Supporting and Grounding one another: the event

(Warning, there is a certain Quaker Magical realism aspect to the narrative below. RantWoman has already received feedback that her blog needs an editor. She knows and the editor is unavailable at the moment. Come to think of it, MAYBE RantWoman needs to revisit a topical request from a few months ago.)

Supporting and Grounding One Another In Our Ministries
On October 23, Marge Abbott led a one-day workshop called Supporting and Grounding One Another In Our Ministries: Committees for Clearness and Support, Peer Groups, and Spiritual Friendships at the Multonomah Meeting house.

When RantWoman first heard of this workshop, she was clear she needed to be there. One reason is questions related to a new role in her Meeting and a sense that mentorship in this role seems like a really basic way to build community capacity. Another is, cough, RantWoman's experiences related to the topic. RantWoman is really grateful that registration and a ride from Neighbor Friend lined up.

Part of RantWoman's preparation, unintentionally had been internal monologue in such acid terms that RantWoman was praying for the right Quakerese if she needed to talk about her experiences over the workshop. RantWoman is very grateful for the miracles of good Quaker listening on both sides during the car ride to Portland and grateful for other threads that came up instead of RantWoman's twitches.

RantWoman had a few experiences with Quaker pastoral care / discernment practices long before she was a Quaker. Examples came from one of RantWoman's Sensible Auntie figures from childhood, her f/Friend who worked in the library in college and someone RantWoman knew from a life experience she keeps meaning to link into discussions. When done well, RantWoman finds these practices to be WONDERFULLY freeing and centering.

RantWoman's readers who want RantWoman's take from her own Meeting are invited either to click on the Clearness tag or use the search bar. Things did not get off to a good start when the clearness committee for RantWoman's membership lost RantWoman's letter and asked her to write another one and then found the first one. At the time RantWoman was also considering a life decision that, in retrospect, in addition to questions of Meeting capacity, RantWoman is clear she did not want to be talked out of. This does not mean a clearness committee would not have been a good idea; RantWoman does not regret a large percentage of the resulting experiences but is humble about her steps at many points. Alas, that is narrative for another day.

Here with some more RantWoman interjections is what RantWoman wrote for a certain committee; RantWoman is VERY grateful someone else took notes about some themes and content RantWoman missed but RantWoman is clear not to reproduce those very helpful notes here.


My first observation: people seem to be hungry for information about this topic. The original publicity listed a limit of 25; almost 50 ultimately attended and it was strongly suggested that if any more people from the Puget Sound than the 5 who attended are interested, we should invite Marge for our own workshop.

My second observation is that the materials suggested to help prepare were helpful, and thanks to Note Taking Friend listed here:

Materials provided to participants
· “The Truth Beneath My Fear” – chapter from A Hidden Wholeness by Parker Palmer
· “Thoughts for Beloit Meeting on the Peer Group Process”
· “How to Be a Spiritual Friend.” – chapter from More Than Equals by Trish Roberts, Pendle Hill Pamphlet #345
· Answering the Call to Heal the World – Patience Schenck, Pendle Hill Pamphlet 383
· Expectant Listening: Find God’s Thread of Guidance – by Michael Wajda, Pendle Hill Pamphlet #388
· The Care Committee: A Ministry of prayer and learning devoted to the School of the Spirit

Only part of the materials were available in electronic format, my preferred mode of access. This also reminded me that there are good reasons to be insistent in a focussed way about systematic efforts to improve accessibility options for Quaker materials. That will require a whole support and accountability committee so it's a problem for another moment. (RantWoman would also note: RantWoman COULD figure out how to be proactive and maybe ask someone to read materials onto a tape for her or get her own dang scanner or.... RantWoman could figure that out, but so far she has not. RantWoman could even start, after the fact, by having someone read the items she has not interacted with yet. RantWoman COULD do that.)

My third general observation: since UFM has been struggling about remodel at the same time as Multonomah, it was really fun to see how the Multonomah remodel turned out. Both their downstairs room and their worship room have been upgraded with more light and other enhancements. There is a new stairway and new elevator and I think also enhancements to upstairs classrooms. I had two small disappointments though: lighting in the worship room would work better for different seating arrangements if the long sides had one more overhead light in each. Also, this is the northwest. There is a lot less mold in the worship room than there used to be but there is stilla bit in places. Nevertheless it was heartening and even exciting to see light out the other side of someone's remodel.

