Getting Ready

I've been trying to get to South Africa for three or four years now and the time has finally come! On Monday morning, I fly out to spend 10 weeks in Pinetown, about 15 minutes outside of Durban. I'll be working at Pinetown Methodist Church, where I hope to be involved in their many opportunities for worship, service, and learning. I also will be able to work some with the students at the Seth Mokitimi Methodist Seminary in Pietermaritzburg. They're building a new campus, and I may get to work with students to try to put in a garden. Throughout all I'm doing, I hope to share lots of good meals with folks, listen to their stories, learn about growing food in South Africa (one of PMC's ministries, Phakamisa, has a gardening and nutrition program!), and see how my interests in faithfully caring for the earth can be shared and shaped by my time there. In this regard, I am very excited that soon after I arrive, I have been invited to be a guest speaker at "Courageous Conversations" at Koinonia Conference Center. More on that later, I'm sure, but it should be a wonderful way to be in conversation with people from diverse backgrounds on the connections between our relationships with God, with people, and with the land.