Suppose you walked into a party, and the host said to you: "Folks, there's only one rule for tonight's festivities. You may ask all the questions you want, but the only statements you can make will be in response to a question. In other words, you may not start conversations with statements about yourself or your observations, unless a question has been put to you. I will be circulating among you to be certain that you do not digress. And please, allow a little time to unfold between your responses; don't be afraid to take that moment to allow yourself to digest the question before you respond. Have fun, and don't be afraid to ask any question."
Ponder this a moment. Really allow yourself to imagine a past situation you were in, be it a social event or a meeting, and imagine all the characters and how they approach you, and see yourself in the situation, mainly asking questions (queries) and only responding to the ones that are put to you. Drop your expectations of the event, and allow the situation to unfold.
Isn't this the quaker practice of worship sharing taken to a new limit? How do your imagine your own behavior might change were you prompted to view all of your interactions from the perspective of worship sharing and to focus on the questions rather than the answers? Is this the manner in which you go out to greet the world?
These are some of the queries that surfaced as I entered the Visioning Retreat at Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM), even before we began the actual process. Thanks to the creative genius of Michael Marquardt, we were introduced to a new way to think and work on 8 challenges that the staff of BYM put before us. We broke into small groups, each one addressing a query, and set upon our task.
I was surprised to see how uncomfortable we seasoned Friends were with a process that we would view as a part of our core, when it was put into this context. It tuned me into my own presumptiveness when I come into a situation like this retreat: that I am already primed with ideas and agendas that I might not even consciously be aware of, and that are certainly not seasoned in the Light.
Michael Marquardt is a professor of Human Resource Development and International Relations at George Washington University and President of the World Institute for Action Learning, the organization that teaches "Action Learning," the process described above. (http://wial.org, http://www.gwu.edu/~elliott/faculty/marquardt.cfm) He is a Quaker and a member of Herndon Meeting. To my knowledge, this was his first time bringing his cutting edge process to his own "family" of Friends. Michael is like so many other Friends over time, who have quietly integrated their own manner of living as a Friend into their business practices. In this case, Michael has actually taken his translation of a part of our Quaker process into the secular world of business, across continents and around the world. As one who has often pondered what impact Quakers might have on global decision making, this was very exciting to learn!
It was delightful to be called to accountability to live our own manner so succinctly. In each group were coaches whose job was to keep the time frame, help with clarity, and hold us to the task of the day: to consider the query and utilize questions to creatively move through the process of responding to that challenge. Of course, being Friends and comfortable with queries ourselves we had some questions for Michael too: "Can we have a period of worship?" "Can we redefine the question?" "What happens in the executive world, do people end up taking a vote?" (Michael assured us that in all of his years working with this method, no one has ever come to a vote.)
I'll have another post on the actual challenges that were put to us to work on, but for now I'll just focus on the process. While Michael was encouraging us to think outside of the box, I was aware of how much he had done just that in his development of the Action Learning method of problem solving.
What's fun about an experience like this is the personal awareness it calls us to. When what may be our usual practices are put into a different box, or called a different name, we may fail to recognize them as our own. The difficult part of this is how we may struggle with the "new" concept, failing to see where it fits in our own toolbox of constructs. The titillating part is in being called to look at our own process with new eyes, and see the way that process then reflects back through the rest of our being.
In our group there was a bit of a struggle to decide if we were doing things the "right" way. We wondered if we should redefine the question as we went along, rather than just living the one we had. We wanted to inject our own ideas into the mix rather than stay on the task of answering the ensuing questions put to each of us or the group as a whole. We balked at trusting the process. Some of us had to put our own agendas aside to be truly present.
To be fair, we were doing a condensed version, scheduled to fit in this 5 hour retreat. This did put a bit of pressure on us to move at a pace much faster than our usual Quaker amble. I believe that the whole concept of Action Learning is to move beyond the linear model of thinking into a more circular one, and this is probably a struggle for many of us even in a more accomodating time frame.
It was a breath of fresh air in what could have been an arduous process. As we laughed and wrangled our way through, the time passed incredibly quickly. I noticed no yawning or dozing. Some of the ideas that rose to the surface were solutions we are used to hearing, but many were new observations or calls for a different approach.
