Page 6 - C.A.L.L. #37 - Winter 2013/2014

KALEIDOSCOPE

The Communitarian Scene from all Over and Under
Compiled (and partly translated) by Joel Dorkam

Joel Dorkam has now retired his column ‘Kaleidoscope’. However,
here are some final clippings which he asked us to include in this issue
of C.A.L.L.. Thanks Joel, for always sharing your forthright views with
us.

David Jansen of Dancing Rabbit advocates putting compassion ahead of ideals and authority. He
remarks in Shalom Connections of Sept. 2012,

“Our vision of an ideal world and a model of community may bring us to the door, but
it will not show us how to live inside the house of community itself…” We love to judge
others by their worst behavior and ourselves by our highest ideals”...”As alcoholics
learn in AA, there will always be a hypocrite lurking within us, ready to take over our
lives in a moment of self-confidence…” And as for hypocrites, the distance between

ignorance and knowledge can be a moment (or the latest book) but the gap between
knowing and faithfully doing with others what we already know can be more than a
lifetime…”

Ma’kwe Schaub Ludwig of Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage (wherever do they get all these funny,
original names?) looks at voluntarism from an unusual angle, in Communities #152 of Fall 2011.
She dives bravely into values, visions, passions and creativity, and soon comes up for air, together
with the surprising recommendation “Cultivate a life that doesn’t need to be atoned for”. I guess
that some of us might need some kind of elaboration about the exact meaning of that sentence and
how it could be realized?

Right Livelihood, Wrong Volunteerism
“[Right Livelihood is] living in a totally authentic way, with no separation between work
life and personal life.”
- Peter LeBrun, On the Path to Right Livelihood

Sometimes I think that volunteerism is definition: “It’s the art of clarifying
a double-edged sword. On the one hand, what it is you are passionate about,
volunteering gives us a creative outlet then finding a way to make your living in
for Service. On the other hand, it can pursuit of that passion… No longer is a
distract us from our pursuit of right teacher or higher authority required to
livelihood. determine what qualifies; the
Geoph Kozeny traces Right Livelihood evaluation process has become
all the way back to Buddha. He says, personalized to the extent that each
“Originally, it meant doing honest work individual decides for himself/herself
and harming neither person nor any what’s worthy and what’s not.”
living thing.” He offers a modernized

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