When I think of my year with Johnson Service Corps, I generally find myself both delighted and astonished. Delighted, because: Wow! So many amazing people! So much fun! So much deep and generous listening and transformation and worship and growth! Astonished, because: How did that possibly all fit into only eleven months??
I had the great luck of being a JSC corps member from 2021-2022, alongside eight other beautiful people (who I adore and miss greatly). There are so many ways my year was transformative, which I can’t do complete justice to in a piece of this length. I was able to serve at L’Arche North Carolina in its earliest stages, through which I gained incredible knowledge and experience of nonprofit management and disability advocacy. I also spent a lot of time with the Church of the Advocate in Chapel Hill, which greatly expanded my understanding of lay leadership, what a church’s community involvement can look like, and just how much fun an Anglican liturgy can be. Our Friday formation days added to my repertoire of spiritual practices and exposed me to new ways of “showing up” in the world.
But above all, when I think about how JSC shaped me, I most remember the people who gave their time and energy to journey with me into being the Christian and human I aspire to be. I think of hours spent learning to knit (unraveling, patient conversation, sharing) with the ladies of our cohort. I think of long walk and talks in the woods with Callie, and Maria. I think of afternoon adventures around Durham with my friend Kyla, learning what inclusion really looks like and what small things we can do to make the world a more accessible place. I think of the many breakfasts I shared with my incredible mentor, Debbie Wuliger- always waffles and blueberries–discussing life as artists and seekers and lovers of simplicity. I think of the weekend Henry, Lydia, Liv, and I were quarantined for COVID in our Carrboro home, and we spent the whole afternoon under blankets watching Lord of the Rings, marveling at the family of deer that frequented our backyard and reminding each other to take naps.
I think of the way former-JSC staffers Andrew Hudgins and Christina Balderson kept attentive tabs on and celebrated my graduate school applications with me. I think of the evening dinners and weekly spiritual practices where my housemates and I shared stories, hopes, fears, laughter, and tears. And, last but not least, I think of the daily rhythm of prayer I shared with Henry (Henry, our very own JSC board member! His care and attention to the continued work of JSC makes me proud). Our shared prayer life manifested in morning prayer before work, followed by evening walks or couch chats, which reliably led us into the farthest corners of our spiritual lives. To say the Holy Spirit changed a few things through our shared life and prayer that year might be the understatement of the century.
And just as beautiful and transformative as all of this: this community has remained connected to me since my departure from North Carolina. I still have frequent phone calls with my beloved L’Arche friend, Kyla. Debbie made me waffles again one morning this summer as I passed through Durham. I love receiving knitting updates from Lydia, and Maria and I recently took her new dog on a hike through the woods of CT. And I still discern life and pray all the time with Henry. All of it is a gift.
My career has begun flourishing in ways that I know have so much to do with the challenges I encountered and the nurturing I received while in JSC. After leaving NC, I moved to New Haven, CT to pursue my master’s degree in religion at Yale Divinity School. My care for myself around the pressures of school and study were entirely informed by a new perspective on what matters most to me; values of simplicity and depth and rest and honoring my unique gifts and needs, all newly realized throughout my service year.
After graduation last May, I started working as Operations Coordinator at the Yale Center for Faith & Culture. Many of the hard skills I bring to this work are, in large part, thanks to L’Arche NC, where I first learned so much organizational strategy and non profit nitty-gritty. At YCFC, I also get space to lean into work of spiritual exploration, collaboration, and storytelling, through projects like hosting our podcast, For the Life of the World (here’s my latest interview!).
I’m grateful for the privilege of being able to pour my energy into collaboratively bringing good things into this complicated world so early in my career. In innumerable ways, my year with JSC was an experience of radically living into the Monday-through Saturday Church in the world. When we had conflict and complications, we learned how to apologize, and be in relationship through it– what needed skills for today’s world! The complete reorientation my service year brought to my life was only possible because of the whole of it: time and space off of the relentless, ladder-climbing hamster wheel, with just enough structure to point me in the right direction and plenty of freedom to let the new framework seed and the Spirit move.
I will forever be grateful to JSC and its supporters, and am always cheering for the work from my home in Connecticut.
–Macie Bridge
Macie Bridge was a JSC corps member from 2021-2022