Living Reconciled
Living Reconciled, hosted by Mission Mississippi, is a podcast dedicated to exploring reconciliation and the Gospel that enables us to live it out. Mission Mississippi has been leading the way in racial reconciliation in Mississippi for 31 years. Our model is to bring people together to build relationships across racial lines so they can work together to better their communities. Our mission is to encourage and demonstrate grace in the Body of Christ across racial lines so that communities throughout Mississippi can see practical evidence of the gospel message.
Living Reconciled
EP. 68: Crossing Cultural Boundaries with Chris DiGiovanni
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What happens when a Philly native dives into Southern culture and discovers a deeper faith? In this episode of Living Reconciled, Chris DiGiovanni shares his journey from Pennsylvania to Mississippi, exploring how his time at Jackson State University, an HBCU, opened his eyes to untold Black history and the power of diverse voices. We discuss the intersections of faith, justice, and education, along with the beauty of multicultural worship. Join us as we uncover the transformative power of embracing discomfort, listening with humility, and pursuing true reconciliation.
Special thanks to our sponsors:
Nissan, St. Dominic's Hospital, Atmos Energy, Regions Foundation, Mississippi College, Anderson United Methodist Church, Grace Temple Church, Mississippi State University, Real Christian Foundation, Brown Missionary Baptist Church, Christian Life Church, Ms. Doris Powell, Mr. Robert Ward, and Ms. Ann Winters.
This is Living Reconciled, a podcast dedicated to giving our communities practical evidence of the gospel message by helping Christians learn how to live in the reconciliation that Jesus has already secured for us by living with grace across racial lines. Hey, thanks so much for joining us on this episode of Living Reconciled. I'm your host, Brian Crawford, and I am with my incredible friends and co-hosts, Nettie Winters, Austin Hoyle. Gentlemen, how are you doing today?
Speaker 2:I'm doing great, wonderful day. I'm always excited to be your incredible friend, so I'm excited.
Speaker 3:That's three weeks in a row. We've been incredible, Nettie.
Speaker 2:We must be doing something right. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Y'all.
Speaker 1:Both will continue to be my incredible friends, along with other incredible friends that we have, sponsors like Mississippi College, anderson United Methodist Church, grace Temple Church, mississippi State, real Christian Foundation, nissan, st Dominic's Hospital, adventist Energy, regents Foundation, brown Missionary Baptist Church, christian Life Church, ms Doris Powell, robert Ward and Winters.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for all that you do to make this podcast possible and to make Mission Mississippi possible. If you would like to join that illustrious group of people who are supporting the work of Mission Mississippi and reconciliation in the state of Mississippi, you can do that very easily. Just visit missionmississippiorg, click on the Invest tab at the top right of the website, and that will take you to a page that gives you an opportunity to sponsor and to sow into this work. We will be incredibly appreciative if you would do so, but in the meantime, we have a great guest that we are really excited about. I'm excited about to have a dialogue as it relates to reconciliation, as it relates to faith, but also as it relates to history and black history, and there's no better time, in my opinion, than this month to have this dialogue with Mr Chris DiGiovanni. Chris, sir, how are you doing today?
Speaker 4:I'm good y'all. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. I've been listening for the past little while and love what y'all are doing at the podcast with the group and excited to talk to y'all.
Speaker 1:Excellent man, excellent. Why don't you start off by just telling us a little bit about yourself, who is Chris Diadiavani, and tell us a little bit about your story of faith and how you came to Christ Jesus?
Speaker 4:Yeah, I appreciate it. I think so. I'm from Pennsylvania, I live in Philadelphia, the Eagles just won a big game, if you all aren't aware, and I am still in the Africa.
Speaker 1:I did not hear that. I'm sure you're pretty excited about that, though, right.
Speaker 2:It's a small game. I'm glad you're curious about which one of the philanthropists it is.
