After 18 conferences focused on developments in technology and other aspects of the communication world, the Council on Church and Media gave primary emphasis to spirituality and the whole person when members gathered in Indianapolis April 22-24, 2003.

“This year we’re focusing on us, how to be better people, better Christians”—not just better workers, CCM chair Steve Shenk said during the opening dinner Tuesday.

The theme, “Rekindling the Spirit: Sustenance for Communicators,” played out in keynote presentations, worship, workshops, times of play and informal sharing, and in the hotel pool and gym for the 62 conference participants. Even the invitation to dress casually fostered a spirit of rest and renewal—along with the opportunity for networking and gleaning useful ideas from others in the field.

In his keynote address, Professor Bernie Lyon of Christian Theological Seminary, Indianapolis, explored the spirituality of workplaces. “In our workplaces lies a spiritual calling—to create communities made holy by God’s calling,” he said. “Yet however important work may be to us, we are not redeemed by it. God alone is the author of our redemption.” This frees us, he said, “to give ourselves with abandon to just, compassionate, productive relationships.”

A second keynote address by Laurie Oswald, news service director for Mennonite Church USA, considered the delicate balance between doing and being. The mix is necessary, she said, if we are to prevent burnout: that too-common phenomenon when “our bodies continue to come to work, but our souls are someplace else.”

Seminars ranged from the very practical (“Developing an Advertising Campaign” by Bill Robinson of MMA was one option) to food for the soul (such as meditations on “Time Poverty, Hurry Sickness” by Arthur Paul Boers of Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary).