Item 2– Happy Halloween! Seriously. The history of this event is fascinating, not least of all because it’s a large-scale example of (among other things) how and why beliefs change over time. Not what we’re exploring this week, but maybe worth a quick look-up. Start with “the history of All Hallows Eve” if you’re curious about how Christianity has always been somewhat porous when it comes to amalgamating other belief systems.
Item 3 – this weekend is the time change. Yes, your phone will do that automatically. No, your body won’t. This announcement is a free public service, courtesy of The Table, where start times are malleable, but not that malleable. For those who find this baffling, the time goes back in the fall. We get one more hour of sleep (unless “the game” goes 20 innings, in which case choices must be made).

About that subject line – our guest this Sunday will be the multi-Grammy award winning (not sure how many, but more than 8) mandolinist, singer and composer Chris Thile. I’ll fill you in on why I’m aware of his career when we gather, but what we’ll see on Sunday is a bit of him telling the story of how his beliefs changed, and along with them his way of making music, including changing the chords he plays. Pretty interesting stuff, and you don’t have to be a music nerd to appreciate it, although there may be moments where it’ll help. 🙂  In particular, we’ll dig into some of his song lyrics as a way of reflecting on our own experiences with what sort of life events stir up the re-examination of what we believe and the consideration of where our own changes might take us. Change can be scary, but it’s also filled with potential. To quote C.S. Lewis, “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.”

All right – kind of a long blurb. Thanks for reading. As always, when we gather at 10:45 a.m. at VA Cafe, we’ll hold space together for the week’s events (and there have been some tough ones) before we get into the Talky Bit.  We’ll livestream here. There will not be a podcast of this week’s gathering.

I’ll see you on Sunday.