Speaker 4:Well, it's the one that believes Kelly Green. No, I'm from Pennsylvania. My family has deep roots there and I kind of came up I would would say kind of like observing faith, right. So like we're historically methodist, you've been in this kind of world for a long time, but this wasn't really an important part of my childhood. I was confirmed to age 12. I did all these things but just was kind of there to just experience it, but not to really dig in, right. And my family moved around quite a bit growing up, so that I was born in philadelphia. I grew up mostly outside of dallas and believe me when I say moving from philadelphia to baltimore for a year and a half into dallas, was quite the cultural experience. I thought I I knew the South. I didn't. But yeah, I just continued to be like attending church and part of youth groups, but not really investing, didn't, frankly, didn't see a need for it, had not had to lean on God for anything Right. And so I went to college at Ouachita Bacchus University, go Tigers, got in there in 2014 and graduated in 2018.
Speaker 4:Throughout my time there, similar story with God. He was there, I was praying to him, but I was not engaging, did not really go to church much. We had a required chapel on campus. That may have been the only time I really engaged with any kind of church. Most of the time Just was not pursuing depth in a relationship with the Lord, nor with other believers outside of a couple of friends. So you think about this kid, right? So I'm this white kid from Pennsylvania who moves to the South, right, I go, I'm studying history at OBU, I'm able to work in a couple of different organizations and I graduate in 2018. And I don't know if y'all know this, but you don't get rich working in history. And so I was trying to find a place where I could afford basically to do history and be broke, and so I graduated in May of 2018. And the role at the Old Capital Museum here in Jackson was open. I did some research. I was like, wow, I've never been to Mississippi, never been to Jackson, but I need a job. So I actually applied for the job on a whim kind of like why not? And was interviewed for it, and God made a way for me to be accepted. So I took this job.
Speaker 4:Having never been in Jackson, never been to the state of Mississippi, I went to college in Arkansas and I grew up in Dallas and I thought I knew the South and I didn't know the South. So within two weeks I had moved into my apartment in Belle Haven, I had gotten a car, I had gotten insurance, I had gotten bank accounts, all these sort sort of things, just kind of falling in line. It was really like looking back guys, providence was all over this. Right, I was not asking for it. I was like I've earned this. Look at me doing all this cool stuff with my history, undergrad, whatever, um, and yeah, I uh, was looking for an apartment and I can remember looking for a specific set of apartments and not loving what I'd seen.
Speaker 4:But it was by a church and the name of the church. It's one here in Jackson it's a psychotomy, for some reason and I was like, oh cool, and I just kept moving on, found my place was not really near the church, about a 15-minute drive, and my grandmother, my mom, dropped me off and then they left on a Sunday morning. My plan was just to go to sleep. I couldn't sleep. I had done the whole thing and I was like, huh, what was that church name? And for some reason, man, I felt this call, this pull to this church, knowing that nary assault, knowing no Jacksonians, having spent two or three days here, and I found myself in the car going towards this church. And I found myself in the car going towards this church.
Speaker 4:There is where I met the core of friends that I still consider my bedrock of who I am here. These are men, multiracial group men, who believe and love others and do not sacrifice their belief for it. It's really powerful stuff and has really come to be a bedrock of how I exist here. I joined a recovery community here and learned what it's like to really live into us, to live in such a way as to not have to hide. And when you do that, you begin to do a lot of self-introspection. Right, and part of it is I'm not making a whole, whole lot of money, I'm trying to figure out how to survive. So you learn as well to begin to lean on others, to lean on the lord, in these ways that, um, you don't know if you don't have to do it right. So there's a desperation to it, but, uh, still a pride and man. It was amazing to see the way it got and got involved further with his friend group and community and continue to work for the state for a number of years.
Speaker 4:In January 2020, I was offered a role as an educator at the two museums. This is a museum in Mississippi, educator at the Two Mississippi Museums. This is a museum in the Mississippi history, in the Civil Rights Museum. I no longer work there, but I will say world-class museum. If you have time, it's worth everybody to spend an afternoon there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's oftentimes highlighted as one of the top museums in the country right.
Speaker 4:Exactly, it's actually up for it. Again, I have friends who still work there and walking around there I was struck by two things. I was struck by wow, nobody uh here gave up. And I was struck by very few people look like me on these walls and I started to think like what does that mean? Right, and there's a gentleman who works there.