As I left the retreat, feeling energized, my mind whirling, I wondered what the continuation of the process will look like. Will the new thoughts or out of the box ideas be raised to the top, so that they can be heard? Will the spirit of ongoing revelation continue as we strive to bring vision to reality? Will there be the opportunity for further use of this process to move us from suggestion to implementation? Will the staid be able to move aside for the creative new?
I have no answers, only more questions.
Showing posts with label BYM. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BYM. Show all posts
05 October 2009
16 August 2009
The Oasis of Community
It has been so long since I posted that I almost deleted this blog and started another. But there is something to the process that needs to be preserved. Having just come through a period in my life where I felt barren, like there was a desert inside, and no water to nourish my spirit, I trudged off to Baltimore Yearly Meeting Annual Sessions. I had the sense of a dying person approaching an oasis, hopeful against hope, yet doubting, as if that oasis might be just another mirage. Thankfully, it was the real thing. (BYM has never failed to refresh and renew me in all the years I have attended.) I was grateful I planned on attending the pre-sessions retreat, as it was like being plunged into a spring, and I emerged refreshed, already with a growing sense of clarity.
The Business of our Lives: The Transformation of Faith into Practice, was the focus of Annual Sessions this year. So the retreat promised us that "we will be exploring how our faith and testimonies can lead us to fulfill our role as representatives of God on earth. We will look at where we are now on our life/faith journey; where we are to go on our journey, and how to get there." I would say that the retreat more taught us the process that we could use to do this work. Most of the focus was on the deep listening that one can offer another in discerning their leading. I found this most helpful, and was also pleasantly surprised when one of my small group members stepped outside this format to say, "Well do you have a care/clearness committee?" and offered other tidbits about her own process that shed light on my own path.
I don't know if it's the fact I missed last years Sessions, or if it was that the agenda was truly so varied , or if my ears were just opened, but the week that followed offered me more nourishment and opportunity to learn than I can remember. I experienced it as though my spirit had entered paradise! What some might call the "work" of people's lives, I came to see as that which also fed them. The fulfillment of those involved in work in Africa, in the African Great Lakes Initiative, Friends Theological Institute, and Hlekweni Friends Rural Service was infectious. Workshops as diverse as Sabbath Economics, as basic as the Practice of Living Simply, helped me renew my faith in the Quaker process. Singing, worship, dining -- fellowship with Friends -- was the real food that my soul craved!
Our clerk, Howard Fullerton, is becoming simultaneously more amusing and adroit as each season passes. Business sessions were refreshing and succinct. Was it my imagination, or was every presenter cognizant of the listeners, striving to be not just informative but engaging? Even the memorial for our older Friends who have passed from this place this year, was like plunging into a refreshing pool. My thirst was quenched.
Out of this came crystal clear clarity. I cannot continue to live a life divided between my Quaker Life and my "other" life. Much like the parable of George Fox and William Penn, where Fox challenges Penn to wear his sword as long as he can, I feel that I can no longer wear the outside world's values and lifestyle. When I fall back into that lifestyle, it is only a matter of time before I feel empty, depressed and like life has no meaning.
This may sound extreme to some, but it is the way I experience it. It has become heavier to carry the burden of not listening to one's calling than it is to follow it. Somewhere inside I always have known it would come to this. The God of my understanding is loving, persistent, and never gives up on a soul. At the workshop on prayer by Daniel Snyder, I heard God called "the infinite, divine lover of your soul." In this week of spiritual retreat and renewal, I came to truly understand this. I can only hope to model an approximation of this love, and to someday pay forward the gift I was given this week. I am blessed to be a member of such an oasis of community in this difficult world.
The Business of our Lives: The Transformation of Faith into Practice, was the focus of Annual Sessions this year. So the retreat promised us that "we will be exploring how our faith and testimonies can lead us to fulfill our role as representatives of God on earth. We will look at where we are now on our life/faith journey; where we are to go on our journey, and how to get there." I would say that the retreat more taught us the process that we could use to do this work. Most of the focus was on the deep listening that one can offer another in discerning their leading. I found this most helpful, and was also pleasantly surprised when one of my small group members stepped outside this format to say, "Well do you have a care/clearness committee?" and offered other tidbits about her own process that shed light on my own path.
