Grace at Meals

I have come to realize how hard it is to have a real spiritual conversation. I keep wondering how people with deep religious convictions can speak together at table about the life of the spirit. What did Jesus speak about at table? It seems that for Jesus the meal was the place and time to preach the good news. For me that is a real challenge.

It always strikes me how grateful people are for a good spiritual conversation, but also how hard it is to make such a conversation happen. Most conversations are chains of free association in which people simply drift from one subject to another, often guided by little else than what happens to come into their minds.

When an enormous spiritual hunger grows among people, churches may not always be the best places to offer "Solid food." Meals with friends who have developed the art of spiritual communication might be much better places. Yet it often seems that we have lost this art.

Unpublished journal.

– Henri J. M. Nouwen

March 17, 2007