Speaker 1:Nobody here gave up walk me through just that, just that sentiment right there, when you say nope, you gave up what. What does that mean to you?
Speaker 4:so I mean the museum's right with the first enslaved afric over towards what is now America. And there's these moments throughout the entire museum of strength, of determination, of really powerful organization and so awful, based in biblical truth right. People like enslaved Africans, prosperous Gabriel, people like Sojourner, truth right. All these amazing people who are going through from that era to Ida D Wells, all the way to people who I know, who are part of the modern civil rights movement today. And to understand that you can't do these things alone, I think for me was so important you can't make a difference alone. And to be struck with the sound of freedom songs, be struck with the sound of freedom songs, to be struck with the sound of organizations who are pointing towards the image of God, not this Right. At some museums there I met a gentleman named Hezekiah Watkins. If you've all been to museums, you've seen him. He's a freedom writer, dear friend of mine, and he was 13 years old and was put on death row and parted in prison because he was accidentally apart until he was, and that was where things began to change, where I started to like understand some of these ramifications. Right, and, of course, 2020, if you weren't aware, is quite a tumultuous year and I had Right and, of course, 2020, if you weren't aware, is quite a tumultuous year, and I had a lot of time to do some reflection and began to work with some friends on a high-resource Bible study at the church. It was DeMar Chisby's work was just really impactful to me that read a couple of books that really changed my life and came back with kind of a new, a new purpose, felt a lot less fearful of using my voice right, felt a lot more comfortable in speaking this truth that I really feel God has put into me to speak Right and to not be afraid that this truth might be uncomfortable for people and to be at a spot where it's like that might not be a bad thing.
Speaker 4:Similar timing I was unsure if I wanted to work in academia or in public history. So academia you know your professors, whatever public histories, your museums, your parks, whatever it might be where you were talking to the public about history, and so I began to look around for grad school programs, because what better way to figure this out than to do grad school, I suppose. So Jackson State University here in town was offering a program's online history master's. With no GED or no GRE. I had some friends who were part of before me. I talked to them. I was like, hey, is it worth it? And they pushed me towards it. So I enrolled in 2021 and just walked from there in May of 2024. And to go to an HBCU, to be in a space as starkly different than OBU, was amazing.
Speaker 1:Right, right, right, chris, you know, one of the things that was really striking to me is that you went to Nettie Winters' favorite university, right, jackson State. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So tell a little bit about your. That's not Nettie Winters' favorite university, right, jackson state. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So tell, tell a little about your that's. That's not netty winter's favorite university. He went to school at alcorn state, chris, but but nevertheless, um, he, I'm sure he, I'm sure he dreams often about, about, um, all the glories that exist at jackson state university. Well, what was your experience like there at jack State University?
Speaker 1:a predominantly Black, african-american, a historically Black college and university. What was your experience like there?
Speaker 4:You know I get that question a fair amount and it makes sense and honestly, it was just another example of the beauty of humanity To be in a space where I'm not the majority is. Oftentimes I'm thinking about it as like an invited guest in a lot of conversations. Right where you're, you're going to these schools, you're doing this sort of thing and you're learning history that I've never heard about before in, oftentimes, places that I'm from, right like I'm learning about stories in Philadelphia where I'm like what? And it's not because I had ignored the lessons. These weren't taught Right, and for me to go to an HBCU was just beautiful. The professors, the student body were incredibly inviting, welcoming and challenging in a way that always pushed me towards better.
Speaker 4:I took classes that I never would have expected the history of art and imperialism. What does that mean? You're learning all these amazing ways to look at the world today Right, and especially when it comes to the HBCU and kind of working with my other work in the Black history world, you're making connections Right, both with individuals who are history makers but also other stories. Right Now, mr Winters, you're an all-corner alum and one of my favorite people to talk about is Medgar Evers and his life with Smurley Evers. You think about his office being on Lynch Street over at the Grand Lodge. You think about these amazing people, intersections of these people who both care deeply about justice and deeply about God, and for me those two things I didn't know could coexist.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad you said it, chris, because oftentimes we a desire to seek justice and to pursue justice for one another and we see so much of that in Old and New Testament the introduction of partisanship and the politicizing of the concept and ideal of justice. Either one way or the other, it ends up hindering the Christian's ability to see the marriage between love of God, love of neighbor and seeking justice. And then also, chris, the other piece that you mentioned. I just want to highlight, man, that I thought was really important, how you were introduced to a whole nother a whole other side of history through your experience in Jackson State.
