Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84However we look at it, we have this obligation to build community; it isn’t just an obligation to one another but to all those who come to us. They need to find true community here, and that is the best thing we can give them. 16 Is community really the best gift we can give to our fellow human beings? If it is, why don’t we get going? Some may object that private ownership is necessary for a happy life because communal life without property inevitably leads to a loss of freedom. But we might equally well ask: Is it possible to achieve genuine peace among humankind as long as claims of owner- ship and property continue to exist? After all, Francis of Assisi already pointed out eight centuries ago that as long as we have any pos- sessions, we will also require weapons. The first two decades of the twenty-first century have demonstrated the continuing relevance of these questions, and not only among Christians. Interest in intentional com- munity has revived, and new communitarian movements are emerging. Take for example Plough Quarterly • Winter 2017 35 the network of people inspired by what they call “convivialism,” who explain their goals as follows: In the face of climate change, financial crises, and mass poverty, a growing number of people agree that we need a fundamental social-ecological transformation that includes all areas of society. Fortunately, a huge variety of concepts and practices for such transforma- tion already exists. 17 These words point us back to the question with which we started, and which Thomas More raised in his Utopia: How then should we live? How do we combine social freedom with equality, solidarity, and justice? How can we achieve a peaceful world in which conflicts are no longer resolved through murderous violence and all people have enough? These are the questions we must keep asking.  Translated by Emmy Barth Maendel and Andries Conradie. 1. Gerhard Ritter, translator’s note, in Thomas More, Utopia (Eberhard Jäckel, 1977), 3–6.3. 2. All quotations from Utopia are taken from Henry Morley’s translation (Cassel, 1901). 3. Thomas Gehrig, “Commons auf Utopia: Beiträge zur Rückeroberung einer Debatte,” in Express: Zeitung für sozialistische Betriebs- und Gewerkschaftsarbeit, May 2011. 4. Grete Mecenseffy, Geschichte des Protestantismus in Österreich (Graz, 1956). 5. Ibid. 6. Cited in Mecenseffy, Geschichte des Protestantismus in Österreich. 7. On the reception history see Terence Cave, Thomas More’s “Utopia” in Early Modern Europe: Paratexts and Contexts (Manchester University Press, 2008). 8. Christoph Andreas Fischer, Der Hutterischen Wider- tauffer Taubenkobel and Vier und funfftzig Erhebliche Ursachen, Warumb die Widertauffer nicht sein im Land zu leyden (Ingolstadt, 1607). 9. Burchard Brentjes, Atlantis: Geschichte einer Utopie (DuMont, 1994), 92–95. 10. Ibid. 11. Ibid. 12. Thomas Lange, “Soutanenkaserne oder heiliges Experiment? Die Jesuiten-Reduktionen in Paraguay im europäischen Urteil,” in Mythen der Neuen Welt, ed. Karl Heinz Kohl (Berlin, 1982), 210–223. 13. Eberhard Arnold, “Bruderhof-Korrespondenz 1934,” in Dietrich-Bonhoeffer-Jahrbuch 2 (2005/2006), 75–87. For the episode related here see Emmy Barth, An Embassy Besieged: The Story of a Christian Community in Nazi Germany (Cascade, 2010). 14. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, trans. John Dober- stein (Harper and Row, 1954), 30. 15. Eberhard Arnold and Thomas Merton, Why We Live in Community (Plough, 1995). 16. Ibid., 42. 17. See the website www.convivialism.org.