It really is “All About Love” in Baltimore.

Today concludes the Episcopal Church’s “All About Love” Festival here in Baltimore. Many of us came to the Festival/Conference/Revival not entirely sure why we were there. Was this about evangelism? Racial reconciliation? Was this a ‘make-up’ conference for General Convention? A vanity project? WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?

Let me say, quite truthfully, that none of that mattered. Because what we remembered when we got down to the convention center is that, above all, it is good for us to be together. It is easy to forget, after all, that the value of gathering communally is usually NOT the content of workshops, programs, trainings, whatever it is.

The value of gathering together is the small conversations with new and old friends, the ability to share dreams, hopes, visions, ideals, and to contemplate new ways of being with each other.

Perhaps the true genius of the Stations of the Cross walks we have been doing is not in the selection of the sites, or the prayerful petitions and responses, but in the time built in between stops for people to reflect, pray, converse, share, and wonder with no set agenda.

Because it is in those moments, the unplanned, unscheduled encounters with the divine that we truly see love in action. That is when we see God at work, when we allow space for the Holy Spirit to act in our lives.

Perhaps, not everything need have a purpose? Perhaps we should make time in our life for unplanned interactions. For quiet. To experience God’s love, to taste God’s joy, and to experience God’s hope.

I hope you will allow some time to be surprised this season.