'If we avoid small talk, we abandon the very field in which we have been assigned to work. Most of people's lives is not spent in crisis, not lived at the cutting edge of crucial issues. Most of us, most of the time, are engaged in simple, routine tasks, and small talk is the natural language. If pastors belittle it, we belittle what most peopel are doing most of the time, and the gospel is misrepresented.'
Eugene H Peterson, The Contemplative Pastor, p.115.
