A few years back, I had the privileged opportunity to work for Starbucks.  I say “privileged” because of the people I got to work with, the people I got to serve, and the vision I learned I was a part of.

I discovered that a Starbucks coffee costs what it does because they took seriously the people that worked for them.  The growers received a living wage (beyond Fair Trade).  We, as part-time employees (or “partners”), received affordable health care. Starbucks leadership desired their stores to engage in community service.  When our congregation wanted to start a community garden at a local elementary school, guess who showed up with pastries, coffee, and shovels?

(What blows my mind are Christians who oppose Starbucks because they don’t print “Merry Christmas” on their cups.  Meanwhile, Starbucks acts more like Jesus than many of their churches do.)

One of the intriguing parts of their vision, though, was their commitment to being a third place.  And what they meant by that was this: people have their homes, and their place of work, but they also need a third place to really thrive.  And so, Starbucks sought to fill that gap.

But why is there this gap?  It was the community of faith that filled this role for thousands of years.  Perhaps it’s because many communities of faith have done a poor job being that third place.  Perhaps they got lost in the weeds, seeing their role as dispensing religious services, or maintaining an institution, or protecting the member at the expense of the neighbor.

My own family had a series of bad church experiences when I was growing up. By the time I hit middle school, we were out of church, parted from our community of faith, our “third place”.

And if you knew the stories of why, you would say we did the right thing.

But…the need for the third place was still there in our family.  It is still there in families and individuals that have also given up on church, on a gathering of people seeking God together.  Perhaps if you knew their stories, you would say they’ve done the right thing, too.

But our need for spiritual community persists.  Part of the reason that we don’t have to be our kids’ “god”, or our partner’s “everything”, is that we are made to flourish in community.  Our kids need more parents than just us.  Our spouses need more friends and counselors and advisors than we can provide. And we need our own elders and mentors and partners.

Perhaps we could say that the nuclear family has the capacity—and probability—of blowing itself up.  We need more “family” than what our consumer-driven culture says we do.  (After all, who benefits most from our divisions into small family units?  Not the small family unit. It is those that sell us their lawn mowers and dish washers, automobiles and modems.)

When we believe that our rhyme and seasons should only be dictated by our schedules and needs, or our spouse’s, or our children’s, we begin to live as if community isn’t truly one of those needs.  Maybe we’ll listen in to a church service or a “spiritual” podcast, but since when is love only communicated and maintained through words?

Sometimes we live as if we don’t need others’ presence and help in tending to the needs of our spirits.

But I would argue that a community of faith needs to be a large part of the rhythm of our—and our family’s—being.  We need other aunts and uncles, grandparents and parents, activists and mystics to shape us into the force for good that God intends us to be for our world.

Because community is not simply about caring for our own spirits. It is also about caring for the spirit of our neighborhoods and cities.  If you’ve ever tried to do good on your own, you know that doing good is hard.  And complicated. You can only keep going if there are others there reminding you who you are and what really matters in the midst of your failure or disappointment, doubt or burnout.

This is how we are made.  This is why we need a rhythm of community in our lives. 

Not only do we depend on that tempo of connection.  

Our world is depending on it, too.

Maybe our third place needs to be our first place.