Following Bonhoeffer, CHRIsTIAN COMMUNITY is "divine" not "ideal". A matter of GRACE that proceeds from the intrusion of the OTHER, not the natural AFFINITIES based on ethnicity, mutual interests, goals, etc. AGAPE over EROS.
"Church" exists on an institutional, systemic level like any other organization, but it does not transcend this limitation until it's natural affinities fall short, and it is confronted with the reality of the "other", the out-of-control, the strange.
Bonhoeffer's work was cut short by martyrdom at the hands of the German fascists, but had he survived to develop his thoughts on community he might have come to be less suspicious of the natural affinities that motivate the creation of churches. We do not usually set out to find the "other" and form communities with it. Rather, we seek out other people whose experiences are similar, whose motivations seem trustworthy, and who (as Father Bill pointed out) "will do" for the purposes of spiritual pilgrimage, and we try to fashion our common life so as to be as receptive as possible to the intrusions of that Otherly Grace (my term).
SO Without affinity the OTHER goes unrecognized; without Boundaries there can be no transgression; without the institutional church there is no place for community to emerge.
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