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When Vicky, working at the IIT Research Park near Adyar in South Chennai, Googled "Café Near Me" he stumbled upon JC's Café and was attracted by the beauty of the landscaped frontage of JC's nestled amongst the leafy and quiet neighborhood of 9th Cross, Indiranagar.

On entering JC's Café, Vicky found a vacant glass-topped table to place his laptop and approached our Barista, Mona, who was working behind the pastry display and ordered a "double shot americano".

Vicky, instead of going back to his table, was distracted by the "Creation Science Evangelism" posters on our café wall and started studying them. I pretended not to see that and tried making myself look busy doing other stuff, but was confronted by Vicky after he went through all the framed posters and quizzed me, "What does JC stand for"? The questioning look on his face made me do a double take and I wondered whether I should fake an answer of "Julius Caesar" or a closer "Jewish Carpenter", but I went ahead with the truth of JESUS CHRIST being behind the name of our café.

In an instant, Vicky took off on a lengthy monologue on the deception of all religious beliefs systems trying his best to make me feel bad about the patently pro-Bible posters on our walls.

He continued on about how Heaven is an imaginary gift offered by religionists for "good behavior" and hell being a non-existent place meant to keep man's bad behavior in check. I tried getting a word in here and there on the scientific evidences that exist pointing to "Intelligent Design" and that the Bible has a "Creation narrative" unlike other scriptures, but unable to get Vicky to hear my perspective on the Christian faith based on the Holy Bible.

Finally, after listening to his 30-minute "lecture" I was able to get a comment through. I plainly stated that, "only the Bible says that God made everything perfect and called it good" and also agreed with him that it certainly isn't perfect today explaining to Vicky it was due to the choices that were made by man.

Now, Vicky stopped to think and after a few moments of silence he reluctantly agreed, "maybe you are right" and said that he had an online meeting to log-in to, and I got up relieved that I had shared something small but significant.

Our barista, Mona, wasn't too pleased that I spent so much time listening to the rantings of a customer but I explained to her that the JC's Café ministry exists for people like Vicky and the heavily tattooed lady that walked in a week earlier with her son and was absorbed by the 24-page mini gospel booklet from Chick Publications titled, "There go the Dinosaurs" displayed at the table with the cutlery.

I also took the opportunity to share with Mona how a member from my Church visiting JC's Café, was touched by the program playing on the TV and accepted Christ after mentioning that even though he had attended St. George's Cathedral for 42 years, he had never accepted Christ.

So, I want to point out that a lot happens over our coffee at JC’s!

A few weeks ago a Muslim man named Sahil visited our café with his friend. As they were waiting to be served, both of them picked up the Chick tracts that were placed along with the cutlery. Sahil was reading "Creator or Liar", and the friend was reading "How to get Rich" and were animatedly discussing the contents.

Sahil has been coming regularly since and spends his time reading the different Chick tracts that we have placed on the tables while waiting for his order to be served. We also have a family room upstairs where we have a wooden display case with all the titles of Chick tracts that come with your sampler.

Since we conduct "Bible and History" sessions for families in this room, the kids get to read all the Chick Tracts titles displayed there once the session is over and enjoy it along with the food that is served after the workshop session.

As I mentioned earlier, a lot happens at JC's....

Philip Vaseekaran
Owner of JC's Cafe
(Find JC’s Café on Google)