Speaker 1:And I just want to make a plug here in terms of this is why you know, black history is not an attempt to, or Black history seasons, or black history months, or black history events. They're not an attempt to, to usurp American history or to overthrow American history. They're, they're, they're the best attempt that we, that we have thus far, to and to broaden and expand our collective understanding of all of it, all of the history. And oftentimes, like you said to your point, chris, there are stories that are happening in the fabric and in the story of American history that don't even get told, that don't even get shared without some intentionality a Jackson State University or a Black History Month or a Black History Event. There are some stories in history that don't get told as it relates to people of color, unless we have some intentionality to insert those stories.
Speaker 4:Yes, and something that you know, going off that that is important, that I've seen, having done this work for a number of years now. Um is the importance of, from my perspective, lament right, trying to figure out in my head how do I forge ahead, acknowledge the harms of the past and work together. Some of them and something that comes to mind biblically. So my fiance and I have been working through the Psalms for the past couple of months. Like a lot of them are lament, this biblical lament that is asking these questions and God's big enough that he can handle it and he'll answer it his own way. And oftentimes it makes people uncomfortable to acknowledge things are worth limiting. And so I think about, like my white friends who don't want to engage in some of these stories, I get it on a base level. It's really uncomfortable to talk about these sorts of violences, comfortable to talk about these sorts of violences, and until we can take a bandaid off of a, of a, a cut right, how do we heal?
Speaker 2:it? How did you get beyond the uncomfortable, the awkwardness of of of this comfort of going into this? Yeah?
Speaker 4:I think there's a couple of things. Part of it was I didn't really have an option. When you get told, hey, you're in charge of 200 children from Jim Hill High School at the Civil Rights Museum, you just kind of have to figure out how to be uncomfortable, to be okay with it, and it's the caring counsel of people, I'd have been uncomfortable with them as well. Yeah, it was a lot, it was teenage school right.
Speaker 4:Yes, it was crazy. It was a lot of fun and it was the care and counsel of my peers, some of whom who looked like me and some of whom who don't. Right, I can remember going into the office of someone who still works in history here in Jackson. He's a black man and being like this is early 2020. Be scared to use the word black right.
Speaker 4:I was like I just like African American and he was like okay, and you realize that that discomfort is actually right and it's not a natural human response to want to lean into it. But that's for me where I've been able to learn right to be in spaces where I'm not the majority, to be in spaces where, um, I'm surrounded by people who don't look like the experience is not like mine, to help educate myself, but also just to be a good neighbor. Don't make it a project, make it a way of life.
Speaker 1:Hey, chris, even I would love for you to just kind of tease that out a little bit more. You mentioned that, that that discomfort being in a being in a space where you're not the predominant ethnicity or your culture is not the predominant culture. You mentioned that being a good thing and then you mentioned the education that you get in being in that space, the awareness that you get in being in that space, the opportunities to love, neighbor well and being in that space Share some other ways in which you feel like it's a good thing to immerse yourself in those uncomfortable spaces and those diverse spaces.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think if we just get surrounded by things that affirm our beliefs, things that look and sound like us, people who look and sound like us, frankly, it's kind of looking at the world in grayscale, right. If you think about a rainbow, right, a lot of beautiful colors and suns around it and these sort of things, compared to a gray scale rainbow, it's OK. It's not beautiful, right, and I think I had to learn that one early on. And I think about this conversation I had with Hezekiah Watkins, my friend in the museum. This gentleman is a older black man, someone who I consider to be a mentor to me, someone who'll be at my wedding, right, and I was talking about all the stuff. He sat down next to me the civil rights museum to get time sitting in the middle and just taking the space. He looks at me and says you're not that important, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I was like Nettie tells us that all the time.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and at first, man, I was like what that, you know, a little humbling. But what it helped me to remember was that I am not the person who's going to make the one difference. So my little choice, my one thing I do, can't help, but it's a to make the one difference. So my little choice, my one thing I do, can help, but it's a movement that makes things happen right. And if I step away from something for some self-care, this spot's not going to fall apart. But also, if I'm not the one doing the work, then what harm am I doing? And it's all about for me.
