Dear Friends

I don’t know about you, but lately I have been receiving a whole lot of personal updates like this one, mainly from people I don’t know very well. Up until last month I deleted most of them unread with only the smallest tinge of guilt, reminding myself that I hadn’t really asked for them in the first place. Lately though, all that has changed.

Don’t get me wrong; I still delete most of them. The difference is that now I feel guilty about it. I may not be close to those people, after all, but right now I can totally relate to the radical transitions they are going through. It suddenly makes sense to me that they include virtually everyone they ever met on their email lists, hoping to capture the attention of even a few extra souls. As my family and I have discovered for ourselves, when your life is in major flux, you crave all the emotional, spiritual, and practical support you can get.

If you have only read this far out of guilt, however, let me release you now from any further sense of obligation because, in the midst of much uncertainly, one thing has become perfectly clear: We Campolos have been blessed with a stunning array of fine and amazingly supportive colleagues, friends, and family members. Happily, it turns out that our inner circle is both bigger and better than we realized. In other words, you guys have been absolutely great, and we are absolutely grateful.

Of course, non-communication is generally not the best way to express such gratitude. Honestly, if not for the ridiculous amount of time and energy it has taken to get us situated here in Cincinnati (and to stabilize things work-wise back in Philadelphia), I promise I would have responded sooner to each and every one of your wonderful notes and phone calls. Even so, I can’t believe it has taken this long.

I probably should begin by updating you on the kids’ school situation, now that they have been at Clark Montessori for a few weeks. Of course, given the miraculous way they got enrolled there, I would love to tell you that everything has been perfect for them ever since. However, the truth is that while Miranda is making a good adjustment, she is really missing her close friends back in Radnor, and doesn’t yet see where her new ones will come from here. She loves her teachers, though, and they have reassured both her and us that time is on her side in that regard.

Roman, on the other hand, got off to a rough start at Clark. Honestly, given my own experience as a Middle Schooler, I don’t know why I thought it would be to his advantage to start out with all the other first year students coming from different elementary schools. How could I forget all the bullying and verbal abuse generated by a bunch of insecure, pre-adolescent boys jockeying for social position in a new environment, when I myself suffered the longest year of my life in the same situation? Regardless, by day two Roman had been targeted by a pack of bullies, who mocked and threatened him to near-hysteria by the first weekend.

Those of you who know Roman will understand the magnitude of this problem for all of us. To make matters worse, Marty and I had to drive back to Philadelphia that Sunday for a hastily arranged EAPE board meeting, to address my father’s concerns about our long-distance management of his office. Only our trust in the patient love of Ric and Karen Hordinski (and in the irresistible sweetness of their two little girls) enabled us to leave our kids behind, but even so we felt quite horrible about it. Not surprisingly, by the time we got back on Tuesday night Roman was inconsolably upset…and everyone else was exhausted.

The next morning, when Marty and I walked into the principal’s office, we were reminded of why Clark is a special kind of city school. Before we could even finish describing it, the principal let us know that he understood Roman’s problem, that he cared, and that he was confident he could help Roman and his adversaries to solve it in a positive way. And so he has. It hasn’t been easy, but every day has been better for Roman since then.

For the record, the trip to Philadelphia went pretty well, too.

As you can imagine, this sudden move of ours has been awfully traumatic for my parents, both professionally and personally. No matter how good is my plan to manage EAPE via phone and email and visits, and no matter how good is the person who replaces Marty as my father’s administrator, they quite understandably felt more secure with both of us right there in the office. More importantly, they felt more secure with both of us – and their two beloved grandchildren – just around the corner from their house. I think they understand why, having decided to radically change our lives, we felt we needed to get here in time for the beginning of school, but that doesn’t change the fact that all this is really hurting them. Which hurts us too.

At the board meeting it was decided that both Marty and I needed to shuttle back to the office more frequently than we planned over the next few months, to insure a smooth transition and to relieve my folk’s anxiety until they are fully confident in the new team in the office. Hopefully those trips will give us more time to process the personal side of this move with both my parents, as well.

After the meeting, some friends helped pack our van and its trailer with enough of our stuff to furnish the apartment on the other side of the Hordinski’s house, where we will be staying until we sell our own in Radnor and find a new one here. It took a few days to clean and arrange it once we got back, but we’re settled in now. The good news is that we get to live in a cool space near great people in the neighborhood we want to serve. The bad news is that Marty cooks in a small, oven-less, counter-less kitchen, Roman sleeps on our couch, and Miranda has to go next door to get to her room.

A lot of people have remarked to us about how rarely people our age actually leave their comfort zones behind in order to boldly follow their dreams. As I consider my homesick kids, my grieving parents, my sleep-deprived wife, my hopes, my fears, and my own sore back, well, I think I understand a little better now why that is. And yet…
I still think we did the right thing. And I still think it’s going to work. I still believe that, someday in the not-too-distant future, we’re going to be standing in the middle of an intentional community of good people committed to loving one another and to loving their inner-city neighbors, glad that we jumped when we got the chance.

