[mercer]

One thing that I've noticed and that kind of concerns me is that in my environment (urban, well-educated, white, late-twenties, Western-Europe) there's a distinct lack of regular interaction with people who are significantly older, younger, less-educated, and/or 'less' white.

Perhaps the reason why I notice is it that in my previous Evangelical Christian life I interacted with a much greater variety of people through regular church-related activities (every Sunday and Thursday, and special events on top of that).

From mentally disabled (apologies if that's not the PC term) to genius-level mathematicians, from as-local-as-<insert typical local food> to a huge amount of different ethnic backgrounds, from watching babies in the Sunday kindergarten to volunteering for 'coffee duty' at events for seniors, and from dirt-poor to local jeweler/banker/realtor; all of that came together on, at the very least, a weekly basis. And it's one of the few things I really miss from my church-going years. Literally every single one of those people in some way enriched my life.

I think it's a very good thing to try to counterbalance increasingly common lifestyles of 'homogenous interactions' through initiatives like this. I really think it does increase empathy, and I really think it's necessary.