Sirius Community is an educational, spiritual, service community of twenty to thirty residents and about two hundred associate non-resident members. It is an intentional community situated between the Quabbin Reservoir and the Connecticut River, in the eastern hills of the Pioneer Valley in Shutesbury, MA. It is a demonstration site for Permaculture Design and enacts the philosophies of "living lightly on Earth . . . living in harmony with nature." Sirius is an eco-village that models organic food production, green energy generation and generally less consumptive and more self-sufficient lifestyles. This involves "green" building and passive solar construction, solar and wind power, organic agriculture, waste management, and composting and energy efficient appliances. The community strives to embody "the new planetary consciousness that honors [the] interconnectedness and sacredness of all living things." Sirius engages in community outreach through hosting workshops, apprenticeships, courses and open houses. And, more than just opening their doors, they actively seek ways to build coalitions with organizations and people in the surrounding area.

When I visited Sirius, I had conversations with Amy Sophia Marashinsky and Daniel Greenberg. Amy Sophia has lived at Sirius for three and a half years. She facilitates workshops and apprenticeships on goddess cultures. She said that the spiritual goals of Sirius are "learning to live form the soul in the spirit of love." A core belief of the members of the community is that there is a Divine Presence, which is love. There are different spiritual paths, all equally valid and honored but they all lead back to this core belief. She talked of goddess cultures and how "we have moved away from the feminine principle of connection and relation to a more individuated state of existence." She contends that this has led to a lack of responsibility towards self, others and environment. By reviving the "lost" goddess cultures, Amy Sophia hopes to live in love, in freedom and in service of the Divine Presence, and to foster a sense of connection, responsibility and interdependence amongst Sirius members as well as in the community at large.

Daniel Greenberg is a three-year resident of Sirius and executive director and board member of an educational program, Living Routes, that attempts to create "learning communities" in "living communities." His vision for Living Routes is to "develop accredited, college-level programs based in eco-villages around the world, which help students gain knowledge, skills and inspiration to build sustainable lifestyles for themselves, their communities and the planet."

When I asked Daniel about the environment he said, "I want to say it is everything-we are part of the environment as much as it is a part of us." This is a departure from "the mainstream culture, where there is no connection between people and the environment." He stressed "the tragedy . . . in our modern era, is that we have separated ourselves from the environment [and] ecology and we see ourselves as either above it or somehow unaffected by it." His concept of community is a three dimensional rubric comprised of the common vision of a group of people, the time and depth of commitment to that vision, and the types of relationships within that group of people. He says there is a common vision of Sirius as "modeling right relationship and right livelihood for humanity on this planet." Sirius Community is attempting to create places of attraction and hope, where people harness their agency in making a world that mirrors their ideals.

Pre-figurative politics come into play when constructing alternative worldviews. Daniel discussed the "illusion of choice" in our culture. He contents that most of what we think of as the "choices" we make are really imposed upon us by the dominant hegemonic culture. He says that getting involved with eco-villages or intentional communities enables us to recognize the constructs or worldviews within which we have been living. Exposure to alternative worldviews, he asserts, makes it possible to see what has been invisible to us-existing worldviews and value systems, as well as possible alternatives.

The notions of environmental justice and equity are very difficult to address in the context of intentional communities likes Sirius. There is very little racial diversity at Sirius. Daniel pointed out that there are almost no structural obstacles to keep anyone from joining the community. For instance, it costs a single person about $300 a month to live quite comfortably at Sirius as a community member. However, the community's efforts to increase diversity continue to produce little or no results. Eco-villages in general attract white, middle-class Americans in this country. According to Daniel this is because that particular demographic group yearns for community and can afford to pursue it. Daniel concluded our conversation by stating that eco-villages are not utopias. They face many challenges and are constantly evolving in the pursuit if constructing alternative worldviews. Nevertheless, he acknowledges the "need for creating new stories, new ways of living in this world that involve new ways of seeing ourselves and the environment as well as our relationship to it."

CONTACT INFORMATION

Sirius Community
72 Baker Road,
Shutesbury, MA 01072
Phone # (413) 259-1251
Fax # (413) 259-1255
www.siriuscommunity.org

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