We continue our dive into the deeper stories and invitations of the conflict in our lives. We come by our default positions and knee-jerk reactions honestly. In this episode, Melissa Lock shares her experience and insights about all of this conflict stuff!

The three ways we tend to “fake it” with conflict: bland (fake peace, smoothed over), burnt (explosive conflict), and “packet heat” (the instant stuff; hot takes and human-less digital rage). What if we chose a healthier alternative to our conflicts?

Most of us were taught that good relationships are the ones without conflict. But long-term love and community can't survive on avoidance, so this series is about how to stay in the heat, together, and let it make us closer. Conflict isn't a sign that something's gone wrong; it's what any relationship that lasts has to make room for.

It can be helpful to zoom out a bit, and name that too often in church spaces, people get preferences and purposes all jumbled up, and end up either fighting or feeling resentful about questions like, “does that even count as church?” Let’s say this out loud: it all counts, if we’re able to take fear head-on. In this episode, we welcome back pastor Natalia Terfa to Fabric to talk about what really “counts.” In fact, she wrote the book on it: It All Counts: Finding God Everywhere They Told You Not to Look was just released this summer! Find it at a local bookshop near you!

Twenty years ago, a small group of people decided church could be different. Greg Meyer looks back at what that decision made possible, not as nostalgia, but as proof that change is possible, and ought to be explored.

Keeping the institution alive was never the point, even though most organizations seem to behave like it is. This week, let’s name the scarcity mindset that convinces orgs to protect themselves instead of staying relevant, honest, and worth showing up for. Belonging before belief. Always.

…the more they stay the same. The landscape Fabric emerged out of in 2006 has only gotten more clear now. More people burned & bored. More people rightfully skeptical of Church, wondering if it has anything left to offer them. As we celebrate 20 years of Fabric, let’s also affirm why spaces like this one are needed more than ever.

Ian has a conversation with Christian Ledesma, principal at Minneapolis' Roosevelt High School that wonders about humanity in the era of AI, robotics, and automation while taking stock of where we are with leadership, community, and education after living through COVID, school shootings, and the recent ICE occupation of Minneapolis.