Tea Anyone?

I like to do nothing sometimes. I also get bored easily, but I also like to do nothing--particularly with people. I have found, though, that people have a huge aversion to doing nothing. I have found that in order to get a group of people together, you have to plan an event--otherwise everyone will find something better to do.

One of the things that I miss about places that I've visited overseas is that people drink tea there. Usually, with no other agenda than to drink tea and get to know each other. I we don't do this nearly enough in the US. What ever happened to just 'having company over' without an expectation of a gourmet meal, a movie or games? Why is it so hard to get people to go to a coffee shop, a park, or someone's house and just chat for a while?

This is a big problem, I think--especially in the Church.
It could be symptoms of many things:

• That we value other people so little, that we are not willing to waste our time with them without doing something else.
• That we are afraid to admit that we are in need of community.
• That we are so insecure that we fear a situation where people might get to know us better. Basically, we know that watching a movie or playing Jenga occupies people enough to prevent them from asking deep questions.

Yeah, you can get to know people eventually through doing stuff, but there are so many consequences of activity-centered gatherings:

• We exclude people that can't afford or don't enjoy what we are doing.
• We get lots of acquaintances instead of friends. We don't develop close friendships that spur us on.
• We don't learn how to not be bored when there truly is nothing to do.

Sorry for the bulleted lists. I am an engineer afterall... Anyway, I don't want to downplay doing stuff in a group. We should invite others to do things that we enjoy as this is often a great starting point for community. However, I don't think that we should limit ourselves to only getting together when there is something to do (or being obsessed with finding something to do when we do happen to get together spontaneously).

Mike