Speaker 4:Where do you invest? Where do you all about for me? Where do you invest? Where do you do things? With whom do you invest right? So, for instance, here in jackson I don't know if y'all know briwood art center. My fiance and I are very involved there and it's a multiracial, multi-generational space. That I think was with the kingdom right and my acknowledgement of not being the savior right, the white savior of all. This means that instead, I have space to make a mistake, I know, a space to just live and be a neighbor, to bring what I have and to listen and to learn, and I think for me, as someone who's always curious, that learning is so important, and for me, that's where being in spaces where I'm not the majority is good.
Speaker 4:And I think, for my job as an interpreter, right. So interpretation, the fancy word for telling you about history and making history interesting to you. My job is not really to teach you hard facts. I can do that totally Right. So if you hear this story about someone and you think about the human part of it, you're going to feel so much more connected to me, the interpreter, but also to the subject in which I'm talking, and then you'll be moved.
Speaker 2:And so for me.
Speaker 4:Being in spaces in which I'm not the majority improves me as an interpreter, as a human being, leads me to a greater understanding and curiosity. I think curiosity is an important part of this as well.
Speaker 2:You know, chris, you mentioned about the difficulty of being in spaces with people that don't look like you, how uncomfortable that is, and you have to get used to being uncomfortable in places like that. You know that's part of the challenge. You had the option, which you chose intentionally to be a part of that, but you also could have chose to go and do something else. You have that option. You know, on this side of the street I don't have that option. You know I'm in uncomfortable, difficult situations.
Speaker 2:That's been my life story, so I guess I'm comfortable in being uncomfortable all the time I've been through that and so many people don't want to bother, don't want to cross that line, don't want to get engaged, because it's just too hard, it's just too this or just too that. So I commend you for your courage and your confidence. I see and hear in your voice the courage and confidence you have to. I'm going, I'm in and I'm going to do this, and so I commend you for that.
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 4:I think something as well that you said, Mr Winters, that speaks to me is the word privilege is the whole thing right, but it is a privilege to have the option to walk out, to back out of this, and not the hard choice, but the choice that at least I feel compelled to and pushed to is to walk in.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and.
Speaker 4:I think for me, as I've gone through grad school, as I've gone through this work in a field, that for me, as I've gone through grad school, as I've gone through this work in a field that for me has felt like the push of God has been to be in spaces and to be a bridge, Not to try to fix everything, because Lord knows there's a lot of work to be done, but if I can move people with every interaction towards God, towards seeing people in their image and towards something else, towards a difference, then it's a good day.
Speaker 3:Amen. Yeah, I like what you're describing, this tension between justice and faith as well, because if you really look at it, it's not actually tension, it's just we've made it to become tension. You know, the prophets faced it, jesus faced it, the early church faced it. You know, scripture is really clear Worship without righteousness is just empty, right?
Speaker 3:You know, micah 6, 8 calls us to do justice, love, mercy, walk humbly with God. You have Amos 5, which calls us to. You know justice to roll down like waters. Isaiah also tells us to seek justice and to correct oppression. You know there's that struggle there. I like what you talk about in terms of lament as well. You know that's a deeply as you're talking about in the Psalms just a deeply biblical aspect. You know it just shows the prophets didn't just rebuke, they were just out there with the microphone, you know, spitting out their verse, so to speak. They wept as well. This was a deep outcry of their heart. You know we even have Jesus weeping in Luke 19 and David weeping in Psalm 13. He says how long, o Lord, will you forget me forever? I also think that that experience that you've had of not being in the majority, stepping into the HBCU, that must have been a very unique experience. I would have loved to have had an experience like that. I'm the type of person who would have just enjoyed himself in that type of an environment.
Speaker 3:You weren't centered. You had to be in a place where you really had to be the one who listened, and that's why I think your journey really matters in a lot of ways. It's not just about learning history, you kind of entered into it in a real way. And so I guess that brings me to my real question how does the church move forward? You know, how do we simultaneously refuse to water down the gospel, how do we refuse to say no, the gospel is know or closed and vague theological language? Um, how do we uh really allow the, the true, authentic lament, uh to be something that is is also healed by the gospel? Simultaneously, in our uh, in our relationships and I'm thinking you probably have a pretty good, have a pretty good perspective on that I'd love to hear your thoughts. Sorry, it's a deep, deep idea.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, it's a good old question.
Speaker 3:I come in at the end and I throw out these hard abstract questions, man.
Speaker 4:It's been to solve a 2,000-year-old problem in 10 minutes. No I think, man, I think like I always think back to the old Dr King quote right, the most good hour in America is 11 am on a Sunday, right?
Speaker 4:And one of those things about lament is you acknowledge the past is truth, right, and the fact that that's still happening, especially my white evangelical Christian friends and brothers, and sisters until we fully understand how it is to lament that it's going to be slow going Right, and that requires a choice to be humble before God but before our brothers and sisters who don't look like us, right To seek out questions and answers and to sit with people who people who look like us have hearts.
Speaker 4:And I think for me, one of the things I personally meant as a white Christian doing black history is when 2020 happened, right, I saw an uptick in white evangelicals curious about this kind of work and it was beautiful. I had this being asked really good, hard questions by people who were from all around the island, right, and there's things that have gone on. That's going on no-transcript, and we're still dealing with that end somewhere. So it is a combination for me of lament of where we currently are. I would be hard-pressed to find many people who acknowledge, I would say, that we're in just the best space as a church, as a nation, as a world, and holding again intention that the gospel is the truth of God, these things that in order for us to lament properly.
Speaker 2:God has to be true right.
Speaker 4:One of the things my fiance once said is at this moment, in this space, I need god to be good, not because of me, but because of my surroundings, because what's going on around me, what I'm seeing, seeing, what I'm hearing, what I'm feeling, and I think how does the church heal?
Speaker 4:I think it's the white church, especially coming and listening and engaging and reaching out towards people who don't look like us, or finding ways to support these communities, these churches, these organizations. That's why I love what y'all are doing in Mission Mississippi communities, these churches, these organizations. That's why I love what y'all are doing in Mission Mississippi. That's why I love the Perkins Foundation, brightwood Arts Center, where you find organizations whose whole job and whole space is to work towards reconciliation, not as some weird progressive thing, but as some biblical truth that we're called to do, not because we feel like it, but because it's biblical from the jump Right. Not because we feel like it, but because it's biblical from the jump Right. Personally, I've come to a place where I have found a church here in Jackson that is majority African American, led by a black man and his wife. Right City Heart Church here in Jackson, sippy Yoke on the hollow rails. It's a great church because it, to me, exemplifies what could be in my look like in celebration.
Speaker 1:Hey, the same. The same question, chris, that I have for you about jackson state with a product as a predominantly african-american university. As a white man being in that experience, share a little bit with us about your experience at city heart Heart Church as a predominantly multi-ethnic black and brown space. As a white man, share a little bit about that experience.
Speaker 4:Man, you want to talk about a unique space for me. So again, I come up in the Methodist background right, and we're like stock still and mainline Christian doing the thing right, like Stock Still and Mainland Christian doing the thing right. And you go into City Heart and we're a little bit more towards this, like there's a lot more. There's gospel work, there's a lot of beautiful worship and there's a lot of dancing and moving around man, I came to see that not as weird, but as what praise is, and part of that, I'll say, is my fiance. She's a white woman, she's from Texas, my way up from Wisconsin, right, and for her she's shown me that one of the ways she worships is dance Right, and to see this physical reaction to worship for me is beautiful, is healing, because it's not what I grew up doing, and to see pastor kevin get up there and bring this really powerful truth every weekend is something that's become healing right.
Speaker 4:Um, and it's amazing, man, because I feel like sometimes we can say we're multi-ethnic churches and it's an afterthought, right but specifically you'll find some spaces where it's not even like designed that way.
Speaker 4:It just kind of happens and for me that is what the church is, you know and so like, when I'm in the church and I'm worshiping, I'm going to a worship night, me and my fiancee are one of a handful of white folks and we still feel completely apartable.
Speaker 4:We have been welcomed from the jump and we have people from Asia, people from Haiti, people from South Jackson, west Jackson, people all over God's acre, quite literally, and it's beautiful. And for me to be in a space where I look forward to going to church every Sunday, where I look forward to the freedom you feel in that little bit of worship and you really feel pushed to do these things, is incredible. To do these things is incredible, and so much of the voices that I have found that helps me in this walk had been African-American voices. I mentioned Jamar Tisby or John Perkins, right, you think about Howard Thurman, right? Dr King, obviously, medgar Evers, right? All these amazing Black Christians who have been working and doing this kind of work. To see that like embodied every Sunday for me is, I mean, I get chills thinking about it.
Speaker 1:Brother, it's been chills for me just even having this conversation, just hearing your story and your experience and learning, learning a little bit about how God has been using you. You're an incredible gift to our, our community, our state. Your experience is an experience that we need more of man, and so I'm so, I'm so grateful for you. Um, if you, if you don't mind close us out by just sharing one positive step that people can make, given your experience, given giving your journey uh, living in various spaces and cities, but having such a diverse experience, man, give us one positive step that people can make in the journey of reconciliation, from your vantage point.
Speaker 4:Yeah, again, I want to point back to a little bit of discomfort right. Oftentimes when we learn or hear something that has to do with reconciliation, especially in a biblical sense, often we get uncomfortable Right, and I always tell folks at this point you have two options you can hold pat and not move or you can go with some curiosity. And so my main thing I always hope and pray for for people is to lead with curiosity. What's ahead of you might not be clear, but again, I need God to be good, not because of me, because of him. So if I'm trusting him truly, I'm living in such a way and I'm walking with curiosity, then I'm going to have faith, I'm going to find something that's going to change me. I think that is what I'd say is my main advice is to leave that curiosity.
Speaker 1:Brother, it's been incredibly rich to spend some time learning from you, hearing from you, hearing your story and your journey. We certainly hope there's so much more we can unpack with you from a historical perspective that we haven't even touched, and so I'm hoping that you would do us the pleasure of scheduling another pod here down the road this year where we can unpack a little bit of the historical elements with you as well, if you don't mind, but it's been rich. It's been rich man. Thank you so much for joining us and thank you to our listening audience for joining us on Living Reconciled. If you would like to connect with Chris DiGiovanni, is there a way that people can connect with you, brother?
Speaker 4:Yeah, so I have a long Italian last name, so my email is super long. So, babe, with me it's Christopher C-H-R-I-S-T-O-P-H-E-RJD-I-G-I-O-V-A-M-N-I. That's my last name. Hopefully people will find it somewhere. It'll be easier than that At gmailcom. The easiest way to get a hold of me is my personal cell phone number is 870-210-6589. Uh, do me a favor, though text me first, because when I see a random number, the odds of me answering you are slim to none. Um, but I would love to connect with anybody curious about more of this. Um, but love to meet in person. It's y'all especially, or anybody involved with this work, to really hash it out. This has been an incredible time for me. I just love the work y'all are doing. I'm praying with y'all that the work continues to make a difference. That's an empty word, amen.
Speaker 1:Amen, it's been a blessing man. You guys know how to keep up with us. You can find us on missionmississippiorg, facebook, instagram search, mission Mississippi and you can get to us, but it's been a pleasure to spend some time with Chris DiGiovanni. I am Brian Crawford, with my incredible friends Nettie Winters, austin Hoyle, signing off saying God bless, god bless. Thanks for joining Living Reconciled. If you would like more information on how you can be a part of the ongoing work of helping Christians learn how to live in the reconciliation that Jesus has already secured, please visit us online at missionmississippiorg or call us at 601-353-6477. Thanks again for listening you.
