| "Holy Listening/Holy Speaking" was intended to address two current realities in New England Episcopal congregations: a steady decline personal evangelistic activity among church goers, and institutional decline in many churches. The course sought to equip participants to more naturally and comfortably engage people in their lives in spiritual conversation, through helping people access and tell their own experiences of faith and the holy, and foster intentional listening skills that would enable them to draw out the spiritual stories of others. The project rested on the belief that when two people converse openly about their spiritual lives, they begin to form community in which further spiritual growth and faith-sharing is possible.;The project itself entailed a four-week course with homework for the week between each class session. It was conducted twice, and the second time, which had a more cohesive group, was more successful in approaching my goals. Overall, though, I discovered that four 90-minute sessions was too short a time in which to overcome many churchgoers' obstacles to evangelism, engender enthusiasm and develop story-telling and listening skills, and effect the kind of spiritual transformation that impels people to seek out faith-sharing conversations. Further, I found that more time needs to be spent addressing and overcoming people's resistance to faith-sharing, and that we need to find better ways to help people adapt communication and conversation skills they use in other areas of their life to having spiritual conversations. |
