Hi, this is Dan, Rachel’s husband.

A darkness permeated with toxic fear, hate, and exhaustion has descended upon us. It feels like, on some issues, our only two choices are staying silent or yelling into an already overwhelming cacophony of other people’s voices.

It’s now obvious that what many of us were taught growing up was not actually about right and wrong or good and evil. It was about winning and losing political power. It was about tribalism and exclusion.

So what now? We’ve lost faith, lost community, lost family.

Rachel put so much of herself into planning Evolving Faith. She understood one thing we all need at a time like this.

We don’t really need more yelling on Facebook. We don’t really need more shaming on Twitter. We don’t really need that one perfect meme to magically change the mind of that one family member.

What we need is a diverse gathering of people who want to journey peacefully together. A gathering to remind us that we are humans behind the screens. We matter. We still have influence over our future.

We need time in a real life, in-person chorus to escape the online, deafening cacophony. We need to gather with others that remind us no matter what we lose, what grief we bear, how many times we are rejected, we are not alone.

Our voices still matter. We can still find companionship. There is still hope.

If you’re agnostic, please join us.

If you’re a recovering evangelical, please join us.

If you know what you’ve lost but are unsure what you’ll find, join us.

Hope is a light that shines through the darkness. The journey is uncertain but you are not alone.

-Dan

P.S. Thank you to everyone who sent notes, wrote comments, and went the extra mile to support our family during Rachel’s hospital stay and after her death. Personally I’m still pretty numb and in the midst of processing our new reality. Evolving Faith 2019 is bittersweet. I know how hard she worked on this event with Sarah, Jeff, and Jim. It feels wrong that she’s no-longer with us. But her words are still present. Her influence still exists. In that sense we’ll still see her there.