Photo of Theology Pub at The Playwright last week with Mark Yaconelli as our guest facilitator
Last week was our biggest Theology Pub ever. Perhaps it was the guest facilitator, Mark Yaconelli. Or perhaps it was the topic, “How to live without anxiety within in anxious world.” Or perhaps the stars were aligned just right.
But people kept coming and coming and we maxed out at 46 people. Many said they came because they saw the posters around town. Now, each time I am putting up posters around town, I am always saying to myself, “No one is actually going to come because they saw these….” And then we will have a week like last week. You can see the poster down below – I think the emphasis on the word “anxiety” is what caused many folks to be drawn to a night of conversation in a pub..
It was a really great mix of people, including at least one woman in her 80s from our church, a freshman in college, people from our church, and random people from the community. Mark led an introduction and then people split up into small groups for conversation.
At one point I was talking to a young guy and he was sharing a bit of his story with me. He had grown up Catholic but isn’t really connected to the church anymore. And then he said something that I loved. He said something to the effect of:
“I’m not at the place in my life where I would even think about walking into a church…but then I saw the sign for tonight, and I figured that sure, I could walk into a pub to talk. That seemed safe.”
And that, my friends, is why I do Theology Pub.