My fourth observation is that the workshop was VERY tightly run withclear timelines and good food including bagels and fruit and pots of homemade soup for lunch. I especially appreciated just being a participant and not having to worry about the details of putting on an event.

The workshop included a large group presentation of many concepts,I was taking notes in Braille which is not as fast as handwriting. Many items from the discussion wer recorded on flip charts which I also do not read and therefore cannot refer back to to catch up. A suggestion was made to type up the content of the flip charts and distribute that to those present. I expect to follow up and ask about that.

Another suggestion was made afterward about cellphone photography. RantWoman's thoughts are http://rantwoman.blogspot.com/2010/10/flipping-out-over-flip-charts.html

(Still another suggestion would be for RantWoman to get her act together and use one of her multiple tape recorders. RantWoman's well-adjusted blind person act is definitely still a work in progress and RantWoman would not mind in the least a sense of better mentors in this area than she has found, or else more backbone when her own inner mentor falters WHINE!)

The next session was an interactive opportunity for the whole group to try the concepts, a monster clearness committee with a volunteer focusperson and a sort of typical pastoral care concern. The room was a mixof concerned laypersons and people such as teachers or social workers with specific legal mandated reporter obligations and mental framework which might have been applicable in the situation offered. It was interesting to see how requests for clarification were formulated. It was also interesting that a relatively small percentage of questions were phrased in terms of soul or Spirit. RantWoman is also reflecting on how difficult some of the questioners found it to formulate neutral, evocative, non-prescriptive questions; this observation caused RantWoman to feel more forgiving of her own, uh, room for growth in this area.

Despite various awkward moments of language and presentation, the volunteer focus person said the exercise was very helpful and powerful. The whole group debrief afterward also brought the wonderful observations that the soul issometimes timid and that sometimes people initially cannot even articulate what they need. (RantWoman editorializes: sometimes Friends face life issues about which it may be difficult to find Friends with enough background in some or another area to help hold a Friend accountable.

The first afternoon session featured small groups about clearness committees, being a focus person, an overview from a Meeting perspective and two others whose titles I do not remember. I went to the one about a Meeting perspective. This one involved a number ofpeople from comparatively large meetings such as UFM, Multonomah, andBridge City as well as people from small meetings and worship groups.One practical point to take away and follow up with: Multonomah MMOversight Committee says they have all their various Meeting documents related to such committees in electronic format with a pending request to put them on the NPYM website. Stay tuned.

The group considered a number of queries. However, I contributed my notes to the leaders and have a brain cramp about a couple points I meant to remember better. One query I wish had been included is howMeetings distinguish between ministries of individuals and ministries of a whole Meeting.

Others talked about people resources: in large meetings support committees tend to involve about the same 20% of the people. To say the least, this is not really treating support of ministries as if we are all ministers of the Divine. (RantWoman tartly observes that last year a certain clearness committee was convened with comparative alacrity and only minimal involvement from the clerk of Oversight Committee. This year, RantWoman finally became clear about something where a clearness committee might help and asked the clerk of Oversight for help. A key step took over a month, partly but only partly because one potential member was out of the country. This is causing RantWoman to meditate about Quaker time and bureaucracy and a wish for more capacity and more automatic thoughts of such service to the community.)

In smaller communities, there just are not the same people resources in the first place. In all cases, support committees have a concern to limit what is offered to spiritual support and to be able to make referrals to appropriate resources such as legal resources or outside social services.

RantWoman subsequently remembered a thread similar to her own bus eldering: a Friend talked of someone in his Meeting who shares his disability and plays the situation rather differently than the speaking Friend, something someone unfamiliar with the disability might not even detect. RantWoman thinks this is somewhat comparable to her eldering of Friends who cannot get places on time on the bus. Bus randomness happens, but people who are consistently late for God frequently have problems in other areas of their lives--besides straining the Wonder Quaker limits of those they are close to.

The whole exercise was valuable both in terms of working with the concepts and int erms of people's actual experiences. There was closing worship which I may remember more details of Afterward though several of the people I was sitting near talked again about how sometimes language of spirit and spiritual transformation was less evident than we would like. Not every situation is like Alternatives to Violence work among equal numbers of perpetrators and survivors of genocide in East Africa, but perhaps some of us need more practice speaking specifically in terms of spiritual transformations, openings, movements of the Divine.



Coincidentally, RantWoman notes this item from another blog and speaking of many of the terms used in the workshop.

http://lambswar.blogspot.com/2010/10/missional-quaker-faith-.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%