I ended my last post talking about my experience of moving to Atlanta. It was definitely a turning point in my life, one that started a few things and put to the test some things I didn’t even know about myself yet.
And so I guess it’s time to get back to sharing about my development as a person and as a person of faith.
Atlanta is a beautiful city. For years I wanted to move back there to live, but I know there’s very little chance of that happening anymore. That’s OK. I’m happy with how my life has turned out, but Atlanta will always hold a special place in my heart.
As I said last time, my team lived in a house in the middle of a trailer park. Each of the Atlanta Mission Year teams had different projects or areas of focus. My team’s focus was an after school program.
During the school day we had other volunteer opportunities and responsibilities. Andrew and I worked at a senior recreation center in East Point. We mostly helped out with odd jobs there. I answered phones, helped teach an old lady about computers, and set up the new Nintendo Wii for the participants to use.
It was a lot of fun listening to older African American men trash talk each other while playing Wii bowling.
In exchange, we received free meal tickets to eat at the cafeteria. Every morning, we would eat grits and bacon. Andrew liked to put jelly In his, and dip his bacon in the maple syrup. I’ve never been a fan of mixing sweet and salty flavors, so I ate them separately.
In the afternoon, we’d get lunch there. The food was actually excellent, and the head chef had trained at a culinary school in New York City. She knew how to run a kitchen!
In the afternoons, we would take the after school program’s two 15 passenger vans to pick up the kids from school and take them to the Baptist church where the program was run.
Andrew and I were responsible for the fifth graders. We would always begin with a time of silent homework help, and then we would do an enrichment activity.
I say enrichment, but I’ve never been very good with kids that age, so we often just played Mario Kart on the Wii. Oh well.
The program was run by an incredible woman named Tara. She had been involved with the ministry for a number of years and knew the families and kids in the trailer park where we lived very well. She eventually went on to become a teacher, and I have no doubt that she is an excellent one.
Then we would take the kids home for the evening.
And that was the basic rhythm of our year.
On Fridays we took a day called Sabbath, where we weren’t responsible for anything. My favorite activities were to go into the city and explore. I grew to know Atlanta really well. I still think Piedmont Park is one of the best green spaces in a city that I’ve seen.
Sundays we attended a local church. It was everything you would expect a black Baptist church to be. The music was incredible. The preaching was really, really long.
At the time, I wouldn’t have said that my theology was changed all that much during the year. Looking back now however, I see how it really did affect me and my life.
For instance, it was my first real experience getting to know people from the immigrant population. This sparked a passion in me that I’m still following to this day in my work in France.
It was also the first time I seriously had my fundamentalist beliefs challenged in a way that caused me to rethink them. Looking back on some of the beliefs I had at that time really puts my changing theology into perspective.
It also gave me the opportunity to practice living with people from different places and with different perspectives and upbringings. This is another thing that I’m still practicing daily.
We lived all of these things intensely, day after day, for a year. And then it just ended.
The last night, I woke up very early to say goodbye to one of my roommates, and then one by one, everyone left. Andrew and I were the last ones.
And then I went home.
The lessons I learned and the ways that I grew during that year have stuck with me ever since, and I don’t think they’ll ever leave me.
It was one of many beginnings that have had lasting impacts on my journey through to this day. I just didn’t realize it then.
And for that, I am grateful.
Coffee & Theology 