A couple of weeks ago we had our Spaghetti conversation about race, location and boundary, which you can catch up on over here. Our friend Babs, was one of the guests who joined us and she had this reflection to add:

babs

A conversation about where you live becomes a conversation about your life, and in South Africa, becomes a picture of what the past means to different people and how it affects how we live everyday.
What I valued was how different conversations I have had with different people separately, became one conversation. It gave a better bigger-picture than the conversations I’ve had in isolation with similar people in the same age groups or contexts. It’s not less heated or more compassionate, it’s just real! The diversity in the people in the room was extraordinary!
I don’t know how to strike the balance between all the thoughts, the realities, the truths and the stories. I loved meeting every single person there and it left me with a lot to think about. It also gave some peace, understanding and inspiration in some areas.  I walked away feeling like, ‘finally, I’m so glad that some of that finally happened in my life’. It was what I needed and it made bigger room in my heart for everyday issues that are very complex to me.
It was a great space to see the work of God in all our lives. Nothing is more important than God, yet the issues we face can seem far from spiritual when we talk about them truthfully and practically and I pray God will guide, guard and give wisdom as we navigate these things.
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So there you have it – five different reflections on the same dinner. And there are going to be more. In my head i have been calling them Deep Dive Conversation Dinners as that is really what they are. Invite some people around for a meal who have different experiences and thoughts about a particular topic and then create a space for us to really dive a little deeply into one aspect of that conversation. The next one we are planning is likely going to be around Economics and how we spend our money and what we do with our stuff and will most likely take place sometime soon after we get back from our trip to Americaland in July.
Another part of the thinking is of this is if we have friends who on Facebook have strong disagreement on some topic we are both passionate about, to say “I’m not going to go further with this online. Sit face to face with me and let us break bread together and let us talk with all the tone and emotion and heart that a live conversation adds to the debate.” We don’t have to all leave the evening thinking the same thing, but the hope is that we will all leave challenged or changed in some way.
How about you? What topic would have you interested to meal with us?