October 2008
“Inform your conscience, use prudence, then vote for the common good.”
A Nation for All: How the Catholic Vision of the Common Good Can Save America
from the Politics of Division, by Chris Korzen and Alexia Kelley, Jossey-Bass, 2008
This month
HAPPENINGS!
• The House of Bishops reads up on member mission
• “Practical” and “down-to-earth” training for member mission
• The Member Mission Leadership Institute, October 6 -11, 2008 – Participants [a picture]
• Sewanee readies for member mission
• The most caring child
• Help to publish the Member Mission Workbook
RESOURCES
• Baptismal preparation for a seven-year-old as shaped by the member mission vision
• Principles and Policies for Christian Voters
• Three ways to pray for the daily missions of the members
FOR MEDITATION
• From consumer to citizen
HAPPENINGS!
The House of Bishops reads up on member mission
At the recent meeting of the House of Bishops, the last two hours were spent on the future of theological education. The Presiding Bishop commended and passed out a paper on that future. The paper, written by a colleague, Peyton Craighill, and I, outlined a future built around teaching students how to support the ministry of the members in daily life. Here are central paragraphs from the paper.
“When seminaries accept and adapt to this approach to ministry they go through a similar transformation. They no longer simply teach students how to minister. They help students learn how to aid those they serve to live into the ministries Christ calls them to. . . .
At this point our research (‘Missionary Spirituality’ – now working as Member Mission Network, Inc. – funded by Trinity Church Grants for 1999-2000) and subsequent experience have significant resources to offer. To truly live their baptismal covenant, students need tools to center on the specifics of what they actually do in each arena of their daily lives – home, work (seminary for students), community, wider world, and leisure, as well as church. First, they discern, as best they can, what God is already doing in each of these arenas of their lives. Next, they discern how they will join what God is already doing there and that becomes their ministry for the time being in that arena of their life. Finally, they look for teammates to help them and anticipate how they will talk about God and the church with their teammates.
The results are two-fold. When students have worked through these tools, their living of the covenant is enhanced exponentially. And, they have learned how to use these basic tools to help the members of the congregations they will serve to do the same.
A further step calling for explicit recognition in parish administration and field work is needed. Students need help in how to reshape the corporate life of congregations to support their members in the daily living of their ministries. Small groups for ongoing support, the Prayers of the People including specific reference to these daily arenas, preaching that tells of people living their ministries, each parish organization and activity thinking out how it will support their participants in their daily living, preparation for baptism and confirmation, the reception of newcomers – one by one, each of these can be reshaped to support the members in their daily living. This is a wholly new way in mission for most churches. Managing change, therefore, becomes a central part of the role of the clergy. . . .
One of the most significant changes in established seminary practice may emerge in regard to the practical theology courses on parish administration and Christian education. At present, these courses have been intended to prepare clergy to be capable of organizing and running an effective parish program. This is certainly a goal much to be desired. But now that we have come to recognize that ministry is not just the work of the ordained and that the most important ministries are done in seven-day-a-week activities, there is a new stress on seminary students learning how to prepare and support the laity for their daily-life ministries. This calls for including the teaching of ways to help each member to discern how one will join God's work in each arena of life; and teaching of ways to reshape church life to support members in their daily living.
To return to the question with which this paper began, how can candidates be prepared for ordination effectively with the resources available for the task? It may be that, like David, we must put aside ‘Saul's Armor’, - the physical and structural impedimenta inherited from the past. Already, much of the education for ordination is carried on through less formal ways that avoid financial burdens too heavy to carry. In certain situations our graduate school-style theological education survives. But let us not judge too hastily other patterns as necessarily being second-rate. In the course of their development, we may perceive the Spirit at work, ushering in more creative forms of preparation for mission in daily life.
The question facing us now is this: for the church community at large, what means are most appropriate for supporting these efforts in ways most responsive to God's challenge to us as he leads us into the future? Will our answers include teaching students to help all of the members of the churches they will serve to discern how to join God's work in each arena of life and teaching students how to reshape the life of these churches to support their members in living this way? As parish clergy take on these roles, Christians living the baptismal covenant more effectively will begin to conform the world much more closely to the future that is God's kingdom.” (AWS)
“Practical” and “down-to-earth” training for member mission
Meeting at Christ the King, Spiritual Life Center, Greenwich, NY, October 6 - 11, 2008, the first Member Mission Leadership Institute was a huge success. We practiced each of the basic steps taken to introduce the member mission vision into the life of a congregation. Over and over, we heard the same four words – “practical” and “down to earth.” The key was hands-on work with every major step from worksheets to presentations to leaders and the congregation. Along the way, we worked on interpersonal, process, and system skills when appropriate. A trainer for each group of four meant specific help came at the time it was needed.
