At The Conversation Project we aim to reach people where they live, work, and pray. To reach any of these segments with our message about the importance of having crucial conversations about wishes for end-of-life care, we understand that we need to deliver about eight different kinds of messages on a variety of platforms.

We’ve had great response to other videos we’ve posted on our website and shared with our national network (like “The Jazz Singer” which you can watch here). So when we decided to deliver a strong, clear message to our “pray” constituency across the country, we turned again to one of our trusted partners at Walker Creek Media, Nubar Alexanian, to help us.

Nubar and I trekked out together with his favorite assistant for a full day of shooting, to three locations, to interview leading members of the clergy in Boston. We spoke with Rev. Gloria White-Hammond MD, Rev. Nancy Taylor and Rabbi Ronne Freidman who generously shared their experiences of bringing The Conversation Project to their congregations.

Nubar has a sensitive and skillful eye for seeing people through a camera lens and capturing something essential about them on video. He created warm portraits of each of the featured speakers sitting in their offices at Bethel AME, Old South Church, and Temple Israel as they spoke of the impact The Conversation Project  is having and can have on how people meet the challenge of talking about their mortality.

Nubar also has a storyteller’s ear. At the end of a long day of filming the interviews, he had more than 100 minutes of video footage that now had to be edited down to just 3 minutes to make a short, clear, and attention-holding program. (I think he must have the patience of a saint!)

When you see the final product, I hope you’ll agree: it makes a sensitive, clear case that having The Conversation–sooner rather than later—is a gift we give our loved ones. And it has a hopeful message that all clergy can share with their congregations: Using the Starter Kit is a tremendous opportunity to learn, as Rev. Nancy Taylor says, “It’s not just about the end of life; it’s about how you want to live until you die.”

Please watch and share the video in your faith community–and let us know what you think!