Worse Auntie gets eldered about Ministry at Length

Bad Auntie, readers will remember, sets a bad example unintentionally; Worse Auntie says things like "You're Darn Right I did and here's why!"

Lord have Mercy! At least RantWoman has not started out hearkening back to those glorious days of yore, before Youtube and television and the incredible shrinking human attention span when sermons might last....TWO HOURS.

The RantWoman side of a recent email exchange. RantWoman is still batting 1000 in the vexatious department:

Dear Friend Whose Title RantWoman Specifically Keeps Omitting

As to your concern about my comments during concerns in last month's Business Meeting
     --Thank you for your sense of something meaningful, along I gather with something that you did not understand.

     --Counting your comment, there were THREE people who told me in private they heard something meaningful. That to me at least balances the three people who interrupted.

     --Is there something it might be helpful to speak more of? I would be happy to answer questions about things you did not understand. I generally think that worship is an act of faith but that not every message might be meant for me. I also have a pretty layered screen before I will rise to speak and generally do so when I have faith that enough of what is one my mind will make it out of my mouth in form understandable to others AND that the room can hear it.

I believe I promised less than two hours and closer to two minutes. I believe that is what I delivered. Even if I was over 2 minutes, I was definitely A LOT less than two hours.

Re interruptions:
   One Friend we both talk to regularly said after one of Eye Roller Friend's more eruptive weeks, "when someone is speaking out of Worship, in concerns, they are speaking from the Light and you should not interrupt them." I am seasoning how to have a conversation about this topic with one of the people who interrupted me.

   Considering the fact that I got interrupted THREE TIMES and can still remember the outline of where I was going, I am more confident of my Light even if it did not quite arrive to others.

But may we please hold some repetitive themes:
--awhile ago you called me about doing half the talking at a certain part of a retreat.

   --we identified a bunch of accessibility concerns which had been only partly addressed.

   --I identified some other concerns I had not exactly articulated related to the ones I had previously called out.

   --I said "Well, NO, I would notnecessarily notice if I were doinghalf of all the talking because when i do consecutive interpreting doing half of all the talking is my job.

   --I did not say what might have been most direct: a speaker was propounding a concept of eldering that I assume works for him but does not match my experience or concept of the issue.

--This time my excuse is the sundry protestant congregations of my youth.

   --No I still cannot see people squirming and rolling their eyes. Oh well.

   --Sermons run 5 to 10 minutes. Sometimes they are full of all kinds of metaphors. Sometimes they lasted up to about 20 minutes, though if that happened on, say superbowl sunday, there would be mutiny.

Anyway
NO, I would not necessarily think 2 minutes is excessive. In FACT, some people give such boiled down messages that  I do not get very much out of what is said,though if I am not going to get much out of something brevity might be appreciated.

--I remember an email to you and "RantWoman I am not interested in your Thought Processes Friend alluding basically to the fact that people use all kinds of different metaphors for things in their spiritual life. That Friend had given a message about communion in mass and I flippantly wrote something about "who, what wine, disaster crackers?" The email did not generate a response and I note it now only in the sense of NO, you are not guaranteed automatically that I will rid my life of metaphors. I invite you to sit with and see what rises for you from that.

I am sorry if this all just seems argumentative, but may we please hold the problem in the Light.

Sincerely,

RantWoman


Dear Friend Whose Title RantWoman Specifically Keeps Omitting

Thank you for interacting some more with the topic of vocal ministry including my message during Concerns last month in Business Meeting:

--I am sorry YOU have trouble following long spoken messages. Pretty much between reading with a screen reader and not being able to refresh my memory visually a lot of the time, I do not have any choice about trying. I wish I could say I have any instant words of wisdom about listening without losing one's train of thought. But retention and capacity to sort does improve with practice. And yes, my mind also wanders.

--As you might expect from the above, No, I am not automatically sympathetic with other people's short attention spans either though I DO have concerns as to balanced use of community time.

--I actually did not think my message during Concerns held together as well as I would have wished. structurally, it had 3 parts:

     --a really blunt one about a versatile God who works with all kinds of raw material: I see things differently than Conflict is a Gift of God Friend

     --an example of seeing things differently referring to the Mayan spirituality presentation from Adult Ed which was rich and about which there had already been two messages during worship before Business Meeting. I remember talking about the 3 axes, the day, a person's life, and the up and down heaven and earth one.  I also remember talking about the blind chicken, a beetle actually. If there is not enough organic matter in the soil, the blind chicken eats all the corn roots. A mayan elder came to this light by thinking about the beetle in the dark for a whole day.

I am not sure where interruptions started but I definitely remember being interrupted when talking about words from far away and what they mean close to us. I KNOW this last part the connections got a little tenuous and i have been trying to craft a blog post but I might not get there.

So that was one message, but may we think of it in context of Meeting for Worship in general?
--A wonderful young Friend who introduced himself  a few weeks ago after FLGBTQC and I and another person had an interesting conversation about to my ear really boiled down messages and messages where the room has to work at them or where things are not perfectly tied together.
 talked about one person in his home Meeting who says 'I wish people would get the message clear before they rise to speak." I understand that wish, but sometimes it really is the process of the
room working with something where richness comes. I KNOW that is a minority view. And...?

Anyway, I would welcome comments. Also, please do not feel you must be an intermediary or gatekeeper. If someone complains to you, it's possible I will be much better able to interact with their concerns if I hear them in their own words and I have LOTS of suggestions about how you might facilitate that.

Thank you for reading this and for any thoughts.

In the Light.
RantWoman

And if you need a sermon, here is a lovely one from NWYM Superintendent Becky Ankeny based on Psalm 119
http://reconciliationpapers.blogspot.com/2014/03/psalm-119-relationship-not-rules.html