EPS 46: Community Life and The Power of Confession (part 2)

As promised this is the part 2 with Tammy Perlmutter about Communal Life. Below are photos from Tammy.

To hear PART 1, click HERE.

Listeners asked questions about the particulars of communal life and I had questions too. Tammy and I recorded another episode and we also discuss the terrifying and powerful concept and discipline of confession in a way you may not have heard before.

This is a good one!

• Scroll for the detailed show notes by the minute, and please, please, please, share this episode with others!


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Show Notes

Tammy Perlmutter is a talented creator who lives (along with her husband and daughter) with the intentional community of Jesus People USA, a commune of Christians that dates back over 40 years.

tammy

MIN 2:
Q: What is the hardest part about living in community for people who first come to live with you?

MIN 4:
Q: How does the “common purse’ work? Can you make your own money and keep it for things you want to do or must everything you make go into the common purse?

MIN 8:
Q: How are conflicts dealt with?

MIN 10:
Q: How do shared meals, food, and cleaning work?

MIN 13:
Q: Personally, what is the hardest part about living in community and what’s the best part?

MIN 15:
Q: What are the main challenges and needs within the communal setting?

MIN 17:
Our Lady of the Mississippi Abby, Dubuque, Iowa.

Being an oblate near Chicago.

ladyofMissi

MIN 21:
On being downwardly mobile and simplifying things, and considering the essentials in our lives and relationships.

MIN 26:
On why Tammy started writing.

MIN 30:
Cornerstone Magazine 

MIN 32:30
Explaining “the gift of going first”

MIN 37:30
“Confession feels like a fever breaking.” (Lisa)

Jean Vanier

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

MIN 39: The power of confession to create breakthroughs.

“Confession is discipleship.”

Creating trust and community.

Depression and sin dissipate when exposed to community and life together.

MIN 44:
Tammy’s final thoughts on community. Being, not just doing.

MIN 48:
The invitation to those of us not living in communal situations.

PHOTO COLLAGE from TAMMY:

Jesus People USA is a self-sustaining , tent-making community. We support our home, church, and ministries through businesses we have created.

Jesus People USA: A church & an intentional community, living together, creating a place to discover who you are and to be challenged to live an authentic life in Christ.

Wilson Abbey: Community. Faith. Art. Concert venue, theater, art gallery, conference center in Uptown, Chicago.

JPUSA Internships: 3-12 month internships in specific businesses and ministries.

Group Missions: Bring your small group, church, youth group, family!

Cornerstone Community Outreach: Homeless shelter

The Rummage Room: A re-sale boutique whose proceeds go entirely towards Cornerstone Community Outreach.

Uptown Tent City: Providing protection, support, and material needs for homeless living under the viaducts in Uptown.

Zeppelin Design Labs: Avant-Garde Audio and Electronic Products.

Grrr Records:The home of Glenn Kaiser, GKB, The Crossing, Leper, Aracely, Exegesis, Resurrection Band (aka Rez), Anti-World System, and many others.

Everybody’s Coffee: Professionally-trained baristas devoted to making delicious, soul-warming, fresh brewed fair-trade coffee and urban artisan baked goods.

 

Nine3Nine CreativeA web and graphic design business doing top quality, cutting edge work. 

Belly Acres Designs: High-quality screen printing.
Deeply Rooted: A Gathering. A one-day faith and creativity gathering in Chicago for women, taking place in May and November.
 
Photos:
#1 Worship

#2 Fellowship

#3 Work

#4 Social Justice

#5 Art

#6 Music

1.JPWorshipCollage

2.

JPFellowshipCollage

3.JPFellowshipCollage

4.JPJusticeCollage

5.

JPArtCollage

6. JPMusicCollage


Dear listener,

What did you think about this episode?

• Have you too been guilty of ditching situations, relationships, and people when things get messy, uncomfortable, or inconvenient?

• What has helped you live a more authenticity community-minded life?

• You can share your thoughts at the Spark My Muse group page here.
If this topic interests you, listen to the episode with activist Shane Claiborne who started the intentional inner city community in Philadelphia called The Simple Way. HEAR that here. 

EPS 44: What is Communal Living Like? (guest Tammy Perlmutter)

Welcome to Spark My Muse! I love that you’re here.

Friday episodes are longer conversational ones with guests. Find the full list here.

Wednesday episodes are shorter, potent ones called “Soul School”. Find the full list here.

SPARK- LIVE: I also do live discussions with friends and guests on interesting topics about 3 times per month and feature the Replays here at the website. Sign up for those HEREand follow me on Twitter for links and info. (Because some discussions are listed elsewhere.)


Scroll down for detailed show notes labeled by the minute, and don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast. If you feel so moved, get the 2-3 times monthly newsletter here that comes to you with love from me with insider info and extras.

