Christians in Conversation

Friends,

Christians in Conversation comes from years of trying to find a path to express our desire for community in a way that makes sense to others. To those of you who have decided to take a chance on us and join us for a conversational journey, we are so thankful for you.

Christians in Conversation is motivated by a desire to create a space where people from all backgrounds, life experiences, and perspectives can join hands and hearts around God's table in "conversational communion." There are great opportunities for listening Christians to show how much God loves the world. It is with this spirit that we approach our time with you each week.

In our journey together, we are going to ask each of you to search your hearts about topics for us to discuss. Joe has already raised our first topic of conversation -- why don't United Methodists talk about the Pope? Thus, we will tackle the thorny issue of the relationship between the Protestant and Catholic churches. As with every issue we tackle, we hope to emphasize God's call for us to converse with one another lovingly, to build one another up and not tear one another down. Because of our consistent and strong belief in a loving God, we will therefore emphasize God's desire for unity amongst the body of Christ. That said, some will have strong perspectives that might offend. This will be particularly true in the future as we talk about issues such as the Christian right, the emerging church, poverty in America, the war in Iraq, drugs, teenagers, and other issues that weigh heavily on us.

Our role as facilitators will be to arm you with as many sides of an issue as we can find which are credibly supported. We also want to provide you a framework for understanding the numerous and conflicting voices that are present in the church, in American society and in the world. Here is the reason we want to talk about postmodernism -- if communion is our metaphor for the type of conversation we want to have, then postmodernism is the music that plays in the background while we talk. Postmodernism will inform the way we speak to one another, the types of conversations we have, and why we feel the way we do about so much of society and culture today.

Finally, we will discuss what it means to truly listen to someone. Again, listening will be a recurrent theme in our class. It is something we all could work on in our relationships with God, with nature, with others, and with our own hearts, souls and bodies. There will be times when we will have the temptation to succumb to being offended by others' perspectives. We will want to throw our hands up in disgust and say, "How can any thinking person really believe that?" Please don't. Stay at the table with your brothers and sisters in Christ. Hold one another accountable to God's call that we love one another as we love ourselves. Thus, as listening Christians, we will sit together even when it is uncomfortable. We will covenant not to silence anyone, but will rather encourage everyone on to the perfection that is our goal in this life.

Check the blog, or better yet, subscribe to it so you know when there is a new post. We will try and post links to the videos we watch in class, and to articles and other things that are relevant to the class. We look forward to the journey we will be traveling in the future together. If you miss class or if you feel better posting a comment to this blog instead of during class, please feel free. Just respect blogging etiquette (simply put, treat others as you would want to be treated) and everyone's privacy, even though the blog will not be open to anyone who has not attended at least one class.

Thanks to you all, and God bless.

Bryan and Deb