I don't know if it's the fact I missed last years Sessions, or if it was that the agenda was truly so varied , or if my ears were just opened, but the week that followed offered me more nourishment and opportunity to learn than I can remember. I experienced it as though my spirit had entered paradise! What some might call the "work" of people's lives, I came to see as that which also fed them. The fulfillment of those involved in work in Africa, in the African Great Lakes Initiative, Friends Theological Institute, and Hlekweni Friends Rural Service was infectious. Workshops as diverse as Sabbath Economics, as basic as the Practice of Living Simply, helped me renew my faith in the Quaker process. Singing, worship, dining -- fellowship with Friends -- was the real food that my soul craved!
Our clerk, Howard Fullerton, is becoming simultaneously more amusing and adroit as each season passes. Business sessions were refreshing and succinct. Was it my imagination, or was every presenter cognizant of the listeners, striving to be not just informative but engaging? Even the memorial for our older Friends who have passed from this place this year, was like plunging into a refreshing pool. My thirst was quenched.
Out of this came crystal clear clarity. I cannot continue to live a life divided between my Quaker Life and my "other" life. Much like the parable of George Fox and William Penn, where Fox challenges Penn to wear his sword as long as he can, I feel that I can no longer wear the outside world's values and lifestyle. When I fall back into that lifestyle, it is only a matter of time before I feel empty, depressed and like life has no meaning.
This may sound extreme to some, but it is the way I experience it. It has become heavier to carry the burden of not listening to one's calling than it is to follow it. Somewhere inside I always have known it would come to this. The God of my understanding is loving, persistent, and never gives up on a soul. At the workshop on prayer by Daniel Snyder, I heard God called "the infinite, divine lover of your soul." In this week of spiritual retreat and renewal, I came to truly understand this. I can only hope to model an approximation of this love, and to someday pay forward the gift I was given this week. I am blessed to be a member of such an oasis of community in this difficult world.
18 November 2007
Is there a conflict here?
Friends, I posted parts of this comment on Johann Maurer's blog about the BYM/FUM conflict, as it has come to be called. As I wrote, I realized that I wanted to post it here as well, and expand a bit, since I have truly been LABORING with this concern since our summer sessions of BYM.
As a member of BYM who was present as this report (of our BYM representatives to FUM) was read, and who has been laboring under this concern for quite some time, I have read and reread your reports Johann, knowing that I wanted to comment, but not quite being able to state my feelings. I am a liberal Friend, who does believe that we are all one body of Christ, though I admit that we all have many definitions of what that means. It was not until I read that simple sentence in the beginning of sailheaven's comment, "There was no confirmation for me that any of the discussion as brought forward was Spirit led, " that I was able to find words for what is stirring inside of me.
What if the indwelling Spirit IS calling us to join and mend the schism between us, but in that mending we must all call into question the very common habits of our everyday existence as Friends? What if we are called to deep worship with one another, in order to see where God is leading us to a new place? In my own understanding, the main difference between a "liberal" and "conservative" Friend is the question of who is saved. I know I am putting myself out on a limb here, and I welcome comments (I will post this comment on my own blog as well for that purpose).
What if, as Philip Gulley says, God saves all people (See If Grace is True)?
What if it is time to put the biblical tenets that the personnel policies of FUM are founded on, that certain behaviors are sin, to the test of worship as one body?
What if this is truly a matter of where God is leading us to TODAY, which may be very different that what we assume is TRUTH?
Are we open to that test of faith? I have had to ask myself that question. If I ask my Friends of all persuasions to sit in worship with me, seeking direction, can I face that the answer might not be what I THINK is right? I believe so, though I cannot say this with total certainty.
Often when I have felt a leading, I have lead myself off course when my own ego and intellect intercepted my vision before it had time to season. How many of us are prey to that?
This has been the hardest challenge of my spiritual journey as a convinced Friend. Over 25 years I have turned more and more to the indwelling Spirit, and it has truly shaped and molded me. I have been blessed to make major life changes as a result, and to be gifted to be present with others through their own life changes.
At the moment that this issue was first addressed within Baltimore Yearly Meeting, which in my memory was at BYM summer sessions several years ago, when Lamar Matthews and others returned from the Trienniel in Rwanda and informed us that he had been disallowed to lead a worship group because of his relationship status, I began to feel a deep rumbling.
This rumbling has not gone away. How could Friends who encountered the loving spirit of a Friend like Lamar possibly deny the workings of the indwelling Christ in his life? The only way, my mind told me, was if the trappings of our religion were followed at the expense of the leading of Spirit. I had unfortunately just had my own experience with this frailty of our human condition, having let a leading I had in another issue be overrun by my own "knowledge" of how a situation should be handled.
