Why I Pay Rent

I could be living rent-free. I'm not.

When I returned home from Mexico in June of 2017, I was very poor.
Yes, I made some Regrettable Financial Decisions. Yes, I spent $150 on a plane ticket for my cat. Yes, I took taxis to work instead of the bus. Yes, I bought an accordion (ran out of money first). BUT in my defense, the exchange rate was also really sucky. For a year I had been paid the equivalent of $600 USD per month-- which was PLENTY to live on in Mexico, where a pound of potatoes costs less than fifty cents and rent is a hundred bucks a month. But what was a ridiculously good wage in Toluca is a very bad one when translated back to American dollars. Therefore: poor.

So, I had no choice but to settle back into the 'rents house upon my return. 

I love my family. I love my home. Life is easy there, where Dad washes the dishes and folds my laundry and cooks dinner (I'm lazy). To be honest, my parents would be content if I lived at home forever... and I could be too. It would be easy to choose that calm, responsibility-free life, to be a kid forever.
But at the same time, my heart cries out for bustle, for noise, and for neighbors-- not for the isolation of three acres of land ten miles outside of Grand Rapids. So after 8 months of (kind of) saving (some of) my paychecks from my job in nonprofit (where I make hella cash, obvi), I got the itch to move out. I envisioned myself in the city, sitting on my front porch on humid summer mornings, waving to familiar folks as they walked by. I pictured community dinners in my living room and on that same front porch.

What I DIDN'T picture was driving a half hour to work, serving and interacting and laughing with Westsiders, and then driving back home to spend the evening alone in Rockford.

Yet I was nervous about moving. I really didn't have much of a financial buffer, and rent in Grand Rapids is not as affordable as it should be (bitter post on gentrification to come). Was moving actually the right choice?
In the midst of my doubtfulness, my dad told me flat out that I should NOT move. "You're living here for free," he said bluntly. It would be better to stay at home a while longer. Build up some savings. Be safe, don't rush.

Although it gave me pause for a time, I did not heed the advice of someone older and wiser than me. And I don't regret my decision not to.

This is why I pay rent:

1. Incarnation- What is it?
I choose to pay rent rather than live at home for free because I strongly believe in the ideal of "Incarnation." (omg, what a Christiany word.) Soooo... what does that mean? Look no further than the root words-- "en carne." (I may not speak Latin, but I speak Spanish, which is basically the same) To "incarnate" is essentially "to become flesh." Super gross sounding, but very beautiful in reality. It is the idea that one cannot understand the situation of another person if you have not experienced it yourself. Rather than using a plethora of made-up words like "amongness" to describe what incarnation looks like, I will give some examples instead.

• In 1996 Shane Claiborne, unabashed Jesus-hippie and founder of the Simple Way neighborhood organization, occupied an abandoned church alongside a number of homeless families to prevent them from being evicted (legality can be debated later). Nowadays, Shane chooses to live in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Philadelphia.
• Oscar Romero, archbishop of San Salvador, El Salvador, was assassinated in 1980 because he believed that the Catholic church's duty was to defend the poor against an abusive government, rather than to maintain a comfy (and corrupt) status quo. He famously stated, "If we look at poverty from the outside, as if we’re looking at a fire, that’s not to opt for the poor, no matter how concerned we may be. We should get inside as if our own mother and sister were burning. Indeed it’s Christ who is there, hungry and suffering."*

• John 1:14- "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us."** I have also heard this informally translated as "The Word [Jesus] pitched a tent of flesh." Um, gross??? Yet that grossness is absolutely foundational to believing in and trusting a God who once was a foreign being, accessible only by select prophets in certain cordoned-off temple rooms. God made himself a man-- incarnated himself, became flesh-- so we could trust him, relate to him, and understand him. If Christ had not descended from his throne to experience our deleterious human life, he would still be a faraway, ethereal "god" with no relation to our human reality. Jesus is the ultimate example of Incarnation.

2. Incarnation- Why practice it?

I want to be among the people I serve. I want to live life alongside them, OUTSIDE of work. I want to break down the barriers of "service provider" and "client," to be neighbors and friends with mutually beneficial relationships, rather than seeing myself as anyone's "savior." (wow, lots of "quotation marks" in this paragraph) This requires the constant crucifixion of pride (we like to be saviors and heroes). 

If we wish to understand another person, it would behoove us to experience some of what they experience on a daily basis.

I am by no means an expert in Incarnation or in Intentional Community (not an expert in anything, really). In fact, blogging about the pursuit of equality with my lower-income neighbors feels like a minor betrayal of that same pursuit-- I must acknowledge that I have the privilege to back out of the West Side (and lower-middle-class-living) if I choose to. I have a college education and financially stable parents, meaning that I will always be protected even in the event of a financial emergency. Most of my neighbors have no such security. Nevertheless, from my unique place of privilege, I hope to use this blog to inspire others to seek out instances or lifestyles of intentional community and to experience the joy in it that I have.

tld;dr- Knowing and understanding my neighbors is why I pay rent, when I could be saving money by living at home.


References

* "Oscar Romero- Option for the Poor" Catholicsocialteaching.org,         http://www.catholicsocialteaching.org.uk/themes/community-participation/stories/oscar-romero-option-poor/

**New International Version. Biblica, 2011. Biblehub.com, https://biblehub.com/john/1-14.htm