Last year, we introduced Conversations by offering Healing the Divide: Conversations on Race in the United States. This year, we’re expanding this to include Stepping Into the Divide: Conversations on Engaging with the LBGTQ Community and Here and There: A Conversation about the Plight of Unaccompanied Children. We offer these conversations as opportunities for listening, learning to value each other’s experience, and building relationships in areas of discomfort.
Conversations are composed of 15 to 20 people and two facilitators gathered for dialogue on significant issues at the forefront of our communities and relationships with each other.
Sign-up at the Info Booth in the Convention Center atrium.
Healing the Divide: Conversations on Race in the United States
Date & Time: Thursday & Friday, Sept. 25 & 26, 1 to 2:45pm and 3:15 to 5pm
Location: Marriott Hotel Governor’s Boardroom
Are we a “nation of cowards” when it comes to talking with each other about issues of race? Attorney General Eric Holder recently said, “I think we are still a nation that is too afraid to confront racial issues,” rarely engaging “one another across the color line [to] talk about racial issues.” We owe it to ourselves to take a moment to reflect and challenge our attitudes and reactions if we are ever to overcome the unconscious biases that affect our actions toward others. We offer these conversations as opportunities for listening, learning to value each other’s experience, and building relationships in areas of discomfort. There will be two sessions on Thursday and two on Friday.
Stepping Into the Divide: Conversations on Engaging with the LGBTQ Community
Date & Time: Thursday & Friday, Sept. 25 & 26, 1 to 2:45pm and 3:15 to 5pm
Location: Marriott Hotel Alumni Room
Christian Community Development places a high value on “Listening to the Community” and we all know that good listening requires closeness of proximity and seeing the “other” as a person of value. We need a safe place to speak, listen, learn, and experience with people who hold different perspectives and beliefs on how we as Christians should engage with the LGBTQ Community. We offer these conversations as opportunities for listening, learning to value each other’s experience, and building relationships in areas of discomfort. There will be two sessions on Thursday and two on Friday.
Here and There: A Conversation about the Plight of Unaccompanied Children
Date & Time: Thursday, Sept. 25, 5 to 6:30 pm
Location: Room 402
World Vision invites you to a conversation about the plight of unaccompanied children fleeing to the US to escape violence and economic instability in their home countries. These children cross vast distances with little protection or resources and often face unimaginable dangers. They arrive in the US with the clothes on their backs and little else. This global issue has immediate impact in our local communities. This conversation will provide a space to share information and thoughtful reflection on how the Church can engage on behalf of vulnerable children, both here and there. Dinner will be provided.