But first there are some obvious questions: Where do we begin? What does that intentional community look like? Who can join? Where will everybody live? What will we actually do together? Is it some kind of church?

I’m not sure about the others, but the answer to that last question is no. Marty and I didn’t come here to start a church, or at least we didn’t come here to start anything like what we think of as a church.

What we have in mind is more like a small, neighborhood-sized, people’s liberation movement, whose initial impetus comes from our band of loving, faithful, gracious brothers and sisters, and whose aim is to free our friends from anything that keeps them from fulfilling their God-given potential, be it systematic oppression or old-fashioned loneliness.

Of course, such movements must always be flexible, according to the needs of the moment. We might be a fringe political party one day, a search and rescue party the next, and a surprise birthday party on the day after that. Actually, knowing what I know about needy people, I expect our community will throw lots of great, big, positive parties, with plenty of good food and music, and no small amount of dancing. What we won’t throw, I hope, are any stones.

I might as well lay this out right from the start: Marty and I hope Muslims and Jews feel free to join our community, provided they don’t mind the rest of us following Jesus. Christians are welcome too, of course, even if they are dead certain God sends everyone else to Hell, so long as they embrace those of us who don’t believe that at all, along with those who don’t yet even believe in God. We hope some of our gay friends join as well, along with their spouses if they have them. We aren’t trying to be controversial. It just seems to us that the criteria for membership in our little community of faith should be about commitment, compassion, and compatibility, not orthodoxy.

My point here is simple: Marty and I are just Jesus people starting an intentional community aimed at serving the poor, not evangelical conservatives starting a Christian organization aimed at maximizing converts. I won’t be surprised if we end up evangelizing some of our friends and neighbors because we love them, but we won’t be ‘loving’ anyone in order to evangelize them.

That’s probably enough for now. For those of you still interested in this fledgling enterprise of ours after reading Letter #3, I am working on a simple website (www.bartcampolo.com) with a running blog to keep you updated. In the meantime, please know we thank God every day for His grace and goodness, which come to us most often in the form of you.

Sincerely,

Bart

PS In case you heard more dire rumors, here’s the scoop: Just as I finished the first draft of this letter, Marty’s left foot swelled up like a balloon for the third time in two months. This time her doctor insisted on admitting her into the hospital for some tests and IV antibiotics and a strong dose of boredom. She was out again in a few days and is on the mend, but we’re both starting to wonder when we get to start claiming all that quick and easy stuff we named on our way out here.

Dear Friends

I don’t know about you, but lately I have been receiving a whole lot of personal updates like this one, mainly from people I don’t know very well. Up until last month I deleted most of them unread with only the smallest tinge of guilt, reminding myself that I hadn’t really asked for them in the first place. Lately though, all that has changed.

Don’t get me wrong; I still delete most of them. The difference is that now I feel guilty about it. I may not be close to those people, after all, but right now I can totally relate to the radical transitions they are going through. It suddenly makes sense to me that they include virtually everyone they ever met on their email lists, hoping to capture the attention of even a few extra souls. As my family and I have discovered for ourselves, when your life is in major flux, you crave all the emotional, spiritual, and practical support you can get.

If you have only read this far out of guilt, however, let me release you now from any further sense of obligation because, in the midst of much uncertainly, one thing has become perfectly clear: We Campolos have been blessed with a stunning array of fine and amazingly supportive colleagues, friends, and family members. Happily, it turns out that our inner circle is both bigger and better than we realized. In other words, you guys have been absolutely great, and we are absolutely grateful.

Of course, non-communication is generally not the best way to express such gratitude. Honestly, if not for the ridiculous amount of time and energy it has taken to get us situated here in Cincinnati (and to stabilize things work-wise back in Philadelphia), I promise I would have responded sooner to each and every one of your wonderful notes and phone calls. Even so, I can’t believe it has taken this long.

I probably should begin by updating you on the kids’ school situation, now that they have been at Clark Montessori for a few weeks. Of course, given the miraculous way they got enrolled there, I would love to tell you that everything has been perfect for them ever since. However, the truth is that while Miranda is making a good adjustment, she is really missing her close friends back in Radnor, and doesn’t yet see where her new ones will come from here. She loves her teachers, though, and they have reassured both her and us that time is on her side in that regard.

Roman, on the other hand, got off to a rough start at Clark. Honestly, given my own experience as a Middle Schooler, I don’t know why I thought it would be to his advantage to start out with all the other first year students coming from different elementary schools. How could I forget all the bullying and verbal abuse generated by a bunch of insecure, pre-adolescent boys jockeying for social position in a new environment, when I myself suffered the longest year of my life in the same situation? Regardless, by day two Roman had been targeted by a pack of bullies, who mocked and threatened him to near-hysteria by the first weekend.