The parallels were undeniable. Therefore, I had no choice but to return to silence, knowing that were I to proceed too quickly, I would most likely fall into the same trap of my ego. I have talked to others, attended information sessions, listened with great curiousity to the reports of our intervisitation program and our FUM representatives, and then continued to return to the silence.
It was not until this summer, when I sat listening to the FUM rep. report, that I felt a leading to step forward and volunteer as an alternative rep. to FUM to fill the void left by Rachel Stacy's resignation. This was purely based on one phrase, "Call them to worship," that I kept and still keep hearing in my deepest parts. I'm not sure I know how to do that, except for myself. I know only too well what happens when I don't listen deeply. And I know that I do not hear enough calls to silence in this process.
Please Friends, return to silence and the indwelling Spirit. Consider the possibility of something new, that may be different than we all can see with our limited minds.
As a member of BYM who was present as this report (of our BYM representatives to FUM) was read, and who has been laboring under this concern for quite some time, I have read and reread your reports Johann, knowing that I wanted to comment, but not quite being able to state my feelings. I am a liberal Friend, who does believe that we are all one body of Christ, though I admit that we all have many definitions of what that means. It was not until I read that simple sentence in the beginning of sailheaven's comment, "There was no confirmation for me that any of the discussion as brought forward was Spirit led, " that I was able to find words for what is stirring inside of me.
What if the indwelling Spirit IS calling us to join and mend the schism between us, but in that mending we must all call into question the very common habits of our everyday existence as Friends? What if we are called to deep worship with one another, in order to see where God is leading us to a new place? In my own understanding, the main difference between a "liberal" and "conservative" Friend is the question of who is saved. I know I am putting myself out on a limb here, and I welcome comments (I will post this comment on my own blog as well for that purpose).
What if, as Philip Gulley says, God saves all people (See If Grace is True)?
What if it is time to put the biblical tenets that the personnel policies of FUM are founded on, that certain behaviors are sin, to the test of worship as one body?
What if this is truly a matter of where God is leading us to TODAY, which may be very different that what we assume is TRUTH?
Are we open to that test of faith? I have had to ask myself that question. If I ask my Friends of all persuasions to sit in worship with me, seeking direction, can I face that the answer might not be what I THINK is right? I believe so, though I cannot say this with total certainty.
Often when I have felt a leading, I have lead myself off course when my own ego and intellect intercepted my vision before it had time to season. How many of us are prey to that?
This has been the hardest challenge of my spiritual journey as a convinced Friend. Over 25 years I have turned more and more to the indwelling Spirit, and it has truly shaped and molded me. I have been blessed to make major life changes as a result, and to be gifted to be present with others through their own life changes.
At the moment that this issue was first addressed within Baltimore Yearly Meeting, which in my memory was at BYM summer sessions several years ago, when Lamar Matthews and others returned from the Trienniel in Rwanda and informed us that he had been disallowed to lead a worship group because of his relationship status, I began to feel a deep rumbling.
This rumbling has not gone away. How could Friends who encountered the loving spirit of a Friend like Lamar possibly deny the workings of the indwelling Christ in his life? The only way, my mind told me, was if the trappings of our religion were followed at the expense of the leading of Spirit. I had unfortunately just had my own experience with this frailty of our human condition, having let a leading I had in another issue be overrun by my own "knowledge" of how a situation should be handled.
The parallels were undeniable. Therefore, I had no choice but to return to silence, knowing that were I to proceed too quickly, I would most likely fall into the same trap of my ego. I have talked to others, attended information sessions, listened with great curiousity to the reports of our intervisitation program and our FUM representatives, and then continued to return to the silence.
It was not until this summer, when I sat listening to the FUM rep. report, that I felt a leading to step forward and volunteer as an alternative rep. to FUM to fill the void left by Rachel Stacy's resignation. This was purely based on one phrase, "Call them to worship," that I kept and still keep hearing in my deepest parts. I'm not sure I know how to do that, except for myself. I know only too well what happens when I don't listen deeply. And I know that I do not hear enough calls to silence in this process.
Please Friends, return to silence and the indwelling Spirit. Consider the possibility of something new, that may be different than we all can see with our limited minds.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
