When we explained Jubilee to people before coming, the most basic answer was that it is "a non-profit organization that works with refugee resettlement." This is the easiest way to describe it during a five minute conversation, but at its core, Jubilee is much more than that. For starters, it's "Jubilee Partners" which is often shortened to just "Jubilee". The word Partners in the title points to its identity as a Christian community. The folks at Jubilee define themselves as an "Intentional Christian Service Community". Jubilee is best understood on a deeper level by looking at each of the three components of this identification.
First, "Intentional Community". A community is basically any group of people. A bridge club is a community, a city block is a community, even the people in line at Wal-Mart are a community. Some communities are simply coincidental (like the people who live next door, or who are in line in front of you) and some are more structured (like a bridge club or church).
The easiest way to understand an intentional community is to contrast it with the community formed by a typical American group of neighbors (the folks living within 1/2 mile or so of you). A group of neighbors is coincidental, meaning that you don't get to choose your neighbors, and you don't often choose your house based on your neighbors. Your neighbors are the people who happen to live next to you. Most American's relationships with their neighbors are fairly shallow, you might greet them on the sidewalk, you might even chat for 5-10 minutes with them, but you probably don't share your greatest joys or your deepest concerns with them. Some people do have deep relationships with their neighbors, but it's becoming increasingly rare.
An intentional community, by contrast, is a group of people who have chosen (intentionally) to live together, usually for some greater purpose. While you still don't get to pick your neighbors, you typically share some values or beliefs with them, and you are generally united around a common goal or way of life. At Jubilee, the intentional community consists of around 20 folks who are committed to living at Jubilee for a period of a year or more. These are often called the long-term staff, and they meet twice a week for a time of sharing and to decide how Jubilee can best function as a community where people can grow in relationship to God, each other, and the world (among other things). Sabrina and I (and the other volunteers) are considered short-term staff, since we each have only committed to stay for a period of a few months (though volunteers can extend into an additional term, as we plan to). All staff (short and long term) eat two meals a day together in a large common dining room, and many work projects around Jubilee involve several staff members working together.
The second key word in Jubilee's identification is the term "Christian". As a Christian community, Jubilee tries to model its life around the model of the early church in Acts 2:44-47 "All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people." At Jubilee, this Christian focus includes a time of devotions every day for 30 minutes before lunch, a time of worship on Sunday evening, a desire to resolve conflict within the community in a grace-filled manner, and a strong belief in the need for prayer daily and before making major decisions.
Finally, Jubilee is a "Service" community. This means that Jubilee does not exist just because everyone at Jubilee likes to live together (though most times they do), but the reason for its existence is to serve the refugees who come through here. Everyone at Jubilee, in some way or another, does something that improves life for the refugees or makes their stay here possible. From the volunteers (short-term staff) who teach the English classes, to the long-term staff person who oversees their medical appointments and prescriptions, to the people working in the garden to harvest fresh produce to give to the refugees, most activities at Jubilee have service to the refugees at their core.
Since all the staff people living at Jubilee have jobs and tasks within the community in service of the refugees, none of the staff have outside jobs. Consequently, Jubilee relies on donations for its operational costs. Most Intentional Christian Communities in the United States (and there are quite a few), choose to either (A) have their long-term members work in outside jobs, and thus support the community financially, or (B) to have long-term members work at some mission or service work within the community, and thus rely on outside financial assistance (or (C) some balance of the two). Because of the generous financial assistance Jubilee receives, all the staff are able to focus their time and energy on ministering to and helping the refugees adjust to their new lives in the US. For Sabrina and I it means that our living expenses (food, lodging, etc) while at Jubilee were covered, and we didn't have to engage in fund-raising to come here.
Well, thanks for reading, if anyone has additional questions about Jubilee as an "Intentional Christian Service Community", feel free to post them in the comments. Because many people may be unfamiliar with the concept of an Intentional Christian Community, I'm planning to return to Jubilee's structure, decision making process, and long-term staff in a future blog post.
-- Nate
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