Those of you who know Roman will understand the magnitude of this problem for all of us. To make matters worse, Marty and I had to drive back to Philadelphia that Sunday for a hastily arranged EAPE board meeting, to address my father’s concerns about our long-distance management of his office. Only our trust in the patient love of Ric and Karen Hordinski (and in the irresistible sweetness of their two little girls) enabled us to leave our kids behind, but even so we felt quite horrible about it. Not surprisingly, by the time we got back on Tuesday night Roman was inconsolably upset…and everyone else was exhausted.

The next morning, when Marty and I walked into the principal’s office, we were reminded of why Clark is a special kind of city school. Before we could even finish describing it, the principal let us know that he understood Roman’s problem, that he cared, and that he was confident he could help Roman and his adversaries to solve it in a positive way. And so he has. It hasn’t been easy, but every day has been better for Roman since then.

For the record, the trip to Philadelphia went pretty well, too.

As you can imagine, this sudden move of ours has been awfully traumatic for my parents, both professionally and personally. No matter how good is my plan to manage EAPE via phone and email and visits, and no matter how good is the person who replaces Marty as my father’s administrator, they quite understandably felt more secure with both of us right there in the office. More importantly, they felt more secure with both of us – and their two beloved grandchildren – just around the corner from their house. I think they understand why, having decided to radically change our lives, we felt we needed to get here in time for the beginning of school, but that doesn’t change the fact that all this is really hurting them. Which hurts us too.

At the board meeting it was decided that both Marty and I needed to shuttle back to the office more frequently than we planned over the next few months, to insure a smooth transition and to relieve my folk’s anxiety until they are fully confident in the new team in the office. Hopefully those trips will give us more time to process the personal side of this move with both my parents, as well.

After the meeting, some friends helped pack our van and its trailer with enough of our stuff to furnish the apartment on the other side of the Hordinski’s house, where we will be staying until we sell our own in Radnor and find a new one here. It took a few days to clean and arrange it once we got back, but we’re settled in now. The good news is that we get to live in a cool space near great people in the neighborhood we want to serve. The bad news is that Marty cooks in a small, oven-less, counter-less kitchen, Roman sleeps on our couch, and Miranda has to go next door to get to her room.

A lot of people have remarked to us about how rarely people our age actually leave their comfort zones behind in order to boldly follow their dreams. As I consider my homesick kids, my grieving parents, my sleep-deprived wife, my hopes, my fears, and my own sore back, well, I think I understand a little better now why that is. And yet…
I still think we did the right thing. And I still think it’s going to work. I still believe that, someday in the not-too-distant future, we’re going to be standing in the middle of an intentional community of good people committed to loving one another and to loving their inner-city neighbors, glad that we jumped when we got the chance.

But first there are some obvious questions: Where do we begin? What does that intentional community look like? Who can join? Where will everybody live? What will we actually do together? Is it some kind of church?

I’m not sure about the others, but the answer to that last question is no. Marty and I didn’t come here to start a church, or at least we didn’t come here to start anything like what we think of as a church.

What we have in mind is more like a small, neighborhood-sized, people’s liberation movement, whose initial impetus comes from our band of loving, faithful, gracious brothers and sisters, and whose aim is to free our friends from anything that keeps them from fulfilling their God-given potential, be it systematic oppression or old-fashioned loneliness.

Of course, such movements must always be flexible, according to the needs of the moment. We might be a fringe political party one day, a search and rescue party the next, and a surprise birthday party on the day after that. Actually, knowing what I know about needy people, I expect our community will throw lots of great, big, positive parties, with plenty of good food and music, and no small amount of dancing. What we won’t throw, I hope, are any stones.

I might as well lay this out right from the start: Marty and I hope Muslims and Jews feel free to join our community, provided they don’t mind the rest of us following Jesus. Christians are welcome too, of course, even if they are dead certain God sends everyone else to Hell, so long as they embrace those of us who don’t believe that at all, along with those who don’t yet even believe in God. We hope some of our gay friends join as well, along with their spouses if they have them. We aren’t trying to be controversial. It just seems to us that the criteria for membership in our little community of faith should be about commitment, compassion, and compatibility, not orthodoxy.

My point here is simple: Marty and I are just Jesus people starting an intentional community aimed at serving the poor, not evangelical conservatives starting a Christian organization aimed at maximizing converts. I won’t be surprised if we end up evangelizing some of our friends and neighbors because we love them, but we won’t be ‘loving’ anyone in order to evangelize them.

That’s probably enough for now. For those of you still interested in this fledgling enterprise of ours after reading Letter #3, I am working on a simple website (www.bartcampolo.com) with a running blog to keep you updated. In the meantime, please know we thank God every day for His grace and goodness, which come to us most often in the form of you.

Sincerely,

Bart

PS In case you heard more dire rumors, here’s the scoop: Just as I finished the first draft of this letter, Marty’s left foot swelled up like a balloon for the third time in two months. This time her doctor insisted on admitting her into the hospital for some tests and IV antibiotics and a strong dose of boredom. She was out again in a few days and is on the mend, but we’re both starting to wonder when we get to start claiming all that quick and easy stuff we named on our way out here.