Persuasion

In this episode of Persuasion, Erin Straza and Hannah Anderson dig into the summer miniseries called Showing Up. Each episode explores the challenges we face to show up in the world. Erin and Hannah invite Rebecca McLaughlin to help us learn how to show up in conversations despite our differences. Rebecca grew up in the United Kingdom and holds a Ph.D. in English literature from Cambridge as well as a theology degree from Oak Hill College in London. She is co-founder of Vocable Communications and former vice president of content at the Veritas Forum, where she spent almost a decade working with Christian academics at leading secular universities. Learning to have honest, charitable faith dialogue is a passion for Rebecca, whose latest book is titled The Secular Creed: Engaging Five Contemporary Claims. This conversation covers a whole host of topics related to engaging others in matters of faith by showing up with your whole self—differing beliefs and all.

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In this episode of Persuasion, Erin Straza and Hannah Anderson dig into the summer miniseries called Showing Up. Since 2004, Rachel has lived in Djibouti, a primarily Muslim country, where she and her husband run a school and where they enjoy cross-cultural, cross-religious relationships. Rachel shares from her recent release titled Pillars: How Muslim Friends Led Me Closer to Jesus. The conversation covers a whole host of topics related to developing strong relationships by showing up with your whole self—differing beliefs and all.

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When the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States in March of 2020, none of us could have known the level of disruption we would be facing. In addition to the reality of illness and death, we also had to face a new way of going about our daily lives. Our daily routines were shattered and reformed to meet health protocols. Work, school, worship, community, sports, culture—every aspect of life was shaken. Now, more than a year later, our world is opening up once again. We're heading back to the office, back to school, back to our faith communities. But after a year away, are we ready to show up?

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Over the past year, as communities implemented social distancing protocols, daily life came to a screeching halt. People stayed home to work remotely or attend virtual school. Without all our usual human hustle and bustle, wild creatures began roaming more freely. People began sharing photos of whales in harbors and goats running through towns. The conclusion? Nature is healing itself now that the humans are no longer interfering.

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Some days life cruises along the course of your well-laid plans and everything runs like clockwork. Other days—most days, perhaps?—life takes a detour off the beaten path and you get lost in the wilderness and stuck in the muck. Life works great, except when it doesn't, which is more often than not. So what can we do in response? Do we bother making plans when they are likely to get turned inside out anyhow? Do we let chaos reign and become accustomed to the wild ride of life?

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In the last episode, Erin and Hannah discussed the hurdles and struggles we face in our attempts to cultivate goodness, finding another point of shared experience in the brokenness of the world.

In keeping with that conversation, we're taking a brief Interlude from our larger series, FINDING COMMON GROUND, and invite you to listen in as Hannah Anderson reads an excerpt from her recently released book, TURNING OF DAYS: LESSONS FROM NATURE, SEASON, AND SPIRIT. "How does one live in this place between longing and fulfillment? How do you dare to hope when the world is so harsh and cares nothing for your good work? How can you sustain hope in the face of it all? How can you not be chilled until your heart slowly freezes over?"

Keep the conversation going on Twitter @PersuasionCAPC or in the CAPC members-only community on Facebook.

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Last week we discussed our shared call to cultivate goodness in the world. While that is true, it's not the whole picture. Because as we work, we also find another shared experience. We all struggle in our work. We encounter barriers and failures. We grow weary. The world experiences disasters and pandemics. And we are left holding the brokenness of this life, wondering what to do next.

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In this episode, Erin and Hannah explore our shared desire to find meaning through our work and in life. Our work may be more mental than physical, but whatever it is, we hope it means something more than a paycheck. We want to thrive on all fronts, to see our work take off and produce a harvest we can enjoy and share with others. To illustrate this truth, Sarah Pabody from Triple Wren Farms shares how her flower farm teaches her about the deeper truths of work and meaning. How is gardening a metaphor for our personal flourishing? What can the natural patterns of sowing and reaping and tending and harvest show us about life? How can we find shared ground in the human desire to flourish? Listen in for dialogue on questions like these as we find common ground together.

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Communicating with others is something we're born doing. We emerge from the womb with limited skills, of course. Our skills grow in time, from wails to words and eventually to full sentences and fully nuanced, complex ideas. But that's not all it takes to communicate well. We can use all the skills at our disposal—verbal and nonverbal—and still experience a breakdown in communication with others. In the past few years, these breakdowns have become seemingly more common. We wonder what has changed and why we are unable to connect well with others as we once did.

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Death has been a constant thought this past year, due to the pandemic that continues to rage among us and around the globe. It's rare in our society to think much about the end of our days. We tend to press on with our plans until death disrupts us, when it jolts us to the reality that all of us are living on borrowed time and breath. From dust we came, to dust we will return. The earth grounds us, binds us together in this shared fate, creatures, and creation. While we attempt to stay nature's course on our fleshly forms, creation pays no mind. Its rhythms of death and decay can be seen all around, as foliage and creature both are welcomed to final rest to become one with the dust. As Ash Wednesday approaches, we dust our foreheads remembrance of our fleeting nature. We are given sacred space to reflect on the limits of this life and these feeble frames. The sorrow of death will be present, of course, but our limits beckon us to remember our place in God's creation. When we repent of our attempts to outrun death, we are able to embrace the space God has appointed us in this life. Here we are called to till the soil of our lives, and plant goodness, and tend the seed to harvest. God calls His creatures to cultivate His creation and make something beautiful out of the days we're given.

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