When I was first asked to help out with an Alpha course at my parish I was skeptical. I thought it would be too focused on the lowest common denominator and too Protestant. It turns out that I love Alpha.
If you're not familiar with it, Alpha is a 10- or 11-week introduction to the Christian faith that encourages skeptics to come with their questions. It welcomes everybody; it makes no assumptions about anybody's starting point. You eat dinner together, you watch a video together, and you talk about the video over dessert and coffee. In the middle of it you spend a chunk of a weekend together learning about the Holy Spirit.
Part of what I love about Alpha is Nicky Gumbel, an Anglican vicar who converted from atheism as a college student. I love his enthusiasm; I love his accent.* (You already know I get excited about British accents, even though they added some Americanisms ("sweater" instead of "jumper," e.g.) to his script.) I helped out with one Alpha course in which all of the videos were just Nicky Gumbel talking, which was fine by me. More recently, there are globe-trotting younger people appearing in the videos, but the content seems to be mostly the same.
I love Alpha's focus on lives redeemed: prisoners, post-genocide Rwandans, people healed and transformed. There are so many powerful stories.
I love the structure of the Alpha program, the way you ease into knowing each other week by week. Tonight at my table I was laughing uproariously with this group of people I barely knew, or didn't know at all, in January. (Topic under discussion: how high-maintenance can a romantic partner be, and does it make a difference if s/he is extremely attractive?) The early weeks of discussion sometimes limp along, but I love to watch people unfurl themselves a bit at a time like slo-mo human peonies. Maybe that's actually kind of a creepy visual but we'll just go with it, shall we?
I didn't expect Alpha to touch my own heart the way that it did, to remind me that the goodness of God surrounds me on all sides. Alpha has taught me how to quiet my heart and rest in God's love for me.
Tonight as I was walking out the door the director said, "I'm going to call you in the fall to see if you're up for another round!" "You do that," I told him. I'm a little sad that it's over.
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