“Some communities start by serving the poor. When they begin, their members are full of generosity—though sometimes a bit aggressive in respect of the rich—and have a rather utopian ideal. Gradually, they discover the need for prayer and an inner life; they realize that their generosity is being burned up and that they are in danger of becoming a collection of hyperactives who put all their energy into external things.
Other communities start with prayer—like many communities of the charismatic renewal. But gradually they discover the need to serve the poor and to develop real commitment to them. Opening to God in adoration and opening to the poor in welcome and service are the two poles of a community’s growth, and signs of its health. And the community itself must grow towards a stronger sense of its own identity, like a body in which every member can exercise its gift and be recognized for it.
If those communities that started by serving the poor do not discover the deepening of prayer and the bonds of love flowing into celebration, they risk becoming a militant group struggling for justice. If those communities that started with prayer and adoration do not discover the waters of compassion flowing from them upon those in pain, they risk becoming legalistic and sterile.
The three elements of community—prayer, or communion with the Father through and in Jesus, presence and service to the poor, and the consciousness of being bonded in a single body—are always necessary for a community to be healthy and to grow. Jesus called each apostle into a personal relationship of love with him, then he bonded them together in community and then he sent them out to announce good news to the poor.”
Jean Vanier in Community and Growth (Trowbridge: The Cromwell Press, 1989) 141-142.