These communities, small at first but growing, were an experiment in a way of being human, of being human together, that had never been tried in the world before. It was like a form of Judaism, particularly in its care for the poor, its strict sexual ethic, and its insistence on a monotheism that excluded the pagan divinities. But it was quite unlike the Jewish way of life in its open welcome to all who found themselves grasped by the good news of Jesus.
