Leading from the Gaps

by Liz Dodd, CSJP

Liz is a Sister of St. Joseph of Peace. She made her first vows in 2023 in Nottingham, England, where she lives in the Congregation’s House of Hospitality and works as a journalist. Prior to entering religious life she was an editor at The Tablet, a Catholic periodical, then at National Geographic, The Times of London, and The Guardian. She has a theology degree from the University of Cambridge and once bicycled around the world.

This reflection was originally published in the Leadership Collaborative's free e-book Leaders of Hope. Click here to download a free copy.

Kenotic Leadership: Embracing Vulnerability as an Act of Solidarity

My home in Nottingham, between England’s rolling Peak District and the sea, is a converted church and presbytery. It is typical of its time, built by and for the immigrant communities drawn to the coal mines that once ran beneath. To them, its windows and arches spoke of the freedom and dignity finally afforded Catholics after centuries of persecution. But to the homeless teenagers and asylum seekers with whom we now form a community of hospitality, it is, initially, intimidating; a great, Gothic chapel, a stark contrast to the immigration detention center or hotel, the park bench or porch where they have been spending their nights.  

It is only by living alongside us - me, a newly-professed Millennial still finding her feet in religious life, and two elders - that they discover that ours is a fragile community; that we carry a weight greater than our collective vulnerability ought to be able to. But we flourish because of the logic of hope; the same logic that draws every oppressed person to our front door, and that enables us to make our home together; a logic that says that vulnerability is our solidarity; and that when we stop being afraid of it, we can lead from within it. 

Leading From the Gaps 

“Vulnerability” emerged as a key phrase at Hope-Esperanza 2024, stirred out of collective reflecting and breathed into life by a courageous group formed within Open Space breakout time. But how strange, I thought, for vulnerability to rise like surf across our reflections. Here we were, comfortable in a smart hotel, while asylees bussed up from the USA’s border with Mexico slept on cots in O’Hare; how uncomfortable to be separated from them by a liveried shuttle. What made us feel vulnerable, when - in our ministries - we knew so well the raw vulnerability of poverty, illness, racism and deprivation? 

In our breakout group we grappled with this gulf; and that grappling, that owning of our own privilege alongside the naming of our wounds and those of our congregations, created a new space of understanding. It bridged: another word that shaped the collective gathering. Our fears - for our communities, ourselves, our elders - were the deep, dark spaces where we could be in solidarity with those whose lives are circumscribed by fear. Leadership is not about transcending or overcoming those spaces; it is about living fully from within them.  

The Catholic Worker movement - which has formed me and the living of my faith, and whose “members” were, interestingly, disproportionately present within the small group discussions about vulnerability - teaches voluntary poverty; that is, a material solidarity with those experiencing deprivation. I am guided in my vowed life in this by the theologian Gustavo Guttierez, who describes evangelical poverty as “as a commitment of solidarity and protest [...] an act of love and liberation.”  

Real leadership - kenosis, the self-emptying poverty of the Christ - is a kind of evangelical poverty, a surrender that makes space for others. It asks us to lead out of our lack, our vulnerability; to embrace those things as gift. It is an abdication of “I” for the collective “thou”; it asks, how can I accompany you to the fullness of yourself? It embraces vulnerability - mine and that of the other - to ask, how can I make the space for you to be as you are? In our Congregational lives this might mean: how can I accompany our collective self into its most free future? In community, how can I create the space for the other to flourish? Politically, what actions can I take to ensure that societal and racial margins are expanded, until no-one is on the periphery?  

We can only begin to do this when we embrace our own poverty, dependence, vulnerability: when we understand that “I” am neither the answer nor the solution, the liberator nor the liberation. We do not lead to take up space, or even to take a side: as religious communities we are bridges, wrought of experiences and dreams, and we are called to be within the gaps. 

Communities of Hope 

We claimed this truth with courage during our gathering in Chicago; on the tables where we shared and reflected we began to name the places where we struggled. I shared from my context: that in England and Wales, just 11 women entered active religious life in 2021, the year that I did. There were only three entrants in 2022. Intercongregational relationships will form the future of global religious life; this seems, at this point, to be manifest. But in my context in England, where the number of Religious looks set to dwindle in my lifetime to a handful, even that seems impossible.  

I came home from the Hope-Esperanza gathering in Chicago less daunted by this reality; warmed and encouraged by the bravery of those I met who named their realities and were willing to lead from within them, however challenging. As Religious we are not so vulnerable when we are great in number; when we populate whole institutions, when we know that others will come because we have much to offer. We are vulnerable when we have little to offer and when we are few.  

This is how we lead in our community in Nottingham, which is among the most deprived areas of the UK, with some of the highest levels of homelessness and relative poverty in England. We three women - our region, even our Congregation - cannot solve our guests’ problems. There is no supported housing available; our city council is bankrupt; social services were decimated by the outgoing government. But once we have owned what we cannot do, we can listen and empower. We can fan dreams into flames. We can encourage our guests back into college; help them prep for job interviews; let them teach us how to cook food from Iraq, Eritrea, Botswana, Kurdistan. This is leadership, and it is also voluntary, evangelical poverty. 

The invitation that I experience in this time in religious life in my context is not to run from the statistics and the questions; not to pile on commitments and causes and fill the empty spaces; not to try and take hold of the narrative and plot a course for the future. It is to trust that God is co-creating our future with us with the gaps left in, like the cracks and crevices in the centuries-old walls inside which I live, where blackbirds and sparrows and robins have made their homes. Often, one of the first community responsibilities I hand over to a new guest is putting food out for them; we cast seeds against the concrete, and then wait in expectant hope for life to swoop in. 

For reflection questions to explore the themes of kenotic (self-emptying) leadership and vulnerability, please download the free e-book Leaders of Hope.