Welcome to the Practice of Inclusion
““You hardly knew how hungry you were to be gathered in,
to receive the welcome that invited you to enter entirely…
You began to breathe again… You learned to sing.
But the deal with this blessing is that it will not leave you alone, will not let you linger…
this blessing will ask you to leave, not because it has tired of you
but because it desires for you to become the sanctuary that you have found…” – Jan Richardson
Every month, All Peoples makes materials available to facilitate exploring a theological theme. Our February theme asks us to explore INCLUSION.
We are living in a time when the practice of inclusion seems to be under fire and that reality makes it all the more important that we work to draw our circles wide enough to welcome all.
In our reading above, Jan Richardson begins with hunger. And so do we. Just saying the word “inclusion” conjures it up: The primal hunger to belong; the longing to be let in. No one likes standing outside the circle. No one likes leaning against the locked door listening to everyone else laughing inside.
From the time we are little, inclusion and belonging are the things we seek. It’s the promised destination. But Richardson will have none of that. To belong is only the beginning. That’s what she wants us to know.
One minute she’s wrapping us in comforting words about settling in and allowing ourselves to finally breathe. The next she’s shaking us awake and telling us to get up and go. That shaking should tell us something.
Or to put it another way, hers is not a gentle invitation. It’s not some sweet reminder to think of others. It’s a warning: Beware of the kind of belonging that only wants to bless you! Deep down we know this. The hard part is to remember it. To use Richardson’s language, if we find ourselves being invited to linger rather than leave, alarm bells should go off.
We need to be weary of those who welcome us with a members only card and a soft couch. They may have let us in, but soon they will enlist us into the work of keeping others out. There will likely even be a part of us that wants to keep others out. After all, closed circles don’t just set us apart, they also set us above. But they also keep us small.
Maybe this is why Richardson’s blessing is so intent on not leaving us alone. It knows that we only grow when the circle does. Circles that keep others out also keep the air out. No one inside a closed circle truly sings; they only suffocate, slowly. It’s all one big reminder that the true blessing of inclusion is not that you get to come inside the circle; it’s that you get to participate in expanding it. As the circle grows, so do we.
Let’s explore together! Click
HERE to access a list of reflection questions.
