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The Rev. Staci Marrese-Wheeler can pinpoint the moment she heard a conversation that crystalized the need for Madison’s churches to rethink their model. Two young student teachers were talking on their way to a monthly gathering, hosted in the former Lakeview Moravian Church building.
“They’d always come past my office and say, ‘Hi,’” recalled Marrese-Wheeler, pastor of Common Grace and co-director of the nonprofit Eastmorland Community Center. “One day I hear (them) as they’re walking downstairs, and one of them says, ‘What does this building smell like? It kind of smells like my grandparents’ house to me.’ And the other one says, ‘Nostalgia. It smells like nostalgia.’”…