Whether at the conference table or the dinner table, we often express our ideas and intentions for improvement and engagement with those around us.
For example, my husband and I are often left sitting at the table as one child runs to wash food out of their hair while the other crawls under the table to feed the dog and then there’s the one sitting in timeout on the living room chair for throwing food into her sister’s hair. We toss ideas back and forth for how we can create a more relaxed environment during dinner time that doesn’t end in chaos. Should we eat by candlelight? Do we serve food at the table or prior to sitting down? Should we switch chairs? Should we rotate who leads prayer? Spoiler alert: We don’t have the answers so if you do, please let us know!
At Catholic Social Services, the Leadership Team may not have food fights but we often explore ideas for how to provide more opportunities to build fellowship among the agency. Our time is filled to the brim with individual program tasks and goals, and we often unintentionally overlook the efforts of our coworkers who are equally consumed by their own programs. How do we slow down and communicate to each other how much we appreciate their efforts? At one recent meeting, as this discussion wrapped up to make way for general updates, Poe Dee, our director of refugee and immigrant services shared some news about a former refugee family.
Due to a series of tragic circumstances, a refugee family of eight from South Sudan needed to vacate their apartment immediately. The children were not safe and parents were split between work responsibilities and being at the hospital. In this moment of crisis, God invited every employee at CSS to step up together and get the family to a safer location.
Surrounded by prayers from CSS employees unable to jump in due to distance or prior obligations—understandable in a service area of 24,000 square miles—more than a dozen of us showed up that afternoon to move furniture, install appliances, make beds, gather kitchen supplies, arrange dinner for the kids, and so much more.
At the safe location that CSS was able to provide, I watched staff mobilize and go into action. In that moment, I was immediately struck by the ways in which God has called each of us in our talents to the Body of Christ. A response like that could not have been possible without faith being the foundation of our work.
While we tossed ideas around earlier that day for ways to build community, God did us one better by inviting us to accompany this family in crisis to a new, safe place. So at the end of the day, maybe our dinner table doesn't need candlelight or a new seating chart. It just needs what CSS showed me that day: people willing to show up for each other, mess and all. That's the kind of table worth gathering at.
