1

The essence of community, its very heart and soul, is the nonmonetary exchange of value. The things we do and the things we share because we care for others, and for the good of the place. Community is composed of things that we cannot measure, for which we keep no record and ask no recompense. Since they cannot be measured, they can’t be denominated in dollars, or barrels of oil, or bushels of corn—such things as respect, tolerance, love, trust, generosity, and care, the supply of which is unbounded and unlimited.

3

The nonmonetary exchange of value does not arise solely from altruistic motives. It arises from a deep, intuitive understanding that self-interest is inseparably connected with community interest; that individual good is inseparable from the good of the whole; that all things are simultaneously independent, interdependent, and interdependent—that the singular “one” is inseparable from the plural “one.”

5

True community also requires proximity—continual interaction between the people, places, and things of which it is composed.