How Kate made Nick cry.

OK, he didn't actually cry. And Kate didn't do anything. So you could say the title of this post is utterly misleading. But here IS what's happening in the kitchen of Crick at 11:40 at night:

Grant is staring determinedly at the water pot (I think he's trying to figure out how to open it) while Kate, Nick, and Shane are having a serious philosophical/theological discussion at the table next to me. Kate just said Dante didn't write "religious works" and Nick and Shane almost started crying. (That was hyperbole. Also where I got the title of this post.)

Laura is handling the water pot now and Grant is adding an opinion to the discussion in his gentle way.

I'm rejoining the conversation now.

[10 minute interval]

Now everyone is mad and Nick keeps prefacing what he says by: "I don't even know if I want to say this."

[4 minute interval]

NOW we all agree and Alison just joined the conversation with "Can I just ask what the heck we're talking about?"

[90 minute interval]

Topics have ranged from: reality to the Trinity to musical theory to church history to the Cross. It's a really serious conversation and the circle has grown to nine people. It's like this vortex that no one can escape. And probably something we all needed to talk about.

I still don't know how much I love this kind of discussion, though I know somewhere in my head that it's important to be able to have it -- because God is worth knowing and worth the struggle it takes to know Him. And people are worth hearing and worth the struggle it takes to understand them.

A possible ultimate conclusion to the discussion: Jesus is the one way to God, but there are wondrously and marvelously many ways to Jesus Christ: because no one is beyond the reach of God's love in Christ. And other than that, there is so much we just don't know.

Also, that we're really glad we can still laugh in the middle of this over someone's bizarre analogy and that we can still go read Harry Potter and know God loves us. And that we still love each other.

It is good to sit and talk.