Could you live with others communally and share everything in common? Money. Food. Living Space. Possessions. Goals. Identity. Your Future. Many of us may extoll the virtues of community but have minimal exposure with a lived-out experience. Tammy Perlmutter lives in a commune with her daughter and husband and you’ll learn her story today.


 

TO HEAR PART 2 -recorded as a followup- CLICK HERE


The longing for tight social bonds is so primal that even when the people we trust most betray us, we will seek out other opportunities for the solace of those connections until we find them.

tammyTammy Perlmutter is a talented creator who lives with the intentional community of Jesus People USA, a commune of Christians that dates back over 40 years.

From Tammy’s website:

I’m an East Coast girl at heart, born and raised in Philadelphia, but (for the second time!) called to Chicago for ministry. I live and work with Jesus People USA, an intentional Christian community of 200 members, living together in the historic 10-story Chelsea Hotel. We are rooted in the Uptown neighborhood, described as “Twenties Charm Meets Psych Ward with No Walls,” to love and serve the homeless, disciple believers, and be a presence for Christ in Chicago. I have lived communally for 15 years, and even with all its challenges and hardships, I consider myself beyond blessed to experience authentic, organic community in all its crazy, chaotic richness.

100_0870
ministries of JPUSA (coffee shop, skate shop, gallery)

From wikipedia:
Jesus People USA
 (JPUSA) is a Christian intentional community of 250 [this number is Lisa’s edit] people [1] in Uptown, on the North Side of Chicago, Illinois. It was founded in 1972,[2] coming out of Jesus People Milwaukee in the Jesus Movement, it is the largest of the few remaining communes from that movement. In 1989, JPUSA joined the Evangelical Covenant Church[3] as a member congregation, and currently has three pastors credentialed with the ECC. The community organized the former annual Cornerstone Festival.[4]  (Click for wikipedia entry for JPUSA),

The group’s long-term existence and historic roots in the 1960s make it, according to sociologist Shawn Young, one of the most contemporary significant groups from the Jesus Movement era:

Founded in 1972, this community is one of the most significant surviving expressions of the original Jesus Movement of the sixties and seventies and represents a radical expression of contemporary countercultural evangelicalism. JPUSA’s blend of Christian Socialism, theological orthodoxy, postmodern theory and ethos of edgy artistic expression (as demonstrated at their annual music festival) prove what some scholars have longed suspected: evangelicalism is a diverse, complex movement, which simply does not yield to any attempt at categorization. [

 

The building where Tammy lives:

920_W_Wilson

MIN 1:
INTRO

MIN 3:00

Tammy’s upbringing: living for 13 years in foster care around inner city Philadelphia and then a residential facility and being a lost girl.

MIN 10:00

How does Tammy think cycles of instability, abuse and addiction get broken and redeemed?

How hope happens?

11:00

Mentoring

Humiliation and despair.

12:00

A turning point when her case was turned over to Bethana social workers.

Being seen and heard for the first time.

13:00

Escaping into books and starting to write using the bookend papers.

15:30

Finding an intentional community (commune) JesusPeopleUSA

16:00

Cornerstone Festival and the rigged drawing

17:30

Being suicidal and living a dangerous lifestyle.

20:00

Keeping her promise about answering any question.

Finding a home instead of rejection.

22:30

Choosing a new life and the spiritual warfare battles she experienced at that point.

24:30

Being attracted to a Jewish East Coaster who she eventually married.

25:30

The Jews for Jesus experience that took them away from the community.

27:30

The deal to move back to Chicago and things feeling hopeless.

31:00

Being made for community and belonging.

33:30

Businesses that support the community and the ministries.

JPUSA.org

38:00

The History of Uptown Chicago

• Green Mill Lounge

• Al Cappone

Being a voice for the poor.

The only family shelter in the city.

The tent community nearby.

43:00

Vocation as a theme

Building community and being downwardly mobile as vocation.

46:00

A calling on our lives.

The gift of going first.

The Mudroom

Raggle Tangle: Invest in the Mess.

49:00

Making room for the mess


If you liked the episode please share it!

If this topic interests you, listen to the episode with activist Shane Claiborne who started the intentional inner city community in Philadelphia called The Simple Way. HEAR that here. 

Hope (art in the Spoken Word)

This is a video, a Advent Meditation. I met Tammy in person this September. She lives in Community in Chicago, and they received me as their guest. I always find her raw honesty and artistic sensibilities inspirational. This video is part of a larger series…

As you watch it, listen. Listen well. Listen 2 or 3 times, because it’s full and rich and good for you. Absorb it and experience hope.

(to read the words, click here)

Hello, Chicago!!!

I’m here at the Jesus People USA commune in Chicago thanks to my friend Tammy P. I have a delightful room with a bathroom, bed loft, and they even gave me towels and a bunch of new soaps and shampoo. Find the links in the previous post to see photos and video of the trip. I’m hoping to grab some coffe at their punked out skater cafe soon and chill. A fun trip so far. Chilly but no rain and the teachers’ strike is suspended too. More soon!