Aiming for 12 participants at this pioneering first-of-its-kind workshop, we expected 17 but two had to drop out. The 15 participants were: four Episcopal rectors and one lay leader; two Methodist pastors, each with a lay leader; and six seminarians – three from Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, MA, two from General in New York, and one from the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in Berkeley, CA. Anne Watkins from Norwalk, CT; Debbie Buesing from Wilmette, IL; Andrew Hersh-Tudor from Wenatchee, WA; and Wayne Schwab were the trainers.
The last day, each participant selected three “entry points” for the first year and teamed up with a trainer for ongoing coaching. Activities for each of the next two years will emerge as experience suggests for each setting. This three-year mutual commitment by participants and staff was a prerequisite for registration. It was much of the impact of the workshop. Repeatedly we heard: “All other workshops end saying, ‘You’re on your own from here on; do the best you can.’ You are making the journey with us! Do you have any idea how glad we are to know that!”
Next year’s workshop will double the participants. The exact October dates and the place will be announced by January. The cost to participants will be $150 plus one half of the travel. Start planning for it now.
The Member Mission Leadership Institute, October 6 -11, 2008 – Participants
Standing – left to right: The Rev. Wayne Schwab, staff, Episc. from NY; Vivian Lam, Sr. from Ch. Div. Sch. of the Pac.; The Rev. Mary Helen Crump, Meth. from NY; Robert Hendrickson, Sr. from GTS; The Rev. Colin Belton, Episc. from NY; John Drymon, Sr. from Gen. Theol. Sem.; Anne Watkins, staff, Episc. from NY; The Rev. Anna Lange-Soto, Episc. from CA; Vivian Melin, Meth. from NY; Andrew Hersh-Tudor, staff, Episc. from WA; Debra Buesing, staff, Episc. from IL; Joyce Dupont, Mid. from Episc. Div. Sch.; Beryl Kenney, Jr. from EDS; and Mary Anne Schultz, Episc. from NY. Seated – left to right: Randy Rogers, Meth. from NY; The Rev. Marion Moore-Colgan, Meth. from NY; The Rev. Ellen Richardson, Sr. from EDS; The Rev. John Allen, Episc. from KY; and The Rev. John Elledge, Episc. from MD.
Sewanee readies for member mission
Contact with seminary deans about their students participating in the recent workshop led to scheduling a weekend, Friday afternoon to Sunday afternoon, in September or early October at the School of Theology, The University of the South, Sewanee, TN. The dates will be set in January. All students will be invited and the Associate Dean for Community Life, the Rev. Walter Brownridge, advises that we can expect over forty.
The most caring child
[Author and lecturer, Leo Buscaglia, once talked about a contest he was asked to judge to find the most caring child. Here is the winner.]
A four-year-old child, whose next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman, who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his mother asked him what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy just said, “Nothing, I just helped him cry.”
Help to publish the Member Mission Workbook
Every dollar you send – whether $25, $50, $75, or $100 – will be matched by a private donor up to $10,000. Send checks or a money order to Member Mission Network, Inc., 10 Jubert Lane, Plattsburgh, NY 12901. If you use PayPal, log on; click on Send Money; use membermissionnet@aol.com as the email address; enter the amount; click on Services/Other; and follow the prompts to complete your donation. Or go to www.membermission.org; click on To Donate; click on the Donate button and follow the instructions. All contributions are tax deductible since MMN, Inc. was granted 501(c)(3) status by the IRS in July.
RESOURCES
Baptismal preparation for a seven-year-old as shaped by the member mission vision – (1) reading in advance for godparents and parents; (2) full notes and activities for a meeting with parents and godparents; (3) full notes and activities for a meeting with the candidate, her older siblings, her parents, and the godparents; and (4) notes for the practice / rehearsal and the baptism. Request from membermission@aol.com – no charge
Principles and Policies for Christian Voters – a resource from Sojourners with guides for voting your values on “Compassion and Economic Justice,” “Peace and Restraint of Violence,” “Consistent Ethic of Life,” “Racial Justice,” “Hunger Rights, Dignity, and Gender Justice,” “Strengthen Families and Renew Culture,” and “Good Stewardship of God’s Creatoin.” Go to http://www.sojo.net/action/alerts/VOP_voter-guide.pdf to download it.
Three ways to pray for the daily missions of the members –
Option 1: one of the seven mission fields each week
Option 2: a specific mission of a member for each week
Option 3: for workers in a different line of work each week
Request from membermission@aol.com – no charge.
FOR MEDITATION – From consumer to citizen
“[Let’s return] to the populist [view-point] to move us more toward the citizens’ republic than the consumers’ republic. As consumers, we are the prey of our own appetites. As citizens, we think about ourselves and our larger community. You could call it the infrastructure way of thinking.”
[Adapted from Nell Painter’s comments during an interview with Bill Moyers Journal of 2/29/08 http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/02292008/transcript2.html]
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God is most interested in how we live from Monday to Saturday.
Sunday – all of church life – helps us to do it better.
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