowing that life does not just begin at conception and end at birth, and that if I am going to discourage abortion, I had better be ready to adopt some babies and care for some mothers.

The best critique of what is wrong is the practice of something better. So let's stop complaining about the church we've experienced and work on becoming the church we dream of.

When the church takes affairs of the state more seriously than they do Jesus, Pax Romana becomes its gospel and the president becomes the Son of God.

When we were starting our community a bunch of older Benedictine nuns said to us, "If you have any questions or want to pick our brains, please do - we've been doing community for about 1,500 years together so we've learned a few things."

There are congregations on nearly every corner. I'm not sure we need more churches. What we need is a church. I say one church is better than fifty. I have tried to remove the plural form churches from my vocabulary, training myself to think of the church as Christ did, and as the early Christians did. The metaphors for her are always singular - a body, a bride. I heard one gospel preacher say it like this, as he really wound up and broke a sweat: "We've got to unite ourselves as one body. Because Jesus is coming back, and he's coming back for a bride not a harem.